PIPE SPRING Cultures at a Crossroads: An Administrative History

Wartime Visitation

Fort visitation for fiscal year (FY) 1942 was the lowest ever in the monument's history - only 372 people - compared with 1,259 visitors the previous fiscal year. After gas rationing went into effect during the fall of 1942, visitation to Pipe Spring National Monument continued to drop. Only eight visitors came in October and only four in November 1942. [1226] In December travel figures were boosted to 20 by a visit of 12 men of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers sent to the area to begin removal of the two CCC camps at Fredonia and in Antelope Valley, Camp G-173. (Demolition of the Short Creek camp did not begin until May 1943.) These pitifully low figures would never be revealed by the director's annual report to the Secretary of the Interior for FY 1943, for on October 1, 1942, park units were instructed by Director Drury to begin a new system of counting visitors. [1227] Whereas up to this time Heaton had based visitation figures on those who came to what he called the "fort museum," under the new system he was to count all travelers using the monument road during daylight hours, whether or not they stopped.

The consequence of adopting this new system was that the travel figures for Pipe Spring for FY 1943 were so inflated that they are virtually meaningless. Heaton reported in March 1943 that about 97 percent of the cars that passed through the monument were local people going to and from their ranches or to nearby towns, yet these would have been counted in annual travel totals. [1228] A crew of 15 soldiers involved in the removal of Camp G-173 passed through the monument every day to go back and forth to work, thus Heaton was required to report travel of 338 soldiers to the monument that month. At the end of FY 1943, "official" travel for the monument was 6,310, compared to 372 for 1942. In August 1943 Heaton was directed by Zion officials to return to the old method of counting for FY 1944. [1229] Pipe Spring received 515 visitors that year. The last war year (FY 1945) visitation to the monument was 635. [1230]

Gas rationing was lifted during the summer of 1945. Heaton was dismayed to report the following: "There has not been any noticeable increase in the travel here since the rationing of gas was lifted. The majority of the travel has been parties in the campground or to swim in the meadow pond.... a total of 54 people at the monument for the month of August." [1231] Heaton was encouraged the following month when he received 152 visitors. Visitation for FY 1946 increased to 1,193.