FORT DAVIS Administrative History

While Erwin Thompson's heartfelt sympathy for a fellow employee and the son of a Fort Davis veteran may have echoed the sentiments of a more liberal nation in the 1960s, this did not play well in Fort Davis, which might also explain George Bentley, Junior's reluctance to speak about his family's history. Gene Hendryx, by now a Texas state representative, recalled how he questioned at the time what he saw as the park service s desire to emphasize the buffalo soldier instead of what the representative called the "whole story," which he interpreted as the larger world of the frontier army. Erwin Thompson himself left the NPS in June 1965, seeking a doctorate in history at the University of California, Davis (where his plan was to write a dissertation on the black soldier in the West). This meant that Jerry Rogers would return for his second (and last) summer as seasonal historian at Fort Davis without the guidance of Thompson. Rogers did remember how the attempt to explain the black presence at the post had caused comment in town; a situation that only exacerbated the growing reputation of park service staff to flaunt the racial conventions of west Texas. [63]

By being a native of the region, and having had a year's exposure to the peculiarities of race in Fort Davis, Jerry Rogers returned to a community where anything that he and his family might have done would be scrutinized and discussed at length. Rogers recounted how people in town "loved Fort Davis, but disliked its black story." He characterized the "whole structure of race" in town as "very delicate." This consisted of the paradox of racial separation between Anglos and Hispanics, the vestiges of segregated schools, and the surprising amount of intermarriage. "The park service equalized and leveled" social life in town, said Rogers in 1995, and racial divisions had a strangely "superficial" cast to them. As an example, he told the story of Erwin Thompson inviting the all-Hispanic maintenance crew to a party in his room at the Hotel Limpia one evening, where Jerry and Peggy Rogers were the only other Anglos besides Michael and Ruth Becker, and Thompson. After a while, Mrs. Rogers wondered why the men had not brought their wives to the party, as she had hoped to talk to the women about life in town. For a time the men demurred, claiming that their wives were not interested in coming. Only later did Peggy Rogers realize that the women were sitting in their cars in the Limpia parking lot, all dressed for a social occasion. She went out into the lot, spoke to the women, and learned that no Anglo had ever invited Hispanics to their private social function, let alone important people like federal employees of the Park Service. This incident only validated the comment of Bob Utley that Fort Davis struck him as "racist as hell," and which Jerry Rogers considered "a fascinating cultural study." The moment also led to close friendships between park staff and local residents of different cultural backgrounds. [64]

Perhaps that sensitivity (as well as the comments on her work at Fort Laramie by Jerry Riddell) affected Nan Carson, who came to the park in late June 1965 to conduct her long-awaited furnishing study. She flew into the El Paso airport to be met not by the superintendent or chief ranger, but the seasonal historian, Jerry Rogers. This led Carson to remark to SWR officials that "Fort Davis has experienced a number of personnel changes in recent months." Bob Crisman had just taken over as chief ranger from Bob Dunnagan, with Crisman' most recent appointment at an archeological park in Arizona (Montezuma Castle National Monument), and Frank Smith had been superintendent a mere two weeks. "Despite the newness of the situation for almost all personnel," said Carson, "work and planning have not flagged and Fort Davis certainly appears to be embarking on its most critical development phase in excellent hands." [65]

After eight days on site, the MWR "historic restorations specialist" became more convinced of the potential for Fort Davis within the park system. "I was enormously impressed with both the quantity and orderliness of progress at Fort Davis," wrote Carson, "which indicates careful planning and meticulous follow through." The veteran of historical restoration at Fort Laramie was touched in particular by the "magnificent interpretation" afforded by Frank Smith's "bugle call and retreat programs." "Their ghostly echos across the valley and against the rock cliffs surrounding the Fort are indeed moving," she told the SWR associate director. The park also presented twice daily a full retreat parade, "prefaced by an interpretative explanation to the visitors by seasonal personnel." This she considered "a bit long (18 minutes), when one is standing in the hot Texas sun." Carson did note, however, that she "did not see one visitor leave before it ended." Even with the problems of sound projection, the experience of the retreat parade "is now an extremely effective interpretive device." [66]

Seasonal historian Jerry Rogers had provided Ms. Carson with ample documentation on the Grierson family and its uses of the quarters under her study (the commanding officers' house and the barracks squad room). Tom Crellin also guided Carson through the "fabric of the two structures . . . to discover evidence of interior finish and detailing, built-in elements, and other historic decorative treatment." In a gesture to the local community, which would have to provide many of the artifacts for the project, Carson spoke to a group of 50 members of the Fort Davis Historical Society, using for comparison a series of slides on her work at Fort Laramie. By the end of her week on site, Ms. Carson met with SWR director Daniel Beard, WODC chief Sanford Hill, and NPS supervisory architect Charley Pope "to inspect the development and to discuss future plans and programs." From this high-level gathering came an agreement to open the refurbished barracks by October 1966, and the following year the officers quarters. "This will be a tight schedule from both the refurnishing and restoration standpoints," said Carson, "and means that procurement must begin for some of the objects needed for Fort Davis at once." [67]

Opening the visitor center in the fall of 1965 proved less difficult than finding monies to procure the furnishing suggested by Nan Carson. On November 8, the park welcomed the first visitors to HB20, the former barracks building, and Superintendent Smith wrote later that month that "visitors continue to be entranced by the magnificence of the 19th century design and the very effective reproduction of the original building." His fear that the opening would be delayed and affect visitation did not materialize, and he reported to the regional director: "Thanks to the smooth and efficient handling of the move by Maintenanceman Bencomo and his crew, there was only a 30-minute interruption in visitor service." But the strategy for furnishing the center encountered opposition in Santa Fe, as the acting regional director, George W. Miller, wrote to Smith on November 23 warning that the park had overspent available funds, even though Smith's estimates for interior furnishings "generally appear to be in line with what has been provided for other visitor centers in this Region." What triggered Miller's concerns was a change of attitude in Washington about the efficacy of Fort Davis' budget. The park carried over into fiscal year 1965 a deficit of $5,300, and Smith's request for an additional $4,500 for visitor center furnishings brought the shortfall to nearly $10,000; a sum that would affect the planned expenditure of $97,000 for all of fiscal year 1966 on construction and furnishing of the historic structures. The SWR itself also faced "an extremely large deficit," and could not guarantee new monies for Fort Davis in light of the fact that "just last week at a large park in this Region we took the drastic action of requiring the Superintendent and the Design Office to reduce the scope of work being prepared for bids in order to provide funds for a large change order." [68]

Acting director Miller's memorandum caught Fort Davis personnel completely by surprise, given the constant and substantial funding support that the park had enjoyed for its first two years. The decision to limit spending on furnishings "strikes terror into our hearts," Superintendent Smith wrote to the regional office, "and raises a number of questions which we find it hard to answer." Where Smith's predecessor, Michael Becker, recalled in a 1994 interview that he always had enough money to conduct park business, and Erwin Thompson remembered that each of the six full-time employees had their own staff cars, by late 1965 the cost of doing business at Fort Davis had alarmed Smith's superiors. Part of this concern came from the escalating cost of the Asian conflict in Vietnam, plus the price tag associated with President Johnson's social welfare programs known as the "Great Society." Budget officers of the federal government as early as 1965 realized that there was not an unlimited pool of resources to meet these new demands, as well as fulfill such promises as a million-dollar restoration program at Fort Davis. [69]

This turn of events left Superintendent Smith explaining such petty details as why he had asked for padded chairs for the audiovisual room rather than standard metal or plastic ones ("I find these pretty hard after the first fifteen minutes" of a film or speakers program), not to mention the need for staff to work some 8,000 hours cleaning, cataloguing, and storing the over 18,000 artifacts now stuffed into closets and drawers at the park. The former regional curator also predicted that future cuts in the Fort Davis budget endangered the very purpose of historic preservation: "Having been through the complications of more than one archeological excavation," said the onetime anthropology major at the University of Arizona, "where the records and preservation work were held up, I have nightmares about what could happen here!" Smith praised Michael Becker and Tom Crellin for having been careful in their own budget estimates, and refused to accept any blame for overspending in comparison to other parks. He then cautioned the SWR director that the opening of the visitors center "coincides with our dedication [then scheduled for April 30, 1966] and with our final closing of the parade ground to vehicular traffic." "It does indeed appear," the superintendent conceded, "that the day of reckoning for our past extravagances is upon us." Yet Smith believed that continued reductions in the plans for Fort Davis (one scenario extended completion from 1966 to 1970) "could effectively kill us for at least another year, providing a mass of public relations difficulties almost as bad as the things resulting from recent Washington Office 'reconsideration' of what we're trying to do." [70]

What made the shift of fiscal emphasis more troubling for Smith and his staff was the increase of visitation that the park experienced in 1965, and the changing perceptions that the local community seemed to have about the NPS and its plans. This was first apparent in matters of employment, as in April the Washington office of the park service called to inquire about a complaint lodged against Superintendent Becker's hiring practices. An unnamed local resident had approached county judge Tom Gray to declare that Becker ignored his military veteran's status when considering him for employment, and had also contacted west Texas U.S. Representative Ed Foreman. Conversations between Becker, Gray and the aggrieved party confirmed that the park had followed proper procedure, and the complaint was dismissed. [71]

One source of employment that the park utilized significantly, and which it could not have performed its duties without, was the various "Great Society" programs for youth and the unemployed that proliferated by the mid-1960s. In August 1964, Bob Dunnagan agreed to work with the "Job Corps" program to attract young workers who could assist with such tasks as maintenance, artifact preservation, and office work. In 1965 the park took advantage of the National Youth Corps (NYC) that targeted potential high-school dropouts by providing them with employment and training in their communities (whereas the Job Corps moved older youth to centers nationwide). Smith had high praise for the supervision of these workers by Pablo Bencomo, who hired many Hispanic youth to assist him with the challenging work of structural maintenance. The majority of these workers went on to college or work in trades and construction, while several pursued careers in the NPS . Interest in federal social programs that would benefit the community also extended to education, as the new historian, Benjamin Levy, attended a meeting in November 1965 where local citizens sought to develop a "Head Start" program in town. Levy, who had come from Edison Laboratory National Historic Site in New Jersey, agreed to speak to the Fort Davis School Board that December about the innovative concept of federal funding for pre-school children of modest means to prevent problems of learning later on in life. Superintendent Smith encouraged Levy's cooperation with the local group, which if successful with Head Start could lead to "a full-fledged Community Action Agency . . . to foster the Neighborhood Youth Program which could be of great value to the [NPS] site." The local Lions Club agreed to sponsor these activities, and Levy served on its committee for educational and social welfare, while Pablo Bencomo worked on "a local plan to provide cooperative water and sewage systems for Fort Davis;" a benefit of special interest to the Hispanic community around the park. [72]

Federal money flowing to social programs also had their counterpart in Texas with the increase of funds for Davis Mountain State Park. In July 1965 Smith received word that the state park would receive nearly $500,000 "for additional physical development during the coming fiscal year." The monies had been secured by state representative Gene Hendryx, and "one plan is to redevelop the scenic route which climbs the far side of North Ridge and ends in a picnic area overlooking Hospital Canyon." Hendryx remembered how dilapidated the state park had become by the mid-1960s, and how the federal activity over the mountain at Fort Davis spurred local interest in improving the older state facility. One reason was Smith's report that Fort Davis had recorded "the largest percentage increase of any Texas tourist attraction in the first half of 1965 [48.8 percent]," and that "it was especially interesting to know that historic forts scored three of the four top increases in Texas [parks]." Smith later wrote to the regional office that Davis Mountain State Park was targeted to become "a model for state parks of this size," and he took pride in creating "a strong climate of cooperation between the two staffs;" a process that included the work of Ranger Bob Crisman to institute the popular series of campfire talks at Davis Mountain. [73]

The success of this endeavor brought to Fort Davis and the state park on October 29, 1965 the "Texas State Legislature Subcommittee on Historic Sites." Chaired by Gene Hendryx, the group of lawmakers, reported Smith, "asked many penetrating questions on our administration, program and policies, on the techniques and cost of structural preservation . . and delved especially deep on the subtleties of visitor service and preservation." The superintendent then described the committee's chairman as "one of the most prominent of young West Texas politicians, and . . . a fast friend of the area," and reported that Hendryx "led the group in a discerning analysis of the difficulties involved and proper and tasteful preservation." Smith declared that this body represents something of a revolution in Texas park history," as "the State is now moving to preserve significant Texas Sites and the Representatives who visited here [were] interested in the techniques of managing, protecting, and interpreting the Area." To complete the remarkable series of events that week, on October 30 the Hendryx subcommittee was followed at Fort Davis by the Texas State Historical Survey Committee, which also sought information about the work of the park service as well as the state parks division in the Davis Mountains. [74]

Marketing the success of Fort Davis was prominent in the mind of Superintendent Smith as he contemplated the most important event of 1966: planning and execution of the dedication ceremonies that April. Visitation at his park for the calendar year 1965 had topped the previous year by 25 percent (107,866 visitors), and Fort Davis had witnessed in January 1966 an increase of 45.9 percent over the same month in 1965; a result Smith believed of the new entrance road and curious locals eager to see the visitor center. This road had also reduced dramatically the incidences of trespassing and vandalism on the property. The regional office sent to Fort Davis in January a landscape team to consider reseeding the parade grounds, while the "Western Tree Crew" came on site to clean up the Cottonwood Grove for future use as a picnic area. In terms of historical research and community interest, Smith reported that historian Ben Levy had spent five weeks in Washington that winter collecting documents and photographs for the park library; a total of 22,000 pages of materials on microfilm, 150 historic maps, and 35 photographs. The only problem to report because of the new attractions at the park was that "the legend of 'Indian Emily' is again raising some fever." Because locals could no longer drive onto the post grounds, "in some cases [they] appear to be quite disturbed." "The lack of roads to other areas," said Smith, "comes in for some criticism but not to the extent of that relating to the Indian Emily marker." But the growth in out-of-town tourism to the historic site had also triggered "agitation for motels and other highly developed urban style facilities." Smith saw cause for concern with the potential for blighted development to the south and east of the park, and reported that "we would like to prepare the ground for continuing conforming use along these two sides of the property." [75]