CRATER LAKE National Park Cultural Landscape Recommendations: Park Headquarters at Munson Valley

The Munson Valley Historic District was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1988 as part of a multiple resource nomination for Crater Lake National Park. The following statement of significance and integrity draws on information from the National Register nomination form, a Historic American Building Survey report documenting the district, and the "Analysis and Evaluation" section of this document.

Although Crater Lake was established as the nation's sixth national park in 1902, development of an administrative headquarters for the park did not occur until 1926. During this time, a camp located in upper Munson Valley and used by the Corps road crews, gained increased use as summer headquarters for National Park Service employees. Over the next fifteen years at the Government Camp site, the park embarked on one of the most ambitious rustic architecture programs ever undertaken by the National Park Service. Designers transformed an open landscape of infertile pumice soils into an administrative complex comprised of three distinct areas of use. Native stone building construction, use of indigenous plant materials, and careful siting of structures resulted in a highly manipulated designed landscape that was "naturalistic" in character.

Landscape architects Thomas Vint, Merel Sager, and Francis Lange were key practitioners of the Rustic style and influential in shaping the Munson Valley landscape. Their drawings, photographs, and monthly project completion reports provide a wealth of detailed formation about the site's development and insight into the philosophy of non-intrusive design known as Rustic. Landscape architects Sager and Lange directed general construction and landscape work on the site using Civilian Conservation Corps and Emergency Conservation Work crews. Their responsibilities were far-reaching ranging from design and construction supervision of trails and grading, and finishing portions of Rim Drive, to supervising major construction projects at the Rim and Munson Valley. The park's "naturalization" program, instituted by Sager, was implemented throughout the park, creating a consistent and cohesive appearance in all the developed areas. Lange continued implementation of the program through additional planting and maintenance of those materials.

By 1941, the Munson Valley area was "home to the most concentrated and coherent expression of Rustic Architecture in the park." The structures and related landscape formed one of the most extensive developments ever undertaken by the Park Service using this type of naturalistic design.(5)

The Munson Valley Historic District, designed and built between 1926-1941, is significant as a historic designed landscape under National Register Criterion A: for its association with events that made significant contributions to the broad patterns of history; under Criterion B: for its association with the lives of persons significant in our past; under Criterion C: for the distinctive characteristics of a type, period or method of design; and under Criterion D: for the important historic information the site has yielded and is likely to yield.

CRITERION A:
Munson Valley is integrally linked to efforts by the National Park Service to develop, manage and protect the natural recreational resources of one of our oldest national parks. Extant landform and major features, such as stone curbing, trails and roads both contribute to the rustic character of the district. Enough components of the designed landscape survive to demonstrate the nature of park planning and construction of the rustic idiom developed during the late 1920's and 1930's which strove to tie rustic-style buildings to their environment. Landscape design development and construction of park headquarters by PWA and CCC crews is representative of a major expansion period in the National Park System made possible under the Hoover administration in the early 1930's and by the New Deal public works programs.

CRITERION B:
The comprehensive expression of Rustic architecture and naturalistic design principles at Munson Valley is in large part due to the early site planning and design development directed by three NPS landscape architects, Thomas Vint, Merel Sager and Francis Lange. Under Vint's direction and influence as chief landscape architect, the Rustic Style and its associated design ethic was brought into national parks throughout the system. Vint was specifically responsible for planning the developed areas in the western national parks and monuments. At Munson Valley early development of Rustic architecture is demonstrated by the extant warehouse, constructed as a result of Vint's 1925 plan for a summer headquarters.

Vint hired Merel Sager to prepare and implement NPS plans for western parks, including Sequoia, Lassen and Crater Lake National Parks. Incorporating the tenets of the Rustic Style, Sager coordinated and directed the construction of large developments at Rim Village and Park Headquarters. Massive boulder construction of headquarters structures characterize the work of Sager, who also oversaw the revegetation and siting of structures and trails. Sager's work provides a design link between developed areas within the park and other parks in the region, including Oregon Caves National Monument. After Sager's direct supervision of Crater Lake construction ceased, his National Park Service career (1928-1953) included a term as chief of Park Planning in National Capitol Parks and as chief landscape architect for the overall park system.

Francis Lange, who began as Sager's assistant and continued as resident landscape architect in the park from 1934 to 1940, had significant impact on the appearance of Park Headquarters. Using PWA and CCC workers, Lange continued the planting program implemented by Sager; designed detail site features and most of the site's now non-extant rustic signs; and began efforts to better adapt Munson Valley structures to winter conditions. Under Lange's direction the designed landscape of Munson Valley Historic District was virtually completed.

CRITERION C:
The designed landscape of Munson Valley is significant nationally as an expression of naturalistic design developed and employed by the National Park Service from the mid-1920's to the early 1940's. The style, commonly referred to as the Rustic Style or NPS Rustic, influenced state park systems and national forests throughout the country. In western mountain parks, buildings were constructed of native materials and incorporated local colors, shapes, and textures: building forms were designed to suit local conditions and environments, and were sited to blend into the surrounding landscape. At Munson Valley, larger site planning efforts and design detailing successfully blend the overall physical development with the natural setting. Principle features of the designed landscape at Munson Valley are: structures sited against a forest backdrop with the appearance of little disturbance to the natural topography, and the economic as well as aesthetic use of native plant materials to present a highly naturalistic looking landscape in terms of massing and grouping. Enhancement and development of views meld key concepts of the Rustic style and naturalistic design into a cohesive landscape composition.

CRITERION D:
The Munson Valley landscape yields important information about the precepts of naturalistic planting design theory and practice as used at Crater Lake National Park. Landscape features of the administrative complex and Superintendent's Residence include spatial organization, site plan, views and visual character all of which remain largely undisturbed. These resources contribute significant information relating to estate (residential) planning concepts prevalent in the 1930's. In addition, the use of native plant materials and natural groupings, and the materials, colors and textures of structures contribute information relating to naturalistic design principles as part of the rustic idiom developed in national parks.

The historic designed landscape of the Munson Valley Historic District possesses integrity of:

Location: The primary structures defining the administrative, maintenance and residential complexes at Munson Valley, including the buildings, circulation system, and vegetation (canopy cover), are in their original location.

Design: The original spatial organization for this site, including land use functions (residential/administration/maintenance) and activities is intact. Though many plant materials have been lost over the years due to natural processes and/or lack of maintenance, the framework of the original planting scheme is still evident.

Setting: The landscape surrounding the Munson Valley Historic District remains virtually intact. From Rim Drive the administrative complex remains visually prominent, and the district's mature forest continues to screen the maintenance and residential structures from the public. The Steel Circle employee housing development, built in the 1960's south of the historic district, is physically separate and does not visually impact the main site. Views to Garfield Peak from the Superintendent's Residence and other areas within the site remain unobscured.

Materials: With the exceptions of snow tunnel additions to the Administration Building and the Ranger Dormitory, and replacement in-kind of building materials during a recent rehabilitation project, structures in Munson Valley remain intact. Existing plant materials are compatible with the historic site although the original plantings are in remnant condition at best.

Workmanship: The buildings of the Munson Valley district are an excellent example of rustic architecture in the park, and represent one of the National Park Service's most ambitious development programs using naturalistic design to guide the improvements.

Feeling: The historic district possesses a distinct presence within the greater landscape context, evoking a sense of the era in which it was designed and created through its buildings, structures, circulation system, materials and organization.

Association: Munson Valley continues to function as it did historically, as headquarters for Crater Lake National Park. The historic district continues to reflect its associations with the CCC and the Rustic Style of design through its buildings, structures, circulation system, materials and organization.

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