Grant-Kohrs Ranch Administrative History

The master plan addressed several other important land considerations. Among these were the Deer Lodge sewerage lagoon north of the ranch, the two railroad rights-of way running through the property from north to south, bisecting the property; and three irrigation ditches. There were also utilities corridors across the lands. Although the Park Service expressed no intention of altering the use of these improvements, the team determined that action would be necessary to clarify and resolve the varied legal aspects relating to the interests. [12]

Beyond the land issues, this early plan outlined the initial management objectives that would serve as priorities for guiding the activities of interim and permanent staff over the next several years. It is worth noting that Grant-Kohrs Ranch NHS was intended initially to be a satellite area administered under Yellowstone National Park, and supervised on-site by a management assistant. [13] That the five-member team included Superintendent Anderson may have influenced this recommendation. However, until a congressional appropriation for the area was forthcoming, Assistant Superintendent Hennesay would continue to be key man for the new site.

Facilities at the site would be minimal and designed to be compatible with the historic setting of the ranch. The team proposed that park housing be constructed for some, but not all, of the staff for the sake of night-time security. Of course, public rest rooms and improved utilities connected with the City of Deer Lodge would have to be installed before the area could be opened to visitors.

The planners concluded by making general recommendations for additional studies, principally a historic structures report and an interpretive prospectus. Both would generate basic data essential to informed management of the resources, particularly the buildings in the defined historic zone encompassing the "old" ranch west of the railroads. Even though it might have been appropriate to include a historic resource study at the same time, the need for such a report was not identified until later. The team did, however, include the suggestion that living history be considered as an appropriate means of interpretation for the site. [14] The final master plan was issued early in 1973.

Key man Vein Hennesay met with regional office staff in Omaha on January 30, 1973 to discuss plans and short-term operations for the ranch. A crucial need was that of conducting a professional assessment of the structures so that a preservation plan could be developed. It was decided that a historical architect should be sent to the area as soon as possible to begin this process. Likewise, a staff curator should visit the ranch to inspect the collections with a view to improving environmental conditions and to train the resident seasonal ranger in cataloging techniques. [15] The condition of the Grant Kohrs house (HS-1), especially the roof, was a major concern on both counts.

The citizens of Deer Lodge, like most residents near newly-designated parks, found it difficult to understand the delays in bringing a unit to an operational level. The greatest impediment was, of course, the lack of funding. Until the beginning of fiscal year 1973, Yellowstone National Park had been bearing most of the costs for Grant-Kohrs. The NPS predicted that Congress would appropriate an operating program of $103,000.00, but the actual amount came to only $88,000. Still, it was a beginning. This modest budget at least would cover basic staffing and office equipment costs, along with the development of an alternative road by which Con Warren could access his ranch lands without going through the historic zone. [16]

The most sensitive planning issue at this early stage continued to be public access to the area. Hennesay and the others attending the January 1973 meeting agreed that it was not yet feasible to allow the public onto the ranch grounds, and that formal establishment should be delayed for an indefinite time. The question of where to put the park entrance "is the major thing holding us up," Hennesay later told the Silver State Post. "Once we get that decided we can proceed with other developments." [17] He predicted, prophetically as it turned out, that even though the staff was discouraging visitation, it would only be a matter of time until interested groups would pressure the NPS to open the ranch. Hennesay was able to evade the issue at the local level until September, when Chamber of Commerce Secretary Ted J. Mannix attempted to force a definitive answer by planning a celebration in conjunction with a grand opening. Hennesay was candid in admitting that the Service "was not in a position . . . to even guess when we might be able to have a dedication . . . ." [18]

Months passed, but Park Service officials could claim virtually no meaningful progress at the site. The temper of the local community, already on a short fuse, began to sizzle anew when it discovered that the NPS had not requested development funds for that year. The Service understood that planning had to precede any work on the ground, but it seems that no one had clarified this in the minds of Deer Lodge residents. On March 15, 1974 the local newspaper unleashed a front-page diatribe accusing the NPS of masking the facts "in bureaucratic confusion" resulting in the "unjustified and unnatural death" of Grant-Kohrs Ranch. [19] At a meeting the very next week, Chamber of Commerce members opened fire on Hennesay with a barrage of questions about the lack of activity, pointing especially to NPS failure to appoint a local manager who could devote full-attention to the site. One person in the audience offered the opinion that this was a principal reason things were in such disarray. The beleaguered key man agreed, but could only respond that his request had been "waiting in the personnel office in Washington since November." Hennesay unintentionally fueled the smoldering mood of the audience by predicting that no major allocation of money would be scheduled for the ranch until 1979. "This is a real sad thing," one audience member lamented, "We feel we have been shuffled aside and we won't be around long enough to see the project." At that point, Congressman Dick Shoup's representative, also present, waded into the fray declaring that, "We will bring pressures to bring this into fruition earlier." [20]

The Chamber and the Silver State Post were not the only ones concerned about the apparent lack of development at the historic site. Con Warren stirred his own political waves with the Montana delegation to find out what, if anything, the NPS was doing toward opening the ranch to the public. Responding to Warren's inquiry, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior Douglas P. Wheeler expressed his regret that of the seventeen projects requested for Grant-Kohrs in fiscal year 1974 (beginning July 1, 1973), none had been funded. Included among these were the construction of an entrance road, water and sewer systems, restoration, and other facilities. The ranch, he confessed, had been upstaged by "commitments to Bicentennial projects" in celebration of the nation's 200th anniversary upcoming in 1976. [21] Warren probably found little comfort in Wheeler's comment informing him that the process of Service-wide priorities required two or three years to integrate new area projects into the funding program. [22]

Con remained unconvinced. Moreover, he was fuming over the NPS announcement of its preference for yet another proposed park entrance. According to this plan, Rainbow Avenue, running west from Main to a dead-end at the railroads, would be extended via an underpass beneath the tracks to connect with the park boundary. [23] Actually, this proposal had been a topic of discussion between NPS officials and the Deer Lodge City Council during the previous year. Vern Hennesay had expressed his view to the regional director that the Milwaukee entrance would route visitors "through one of the more undesirable parts of the city: namely the city utility yard." (This lay immediately north of the city park) Of even greater concern was the high potential for traffic to be blocked and backed-up for lengthy periods by train switching and refueling operations.

He pointed out that the railroad crossing on Milwaukee was the only route available to Deer Lodge's west side residents, thus the already high volume of traffic on this street. The Rainbow alternative would be somewhat shorter and would access the park directly on the east side, circumventing the Milwaukee Avenue problems, as well as the city park. [24]

The revised concepts of developing an approach road outside the park boundary rankled Con Warren. In recent years, Con had become somewhat distanced from the Deer Lodge community, probably as a result of his wife's chronic illness and his own change of lifestyle. [25] He resented the fact that the townspeople had not supported his six-year struggle to attract the government's attention to the historic ranch. These new plans, if adopted, would necessitate constructing a costly underpass, either on Rainbow Avenue or farther downtown on west-bound Milwaukee Avenue, to avoid traffic delays at the railroads. Warren saw this as being unnecessarily complicated with regard to opening the park. Venting his exasperation in a letter to Regional Director Lynn Thompson, heading the new Denver-based Rocky Mountain Region, Warren exclaimed, "The Powell County [Deer Lodge] Chamber of Commerce, the City Council, and the people of west Deer Lodge have long wanted an overpass of the railroads . . . They are using the Historic Site an excuse to get this overpass at the expense of the National Park Service." Firm in his denouncement, Con declared, "I do not intend to stand by and see these people use the Site for their own gain." [26]

Warren reminded NPS officials that their original understanding had been to install an access directly from Highway 10. Visitor facilities would be located east of the Burlington Northern tracks on Tract E, the parcel of land south of his house, ostensibly acquired by the Park Service for that purpose. Early concepts, in fact, envisioned a pedestrian underpass on a foot trail leading from a parking lot to the ranch proper. The Rainbow Avenue approach, he maintained, would permit unrestricted public access directly to the historic site and would infringe on his easement over the Stuart Meadow, west of the railroad. He particularly resented Congressman Shoup's demand that the Park Service "get this thing going, even if we can't go inside the building . . . [visitors can] peer in the windows . . . ." Warren demonstrated a keen grasp of park priorities by rejecting this as "ridiculous" because "it would only open the door for vandalism and pilferage, something we have been able to avoid so far." [27] He wanted the historic site developed, to be sure, but in an orderly, well-thought-out sequence. Warren, like most rural westerners, was accustomed to doing business on his word. If the NPS was not going to abide by its commitments to restore and preserve the ranch buildings first, and instead launch "into an ambitious and vastly expensive project such as the Rainbow Street overpass . . . [he] would not be interested in any further contributions...." [28] Con had drawn the line. It was high noon at the ranch.

He was not facing down the Park Service and Shoup alone, however. He had enlisted his friends, Montana Senators Mansfield and Metcalf, to back him up. Against these odds, Shoup quickly blinked, saying that he did "not mean for them to do a hurried job on the Ranch," only that the NPS should "start work on their planning and development phase ." [29] Predictably, the confrontation sparked a gust of letters throughout the halls of the Park Service, all of which were crafted to reassure Warren that preserving the integrity of the ranch was paramount. As further assurance to the ranch's benefactor, Rocky Mountain Regional Director Thompson arranged to come to the ranch to discuss the issues personally. [30]

Congressman Shoup used his influence to lever the chair of the House Appropriations Committee for Interior to advance the funding schedule for Grant-Kohrs Ranch. He announced in mid-July 1974 that the funding had been jumped up in priorities by one full year, at the same time criticizing the NPS for previously requesting planning money in the same year with development funds. Shoup secured promises of $30,000.00 for planning, plus an additional $100,000.00 for construction of the entrance road, parking lot, and a picnic area to be included in the 1974-75 appropriation. "I have been assured by the Park Service," said Shoup, "that they have no objection to this request and that if such moneys [sic] are appropriated in fiscal year 75 budget, this site would be available for public use in the summer of 1975." [31] At last, everyone seemed to be satisfied that the new park was on-track.

The serenity did not last long. But, it also became someone else's problem. Vern Hennesay, who had served as the coordinator for Grant-Kohrs for four and one-half years, was probably somewhat relieved to announce in July 1974 that a permanent manager had been selected for the site. During his seven years with NPS, Richard R. Peterson had followed a career path in administration from Rocky Mountain National Park, to Redwoods, to doing a stint as an urban trainee in Washington, D. C. He was serving as administrative officer for Mather Training Center at Harpers Ferry, West Virginia when he was tapped for the Grant-Kohrs Ranch job. His previous experience would serve him well in bringing to the site a sense of order and a thorough understanding of the NPS fiscal system. [32]

Superintendent Richard R. Peterson speaking at park dedication, July 16, 1977.
(Courtesy Grant-Kohrs Ranch NHS)

Peterson was faced with myriad details in getting the fledgling park operation on a solid footing, challenge enough in itself, but the most pressing matter was the access issue. The community "was very anxious for something to happen," he would later recall in a 1996 interview. [33] This question had to be resolved, and with both public relations and those with Con Warren at stake, it had to be done diplomatically. Soon after his arrival, Peterson met with regional office staff in Denver, after which he had the unenviable duty of informing the press that, "the $130,000.00 did not include money for planing the access road," and "you can't build a road without planning." He added that the master plan would be re-done, with all of the proposed alternatives back on the table. Like his predecessor, Peterson still had no way of knowing when the park might open. Just what happened to the planning money Shoup had promised is uncertain, but it may have fallen victim to a mix-up in labeling during the appropriations process, and once branded, could not be reversed. Peterson assured everyone, however, that he and regional officials were working together to find the necessary funds. [34]

This news prompted a fresh campaign of letters to the Montana delegation, to which NPS Director Ronald H. Walker replied that the 1975 fiscal year Interior appropriation did in fact include $135,000.00 for Grant-Kohrs Ranch NHS. Part of this, he said, was earmarked for planning the entrance, while the lion's share would go to constructing the access and parking. He attempted to appease the citizens by expressing his confidence that the park still could be open to the public by summer 1975. [35] While Walker's announcement played well in the press, it is doubtful that his prediction was taken very seriously by anyone in the Denver Service Center.

In his first Superintendent's Report, Peterson acknowledged that much of his time during those first few months had been devoted to trying to "improve local relationships and work out ways to open the site." [36] He also was granted greater authority and latitude in leading the park effort when the area was declared an independent park, thus severing it from oversight by Yellowstone, effective December 8, 1974.3 [37]