Lake Roosevelt Administrative History

Fort Spokane

The interpretive program at Fort Spokane is closely connected to the story of the loss of most of the buildings from the military period, the acquisition of the land by the Park Service, and the subsequent restoration/rehabilitation work on buildings, foundations, and landscaping. Restoration and interpretation of the extant buildings and foundations at Fort Spokane has been a concern of the park since it acquired the former military reservation in 1960.

Park Service efforts to research the history of Fort Spokane began in 1958, when Regional Historian John Hussey prepared a five-page history of the fort's military period. Research picked up in 1960. Hussey conducted more studies of the fort, and an architect and student crew prepared measured drawings. LARO staff began talking to area residents, trying to gather information and artifacts. The Regional Office and the LARO Superintendent arranged for researchers to copy documents and historic photographs in local newspaper files and the National Archives. [65]

The 331 acres of land at Fort Spokane on the upper bench were transferred to the Park Service on May 9, 1960, by Public Land Order 2087. Of the forty-five original buildings at Fort Spokane, five remained standing on the site — the guardhouse, quartermaster stable, powder magazine, reservoir house, and quartermaster storehouse. Twenty historic foundations were also evident in the 1960s. Preservation of these buildings and foundations began in 1961. [66]

Looking across Spokane Arm to site of Fort Spokane, 1958. The LARO campground and swim beach are on the lower bench near the bridge, and the historic grounds and buildings are on the bench to the right of the road. Photo courtesy of Grant County Historical Society and Museum, BOR Collection (P222-116-40762).

Interpretion at the Fort Spokane Guardhouse

The focus of interpretation of Fort Spokane through the 1960s was on its military period. Other uses — Indian Agency, Indian boarding school, and Indian hospital — were mentioned in the discussion of interpretive programs and planning but not emphasized. For example, in 1968 LARO Superintendent David Richie suggested the following themes for the guardhouse exhibit room: why Fort Spokane was established; garrison life of the soldier; social life of the soldier; "family"; and the abandonment of the fort (including its early 1900s roles). By 1975, interpreters were increasingly emphasizing the post-military period, but the re-creation of the grounds continued to depict the 1890s development. [67]

Information desk at Fort Spokane guardhouse, 1967. Photo courtesy of National Park Service, Lake Roosevelt National Recreation Area (LARO.FS).

Interpretation at the fort, like many other aspects of LARO's development, reflected the personal commitment of park staff and their spouses. For example, in the early 1960s LARO Superintendent Homer Robinson carved and his wife Sis painted twelve-inch-tall wooden soldiers, based on historic photographs, for display in the guardhouse. [68]

During the 1980s and 1990s, LARO and other Park Service personnel recognized the need to improve the interpretation of Fort Spokane. The 1997 Museum Management Plan suggested less emphasis on interpreting the guardhouse as a detention facility, questioned the effectiveness of the mountain howitzer display (a reproduction donated in the mid-1980s), and commented that the stable interpretation did not convey the importance of animals to the military. An exhibit installed in 1999 in the guardhouse acknowledged the suffering and the cultural damage caused by the Indian boarding school at Fort Spokane. Its nine panels are based on interviews with tribal elders, telling the story from the tribal point of view. One panel makes effective use of the location by mentioning that children who ran away from the school were held in solitary confinement in the guardhouse for several days. [69]

A recurring debate at Fort Spokane, as at many historic sites around the country, is whether to target a specific time period or to try to give a feeling of the site through its several phases. There is currently a "big push" within the Park Service, according to LARO Education Specialist Lynne Brougher, to strive for multiple-view, multiple-culture interpretation. The days of interpreting Fort Spokane only as a short-lived military facility appear to be over. [71]

A local teacher, Ralph Brown, began working at Fort Spokane as a seasonal historian in 1964. He led walking tours of the fort grounds; he also tried to identify Fort Spokane objects in private collections. LARO had hoped to hire a permanent historian, but the Park Service during this period began to assign research projects to historians in Washington and Denver and have the historians in the field focus on interpretation; communications skills thus took precedence over discipline specialty. Although everyone involved felt that the basic story would best be conveyed through audio-visuals, an exhibit room and furnished jail cell were seen as important components. Nevertheless, as the Park Service Acting Chief, Division of Interpretation and Visitor Services, wrote about Fort Spokane, "personal service . . . is our hallmark. The others are tools which should be used when they are best suited to the particular communications job at hand." [72]

The exhibits prepared in the late 1960s for the Fort Spokane guardhouse were rather sparse. As was true Servicewide, a variety of media, particularly audiovisual and publications, was used instead of narrative description to tell much of the story. In 1968, a few donated historic objects were on display, along with historic photographs from the National Archives and a framed document from the Indian school period. At first, there was not enough funding for life-size dioramas, so LARO recommended displaying military gear and civilian objects to complement the audiovisual program and programs presented by the information-receptionist. A slide cabinet provided programs on Grand Coulee Dam, Lake Roosevelt, and national parks of the northwest. The proposed research on furnishings was postponed. Within a few years, however, a diorama with two mannequins was installed in one of the prison cells. This portrays a sergeant of the guard seated at a table filling out a report, with an orderly reporting to him. In the accompanying audio, which runs continuously, the sergeant of the guard explains his duties. Beginning in 1975, another cell housed the sound-slide program and prints showing uniforms of the period. Soon, a second diorama showed a prisoner in the solitary cell. The two dioramas are still in place. [73]

LARO opened the Fort Spokane grounds to visitors in a limited way in 1962. At that time, the individual buildings were still surrounded by chain-link fences. That summer, about two thousand visitors came per month. When the visitor center opened in the guardhouse in 1966, local chambers of commerce sponsored an open house. LARO kept the visitor center open every day of the year, with summer hours from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Soon, scheduled guided walks on the human and natural history of the area were available. The visitor center guardhouse was last staffed year-round in 1985. [74]

The script for the original slide program at Fort Spokane was produced locally in 1965. In 1968, Harpers Ferry Center produced a new program, making only minor changes to the earlier script. This script heavily emphasized the military history of the fort. The text was revised in 1981 to include more information on the boarding school and hospital. The audio stations in the guardhouse use an interview format modeled after the once-popular television program, "You Are There." For example, an Irish man's voice explains to visitors that he was incarcerated in the guardhouse cell for disorderly conduct. [75]

A popular tool that began to be used at Fort Spokane in 1969 was a timed recording of period bugle calls and a retreat parade, similar to those already in use at Fort Davis National Historic Site, Texas. These recordings played every half hour from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., and they could be heard as far away as the campground. The sound quality was very poor, however, and in 1984 the Regional Audiovisual Specialist moved the broadcasting equipment from a tree to the cupola of the guardhouse. The slide-sound system in the guardhouse also did not always work well; sometimes sounds from this system invaded the taped bugle calls or were heard over area telephones. Park staff are now installing new equipment sent from Harpers Ferry Center to replace the old eight-track players. [76]

Until 1977, rangers used the baker's table inside the powder magazine at Fort Spokane for demonstrations of loading cartridges. Exhibits in the magazine, located far from the guardhouses, tended to be vandalized, however. In the quartermaster stable, visitors can wander past stalls that once housed fifty-eight mules, many with the names of their long-gone occupants still posted above the stalls. [77]