Big Hole National Battlefield Administrative History

Chapter Four:
Management of Cultural and Natural Resources

From the early years of Park Service administration at Big Hole Battlefield National Monument rangers integrated cultural- and natural-resource management. In 1947, the Park Service prohibited grazing within the monument boundaries. "In an area of 200 acres," Chief Ranger Barrows argued, "it seems that all grazing should be prohibited if we are going to preserve original conditions" – as they defined the cultural rather than the historic scene. [52] Efforts for further restriction continued through the 1950s, with continued (and unsuccessful) attempts to fence the monument "as a protection against cattle grazing in the surrounding forest. Much damage has been noted, not only to the area in general, but to the battlefield in particular."

Park Service officials continued to debate the merits and advisability of visitor and administrative facilities that encroached upon the Siege Area, threatening physical integrity and disturbing the historic scene. Similarly, they resisted the frequent requests for expansion of campground and picnicking facilities, arguing that the battlefield was of historical rather than recreational importance, and that the Park Service should encourage visitors to seek camping and picnicking facilities on the Forest Service land that adjoined the monument to the east and west. Facilities remained limited to a small six-unit campground dating to the Forest Service tenure. This campground was later determined to be inconsistent with the master plan for development and was removed. [53]

Beyond the land base, cultural resources recognized and protected by the Park Service were limited to the lodgepole pine, riddled with bullets during the prolonged siege of the entrenched soldiers and savaged by the pine beetle blight of the 1910s and 1920s. In 1935, Forest Service officials "topped" the dead and dying bullet-scarred trees, creating a false and unhealthy natural environment while attempting to preserve cultural relics. By the 1950s, these trunks, most as tall as 10', were also collapsing. "The most urgent of all recommended projects," wrote Seasonal Ranger Ted Hackett, "is the preservation of the numerous standing tree trunks that are the remains of the trees which stood during the battle. These bullet-scarred tree trunks are one of the few evidences of the historic battle, and their presence creates an atmosphere that takes the visitor back to the time of the battle." In an effort to preserve the trunks, the Park Service cemented the root bases. While these efforts preserved the trees as artifacts, they also created unhealthy and unnatural forest conditions and a visual scene markedly different from that at the time of the battle. By the 1980s, the Park Service and Forest Service would cooperate on "reconstruction" of the Siege and Horse-Pasture areas to more natural and historically accurate growth patterns. [54]