An Interview with Robert M. Utley on the History of Historic Preservation in the National Park Service—1947-1980

AN INTERVIEW WITH ROBERT M. UTLEY ON THE HISTORY OF HISTORIC PRESERVATION IN THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE—1947-1980
by Richard W. Sellars and Melody Webb
September 24, 1985 - December 27, 1985

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This is Tape 14—December 19, 1985

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Bob: We were talking about good interpretation and bad, and lest I be labelled totally a negativist, we stopped a year or so ago at Wilson's Creek Battlefield in Missouri. We both concluded, Melody and I, that in all respects the interpretation was very good. The new visitor center is small, but it is a fine mix of mood-setting and literal interpretation, with labels, and the whole presentation focuses on one of these new fiber optics maps, which I found very effective. The onsite interpretation was good too, with a logical tour around the battlefield and good onsite interpretation.

Dick: What is your impression of the Gettysburg electric map?

Bob: I can't remember whether I've seen the new one or not. Yes, I have, that's the fiber optics. It is great too.

Dick: Bob, would you explain how and when the Service embraced living history, and do you feel living history was an outgrowth of a desire to bring life to our historic sites?

Bob: Yes, I think maybe we have already recounted how George Hartzog almost accidentally originated living history at Hubbell Trading Post by committing the Park Service, in legislative hearings, and without any prior discussion within the staff, to continuing the trading post as a living trading post. He is very proud of that. We had dinner with him just last week, and he was boasting about the origins of living history at Hubbell Trading Post, and I believe this is where it did originate. In my judgment, that is the only place where living history has been almost beyond criticism and highly effective. I was appalled at the time, I could not see Navajos exhibiting themselves to the travelling public in the trading ritual. But apparently it has worked and it's successful. And it did indeed originate, as he put it, in his determination not to have another dead and embalmed historical area. He wanted historical areas to have life, and interpretation just took that sentiment and with his unqualified backing ran with the idea and inflicted living history on the Park Service to the degree that any superintendent who didn't have living history was judged adversely. Many of the living history demonstrations were harmless, and probably they did some good. But the way this thing fastened itself on the Park Service like an octopus was bad overall for the cause of interpretation. Living history became a be-all and end-all in itself, an entertainment program increasingly divorced from the resource it was supposed to illuminate, and something that was expected at every Park Service area whether it was needed or not, or whether it was effective or not, or whether it was relevant or not. I guess as much as anything my criticisms focused on irrelevance. What possible relevance was there to the Battle of Saratoga of a woman sitting in front of one of the cabins making candles. This has nothing to do with the Battle of Saratoga. I remember criticizing in vociferous terms the sorghum-making operation at Chickamauga Battlefield. They had mules pulling that grinder around and grinding sorghum. The explanation of the superintendent was that she wanted to demonstrate that Chickamauga was not always a blood-soaked battlefield. Well of course Chickamauga is in the Park System not because it was not always a blood-soaked battlefield but precisely because it was. And so therefore you interpret the blood-soaking process and sorghum-making has nothing whatever to do with it. More and more living history came to be a demonstration of folkways, and old ways of doing things, whether they had anything to do with the park or not.

Dick: Furthermore, it is fairly evident that the park was not always blood soaked.

Bob: Sure, people need not have to be told that.

Dick: The Granite Farm at Gettysburg attempts the same thing.

Bob: The Granite Farm has been one big continuing battle ever since it was instituted. The present superintendent, who has been there for many years, is just as dedicated to it now, as I found out last week in the East, as he was in the beginning. People enjoy looking at the way things were done on Grandpa's farm. You can't see that everywhere now. Grandpa's farm no longer has all those things, and it is interesting to see them once more. But that is inappropriate at Gettysburg. It is irrelevant to Gettysburg, where you have so much of great significance that you cannot interpret it all properly because the visitor's attention span won't permit it. They ran a survey there recently in which they discovered that the typical visitor spends something like half a day or a full day at Gettysburg, and comparing that with all the major features at Gettysburg, and how long it takes on the average to view each, it was obvious that the visitor wasn't coming anywhere close to visiting even the major features. And when you spread his half-day visit to include Granite Farm, it is not just irrelevant but a distraction too. It is an interference with, a detraction from, the major features of the battlefield.

Dick: Bob, other than Hubbell, what are some examples of good living history programs that come to mind?

Bob: None come to mind. I have no real problem with firing demonstrations at Fort Davis. For a time they went out in their calvary uniforms and fired a carbine. So long as it's kept in proper perspective, it's ok. So long as it is not permitted to overwhelm the principal resource and the principal significance that you want the visitor to take away, it's ok. As for major living history programs, I can't think of a single one other than Hubbell Trading Post that I would say is not distractive and is relevant enough to justify the expense.

Melody: At Fort Davis, what you're capturing there the life of a fort. No really significant historic event happened at Fort Davis. It is mostly a matter that the fabric was there to preserve and by some measure you can possibly justify living history there because you have a chance to capture what a frontier fort was like.

Bob: The life of the fort is a major part of the story, but the story and the significance of Fort Davis are not confined by the boundaries of the fort, and so what you interpret are lots of things that happened elsewhere but happened because Fort Davis was there. Same at Fort Union. When living history demonstrations overwhelm the Victorio Campaign at Fort Davis, or the Civil War story at Fort Union, then they get in the way. But I've never objected much to what they have done at Fort Davis. Generally this Region has kept things pretty well in perspective. It's the eastern Regions where they have let it run away with them.

Dick: Would you say that generally the parks whose purpose focuses on a more vernacular kind of theme, such as a trading post with the daily comings and goings of the Indians, would lend themselves to living history more than, say, a battlefield?

Bob: To some degree, but you probably have Bent's Fort in mind, and there are plenty of significant things associated with Bent's Fort that you want the visitor to take away other than how they made buffalo stew or how the mountain man primed his rifle. My favorite one is the bread-making operation at Pecos National Monument. I've never been able to understand the relevance to the missionary and Indian story of making bread and selling it. But I have to concede that bread making at Pecos is very popular with the visitor, and most visitors buy some bread and take it down the road with them. And what is it that's going on inside the automobile as they drive down the road? They're not talking about the Pueblo Revolt of 1680; they are eating warm bread. Eating warm bread is a very fine experience, but that is not the dominant impression you want the visitor to take away from Pecos National Monument.

Dick: Have you ever bought any biscochitos at Pecos?

Bob: Yes, I think so.

Melody: We bought bread.

Bob: We bought bread, okay. It was very good bread. But then I already knew what the significance of Pecos was.

Dick: Bob, would you care to comment on why, during the 60's and 70's, living history came into the Park Service? Was it tied to anything outside the Park Service that was going on?

Bob: No, on the contrary. I think what happened outside the Park Service took off from what happened in the Park Service. I think this living history craze spread from the Park Service into the state and local sector and out into the private sector too, and really no historic site could be considered complete during those years without its living history program. I think that all started with George Hartzog and Hubbell Trading Post.

Melody: What about Williamsburg.

Bob: I don't think Hubbell Trading Post took any of its inspiration from Williamsburg, and I don't think the craze that swept the country took off from Williamsburg either. I think Williamsburg tended to be more of an isolated phenomenon. I may be wrong.

Dick: I think I would disagree with that.

Melody: I disagree with you too, because I remember that during the mid-60's and early 70's there was a television program called "Williamsburg," in which they recaptured the life of Williamsburg and at the same time told the history of its preservation, and it was a fascinating story.

Bob: Well I guess I have to back off with you too, because now that you mention it I remember New Salem in Illinois. They had some of that sort of thing there too. So you're right, it is connected to other things that went on.

Dick: Old Sturbrige Village would be another example of that.

Melody: And Plymouth Plantation.

Dick: In fact, I think in a lot of ways interpretation in the Park Service, and also to some degree preservation in the Park Service, when the overall history is done would have to tie in with the outdoor museum movement.

Bob: Yes, you are right. But I wanted to point out that all of the examples we've mentioned are outdoor museums, and that goes back a long way and has its origins in Europe. And I'm not sure we're talking about entirely the same thing, when we talk about living history in the Park Service, as what is done at Salem or Sturbridge Village or Williamsburg. There probably is a connection,and there probably is some inspiration coming out of these outdoor museums, but I think what the Park Service then did with it was to democratize it, to capsulize it at all of its parks in ways that to me are less legitimate than what was done at New Salem or Sturbrige Village, because these are legitimate portrayals of a past way of life that not only are relevant to the site but are the whole message of the site.

Dick: It ties back into their being somewhat closer to the vernacular.

Bob: That's right.

Dick: Now Old Sturbrige Village, for example, is not built on the original village site.

Bob: No it's an outdoor museum whose purpose is to interpret to the public the way life was at a given time. And that activity takes place on a stage that has been erected for the purpose. Right? And this is something different than Petersburg, where you have a genuine battlefield, where two armies fought, and where to have an artillery firing demonstration of weapons that didn't play much of a role in the Battle of Petersburg is of doubtful relevance and certainly distracting effect.

Dick: Bob, let's talk a little about the definition of living history. It seems to have a sort of a vague definition among Park Service rank and file. Would you discuss your views of what it is?

Bob: I guess I have tended unfairly to lump all costumed living activity as living history. The interpreters do make a distinction between demonstrations, whether firing weapons or making candles or other craft activities, on the one hand, and the so-called role-playing, on the other hand. An example of what has been counted successful role-playing is the Confederate soldier at Appomattox, who sits there as if it were April 11, 1865. This effort is never to step out of his role and by word or deed convey anything later than April 11, 1865. We recently were at Sutter's Fort in Sacramento, where the interpreters for the State of California do the same thing. They are costumed denizens of Sutter's Fort, and there is no way in your conversation with them that you can blast them out of the historic period and into the future to acknowledge, for example, the existence of automobiles and other modern conveniences. This to me is just sheer nonsense. It doesn't convey anything worth conveying in the historic sense. It is a play game in which the interpreter sees if he can outwit the visitor and not be removed from his historic role. The truth of the matter is that the sensations of the past cannot be recaptured today. And this is what these people think they are doing. This is what they would have you believe they are doing. What was cold to the people at Sutter's Fort is not cold to us today, because there were differing conceptions of cold, having to do with the clothing that they wore then and we wear now, having to do with central heating (and I believe Sutter's Fort is probably now centrally heated), having to do with the electric blankets that we sleep under and that the interpreter sleeps under when he goes to bed at night. Distance is another conception. What is distance to us today driving from here to Fort Union in an automobile, in which it takes us an hour and a half, was a totally different perception to the Santa Fe Trail driver who took his ox team from here to Fort Union in about three to four days. So there is no way you can recapture these things, and it is dishonest to imply, or to state, that you can, as these role-playing living-history interpreters do. I think this is dying out somewhat. I hope in the Park Service it is, because it is basically dishonest.

Dick: What you are saying is that not only we as the people who present these sites, but the visitors as well, are locked into the 20th century.

Bob: Absolutely, and there is no way that you can get out of that lock in the most elemental of human perceptions. Where we end up is that I am making a distinction, in terms of my approval, between role-playing living-history and demonstrations where they are relevant, where they are kept in proper perspective. So that they are not distractive. Where they are supportive of the main thrust of interpretation I have no problem. Role-playing in living history I oppose on principle.

Dick: Bob, do you feel that the Park Service is responsive to changing trends in historiography?

Bob: I think it is a mixed bag. The Park Service should reflect the latest historical study in its interpretation and its presentation. Park Service should always be able to document for the inquiring visitor every aspect of its interpretation. So if, because of new research, we view Gettsyburg differently than we did ten years ago, interpretation should adjust. Your best illustration is Chalmette, where you have discovered evidence that totally changes your interpretation of the Battle of New Orleans,and you would be remiss in your obligations if you did not adjust your interpretation at Chalmette to account for that. Where interpretation is not keeping up with research, it is a lapse on the part of the Park Service. But there is another dimension that probably ought to be folded in here, and that is changing interpretation to reflect or accommodate to changing public attitudes. You may be aware of this fellow Bob Hart down at Las Cruces, who is taking Custer Battlefield as his subject, to discover the ways in which National Park Service interpretation of that site has changed over the years, not to accommodate new findings, although that would probably be part of it, but to accommodate new perceptions of the Indian Wars and Custer and of the military on the frontier as reflected in public attitudes that grew out of the Vietnam War and the Red Power movement and so forth. And I think you might find that, subtly and in unplanned ways, Park Service interpretation has changed at other sites to accommodate public expectations. During the Vietnam War you had problems at some of your Civil War battlefields, not only with the visiting public but with some of your own interpreters. At Gettysburg there was a man who insisted upon using his Park Service position as a platform for denouncing war. In the context of the Battle of Gettysburg. So this is probably a subsurface problem related to the one you are talking about, because historiography changes with public attitudes.

Dick: A study of the changing interpretation at Custer seems to me a valuable one, and one that could be an interesting topic for any number of parks.

Bob: That's right. Any park where you have the slavery element in your story, obviously you're going to have changing interpretation reflecting changed attitudes in this nation towards blacks, towards Jim Crow.

Dick: Or Indian elements.

Bob: Indians likewise.

Dick: On page 74 of your interview with Herb Evison you make the point that the Cammarer administration allowed direct communication between the park historian and the Washington Office. Was the administration organized differently then, or was Cammarer simply more liberal in allowing such communication?

Bob: For most of his administration there was a different organization in that there were no Regional Offices. The management line went directly from the Director to the superintendent, which would have made this kind of professional communication much easier than now, when there is the intervening Regional Office. I think, too, the Park Service was much smaller, and everybody knew everybody else. The professional arm of the Park Service tended to have more respect from management than today, so that what the historians said was gospel, and there was not the tendency to ignore or contest it from line management that you have today. It was just a smaller and more informal organization. This kind of direct communication would be considered today by just about everyone, including myself, as subversive to the accepted cannons of good management. In an organization of the complexity and size of the Park Service, you could not tolerate that sort of thing in any sense other than functional communication that does no violence to line management.

Dick: Bob, would you tell why you think Hartzog decided the Regions did not need Regional Historians?

Bob: There was a period of two or three years in which there was no Regional Historian in any region. Some of them got reclassified as something else. In his first years as Director, George took a precise view of management flow and personnel allocation. He believed that there ought not to be duplication of effort anywhere. He had personal experience in this as superintendent at Jefferson National Expansion Memorial. He had Bill Everhart and a bevy of research historians. The last thing he figured he needed was Regional Historian Merrill Mattes up in Omaha telling him what to do in history, because he had his own historians. And he carried it out. He didn't believe that you needed a Chief Historian in Washington telling Regional Historians what to do so they could look over the shoulders of park historians. And this was precisely the terms he put it in. Most of the big parks where there was historical responsibility had park historians. He felt it was a duplication of effort, it was not cost effective, and it was confusing to have someone second-guessing the park historian as he had been second-guessed at JNEM. It didn't seem to have any impact when I countered with the argument that well, then, you don't need Howard Baker as the Regional Director in Omaha second-guessing you as the superintendent at JNEM, do you? He couldn't make that transference. Obviously what you are dealing with here is a very special person, George Hartzog at JNEM, who didn't want anybody second-guessing him. That was his park and anyone from outside was interference. But if you're going to take his experience and translate it into the general proposition that there ought not to be any Regional Historians overseeing the park historians, logically you have to go the next step and say there ought not to be any Regional Director overseeing the superintendent in his management. But he just laughed that off. In fact, it was a gut reaction of George Hartzog not appreciating Merrill Mattes serving as guardian of the historic resources in George's park, JNEM. And of course, of all parks in the System, that one needed somebody from Omaha overseeing what happened because there wasn't always the best judgment exercised. Probably the last park in the System that had a historian with independent judgment and clout was JNEM. Any advice George got from his park historian that ran counter to what he wanted to do, I am sure he rejected it. But happily he came to see the error of his approach, or at least I think he did. I think he had some bad experiences that resulted from bad decisions on the park level that were not caught in the Regional Office because there was no one there to catch them.

Melody: Also how about E. O. 11593?

Bob: Yes, that all came to fruition under the unfolding program under the National Historic Preservation Act.

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