PIPE SPRING Cultures at a Crossroads: An Administrative History

Monument Administration (continued)

1958

98. Park Historian James C. McKown with handcranked wood lathe, fall of 1958 (Photograph by Jim Digby, courtesy James C. McKown).

Heaton was informed by Superintendent Franke in December 1957 that the monument's first permanent park historian had been selected for Pipe Spring National Monument. Heaton spent several days in January 1958 fixing the house trailer for the new employee, James C. ("Jim") McKown, who reported for duty at 5:00 p.m. on February 10 and moved into the trailer house. [1678] McKown had grown up in California and had a degree in history. Prior to coming to the monument he worked six summers as a seasonal ranger at Yellowstone National Park. The day after McKown's arrival at Pipe Spring, Heaton gave him a tour of the fort and the area, then informed Zion officials of his arrival. Superintendent Franke told Heaton he could keep McKown at Pipe Spring only until February 24, when he was to report to Zion for several months. [1679] As Kelly Heaton was still unable to work due to illness, most of the work McKown was given his first few weeks at the monument was maintenance work, assisting Gary Heaton rake and haul leaves and cut up wood in the campground. McKown, a Catholic, attended church in Kanab shortly before leaving for Zion. When McKown returned to full-time duty, Heaton arranged his work schedule so that McKown could take several hours off on Sunday mornings to attend mass.

Gary Heaton worked several days in late February repairing the old stone fireplaces in the campground, which were often damaged by campers' vehicles. Near the end of the month Kelly Heaton returned to work and, with Gary, worked in the fort cleaning museum articles and outside on maintenance tasks. Gary worked alone as laborer in March and April 1958.

In early March 1958, Heaton attended a staff meeting and later went over Mission 66 plans for the monument with Zion officials. To his disappointment, Heaton learned that McKown was to be kept at Zion for another three weeks. On March 9 he received a visit from Regional Curator Franklin G. Smith who went over the museum's records. They must not have met his approval for Heaton later wrote in his journal, "As soon as Jim McKown gets back will start him on our records. We need to get Woodward's report on historic display so we can get going." [1680] On March 25 Heaton called Zion officials to ask if he could hire a historian to work weekends. He was authorized to hire Ortho Christensen to begin April 5 and to work weekends until McKown returned from Zion. Heaton appeared to be wearing thin under Zion's supervision. He wrote in his journal that evening, "A bit out of patience and sore because Supt. Franke is keeping McKown down there so long just to help Zion out. More disgusted with my job all the time. Feel like quitting." [1681]

99. Ray Mose, undated; probably late 1950s or early 1960s (Pipe Spring National Monument).

The lightning protection system installed on the fort in 1956 created a new security problem for Heaton to deal with. On April 26, 1958, a number of Kanab High School students were picnicking on the monument. Heaton later reported that some of the boys "climbed over the back of the fort by lightning rod cable and opened up the fort after dark. I have been afraid of this ever since the cables have been put up." [1682] Heaton speculated access had been gained to the fort on other occasion via the cable. The idea of scaling the fort walls by various means was not new - it had occurred to some of Camp DG-44's CCC enrollees in the late 1930s and to others since that time, only trees had previously been used to surmount the walls. The concept of penetrating the defenses of a fort originally designed to withstand enemy attack appears to have been just more temptation than some adolescent boys could resist!

On April 28, 1958, Heaton learned that the tunnel on the Zion-Mt. Carmel Highway had caved in at 6 p.m., forcing the temporary closure of the road. Travel along the Hurricane-Fredonia route significantly increased with many stopping to see the fort, but ended as soon as the tunnel was repaired and the Zion highway reopened. [1683] At a staff meeting on May 7 Heaton picked up the new Mission 66 master plan for the monument and learned that an order he had placed for 10 picnic tables and five cement fireplaces would soon be filled. He was given permission in April to hire another laborer (in addition to Gary Heaton) to do work at the monument. By May 19 he hired a Kaibab Paiute man, Ray Mose, whose Paiute name was Saxaivaw, meaning "blue-green water." [1684] Mose's first big maintenance project was to stabilize the fort pond walls by repointing exterior stonework. (See "Ponds, Fish, Fowl, and Springs" section.)

On May 12, 1958, Jim McKown returned to the monument from his Zion detail and Ortho Christensen was released from weekend guide duties. Still miffed about Zion's absconding with his new employee for three months, Heaton wrote in his journal upon McKown's return, "He is back from Zion Park now and [I] hope he will be left here." [1685] Heaton had much for him to do - above and beyond guide work - for Establishment Day was fast approaching. Heaton liked McKown's ideas for making the fort displays more attractive and allowed him to rearrange the museum's display that month. Heaton was quite pleased with the results. McKown also cleaned the artifacts on display, then he was assigned the less creative task of washing all the fort's windows! On May 28, 10 new picnic tables and five cement fireplaces for the campground were delivered from Zion, along with a gas-driven mower. [1686] McKown put together a self-guided leaflet for the fort and nature trail then took it to Zion to run off on a mimeograph machine so it could be used by Establishment Day visitors.

That year Establishment Day was held on May 30, 1958. The event was made even more memorable because that year marked the 100th anniversary of Jacob Hamblin's party's stop at Pipe Spring (October 30, 1858) and the 35th anniversary since the monument's establishment. The program was held in front of the fort and included a welcome address given Leonard Heaton, a reading of the poem "Call to Dixie" by Olive Heaton; an accounting of Hamblin's work among the Indians by Mrs. Helen H. Burgoine, great-granddaughter of Jacob Hamblin; a recounting of events leading up the monument's establishment by Charles C. Heaton; and remarks by Superintendent Franke and by Carl Jepson, who brought the new mimeographed leaflets along with him.

Once the big event was over, the work routine returned to normal for Heaton and McKown. Unlike his predecessor Lloyd Sandberg, who was Mormon, McKown did not fit into the local white community. Besides, McKown had a sincere interest in making friends with the Kaibab Paiute and in learning about their culture and language. He spent a lot of time with Ray Mose and recently recalled that Mose "had a tremendous sense of humor. He taught me a lot of Paiute words." [1687] From time to time, McKown was invited into the homes of his Indian friends and they in turn visited him in his trailer, often in groups. In a recent interview, McKown recalled being somewhat surprised that one Kaibab Paiute woman friend asked to take his picture, since it was typically the white folks who took pictures of the Indians! "I was one of the few white people the Kaibab Paiute trusted and opened up to," McKown remembered. "They knew I was interested in them and their language." [1688] McKown was also deeply moved by the alcoholism that wrought havoc in the lives of many of his Indian friends. He recalled that the attitude expressed by many local whites toward the Indians at that time was "condescending." Leonard Heaton, however, "had a better attitude. Just like he accepted me as Catholic, he accepted them as Paiutes. And that was why they trusted him and went to his house.... He accepted the Paiutes as human beings." [1689] Heaton, said McKown, "was great, the nicest person I ever worked for, and Edna after a while warmed up to me and brought me freshly baked bread every week." [1690]

Heaton still had to contend with monthly trips to Zion. After returning from the June 5, 1958, staff meeting, Heaton wrote in his journal, "The trip to Zion just about does me up, nervous tension and tobacco smoke in the staff meeting rooms. Heard over the radio today that all Civil Service white-collared workers get 10 percent raise. Should get about $20 [per] pay period if it is true. Sure will help a lot." [1691] That June, Heaton and McKown worked well together as a team, discussing changes in the fort display and improving their methods of visitor contact. Whereas tours used to always start at his office in the fort, they now started at the fort ponds, went through the east gate into the fort, through the fort, exiting through the office last. They also decided to remove more from Heaton's office (to make it less crowded) and to remove furnishings in the fort that were not appropriate, even if it meant leaving the rooms looking a little bare, until the "right" furnishings could be acquired. They removed anything broken from display and agreed not to put it back until repairs had been made. Finally, they decided to make a registration booth and box for self-guided leaflets for visitor use.

Ray Mose was the only laborer kept on during the summer of 1958. Heaton had him work on a variety of maintenance and grounds-keeping projects around the monument. He covered over an old trash dump in the monument and rebuilt the rock ditch that led from the spring to the ponds. In late July Mose demolished an old garage/woodshed located at the southwest corner of the monument. In August he removed the rock floor from the garage site, using the stone to line the walkways to the comfort station. He also repointed the rock walls east and west of the fort with colored cement. Mose was laid off for the season in mid-September.

In early July 1958, approval was given to construct two residences at Pipe Spring during fiscal year 1959 (see "Planning and Development" section). McKown was left in charge of visitors that Fourth of July, the first such holiday Heaton had ever been able to leave the monument. Shortly after, McKown moved all the display case exhibits out of the upstairs rooms of the fort in preparation for switching to exhibits more in keeping with a historic house museum. On July 25, 1958, McKown reported to Heaton that a group of boys from Kanab had been pot hunting the previous night in the Pueblo ruins south of the monument and had found several pots. Heaton later reported that he went to Kanab the evening of July 25 and obtained from Wendell Heaton and other boys the broken pottery they dug up from the Indian ruins south of the monument. "There were six dug up. Got five broken ones, most of which were broken while digging them up and they were very nice ones, if whole," Leonard Heaton wrote in his journal. [1692] On July 26 Carl Jepson and another ranger from Zion visited the monument to go through the fort and provide ideas on how it should be furnished. The decision was made to display Indian material in cases in the north room of the east cabin. Heaton padlocked the room's door to secure the collection. [1693]

In early August 1958, Heaton learned that $20,000 had been allotted for repairs to historic structures, but he had not yet been told how the money could be spent. At Franke's request, Heaton worked up a long list of possible projects and forwarded it to the regional office. That month Zion's electrical engineer came to assess the monument's needs and to lay out its electrical system. In early August Jim McKown worked on preparing a new self-guided tour pamphlet. It then went to Zion for Carl Jepson's review and approval and for printing. When McKown picked up the printed leaflets later that month, he discovered 20 or more mistakes included, thanks to Jepson's editorial revisions.

On August 30, 1958, Regional Director Hugh Miller made an inspection visit at the monument. He later described the rearranged fort display as "greatly improved" since he had last seen it. He also agreed that the archeological materials and blacksmith and carpenter tools in the "old quarters" (east cabin) deserved to be included "in some form" in the monument's interpretive program. [1694] He noted a lack of museum storage space on the monument, but expected that to be corrected with the building of a new visitor center, which was included in the Mission 66 plan. Miller went over the monument's development plans with Heaton, who had only one objection and that was to the relocation of the utility area. Heaton wanted it to remain where it was. In his later inspection report to Director Wirth, Miller had the following to say:

The primary function at Pipe Spring is the protection of the old fort and the interpretation of its history to monument visitors. The area elicits real visitor interest.... However, we have a long way to go here. How far we should go and can succeed in developing the fort as a house museum is open to question. I am inclined to like Mr. Steen's suggestion that we furnish a few rooms carefully as a starter and withhold the rest of the fort from the public, opening it only as really adequate furnishings can be provided.... I know this matter is being studied both by officials of Zion National Park and in the Regional Office and that progress will be made. It has remained quiescent as a project far too long except for Acting Superintendent Heaton's indefatigable efforts to accumulate authentic historic objects.... Mr. Heaton's interest is genuine and enthusiastic.

Pipe Spring is an oasis in the desert which it would be a pleasure to visit even if it had not history. With the delightful story which can be presented there, it seems to me that it cannot fail to become increasingly popular. Its future will be affected also by the construction of the road from Hurricane to Fredonia... which we expect to be built within the next three years. [1695]

Assistant Superintendent Art Thomas was appointed superintendent at Mesa Verde National Park, effective September 1, 1958. His replacement was Charles E. Humberger. On September 6, 1958, Landscape Architect Ronald Mortimore, and Engineers Paul J. Garber and Ralph Stratton (all Western Division, Office of Design and Construction, or WODC) arrived at the monument to make plans for surveying the monument for development purposes. A Park Service engineer also arrived two days later to look over the proposed alignment for the new bypass road south of the monument. On September 19 the monument received a visit from Utah State officials, Senator Arthur V. Watkins and Governor George D. Clyde. On September 30 Engineers Stratton and Mortimore returned to the monument with Park Engineer Ed Bossler. The men spent three days conducting surveys for utilities, service roads, and buildings.

On September 13, 1958, the monument's diesel generator broke down. A Zion mechanic tried to fix it but was unable to. While waiting several weeks for parts for the diesel plant, the Heatons and McKown used a noisy, gasoline-powered backup plant. The backup plant's motor fluctuated so much that it burnt out light bulbs and nearly burned out the motor on the Heaton's refrigerator. Heaton worked on the diesel plant for over a month trying to locate the problem.

Heaton went to Zion for the staff meeting and supplies in early October 1958 and later wrote in his journal, "It was cut short so the fellows could listen to the World Series baseball game. Wish there was such a game every staff meeting." [1696] Architect Wilkenson (WODC) and Park Engineer Bossler came out to the monument on October 10 to go over development plans for monument. McKown worked during October and November on cataloguing additions to the museum's collection. (In the spring of 1959, Regional Curator Franklin G. Smith lauded McKown's accessioning as "a model for museum records.") On November 2, 1958, Regional Architect Ken Saunders, Regional Archeologist Charlie Steen, and Assistant Superintendent Humberger visited the monument to discuss the fort's rehabilitation needs. The monument was authorized to spend $16,700 on projects and the money had to be spent by June 30, 1959. Steen was assigned the task of preparing a priority list. Heaton began work on locating carpenters, masons, and laborers to do the work. Ray Mose was rehired in December. Heaton also arranged that month for carpenter Clair Ford of Kanab to work on the upcoming fort restoration project and agreed to hire Wesley McAllister by the hour to make repairs to antique furnishings. He planned to hire additional laborers as needed from Moccasin.