The Heavens Peak Fire of 1936 was neither the first nor the most destructive fire in Glacier's history. The first administrative problem confronting Superintendent Logan in 1910 was the hundred thousand acres of park forest then burning. During the first decade of the park's existence, fire became a familiar hazard (one writer estimated that an average of 30,000 acres of forest burned each year). Rangers and fire-fighting crews were kept busy during the 1920s as well, with an average of 5000 acres burning each year. By 1928, the Park Service began studying its fire-fighting procedures and its fire organization. Close study of forest-fire behavior, forest fire fuels, fuel-type mapping, study of travel time to fires, and the like, gave evidence of their effort to control this annual problem which threatened developed areas and the "pristine wilderness" alike. Then, in 1929, a fire near Columbia Falls, some eleven miles from the southwestern boundary of Glacier, raged out of control, ran eastward toward the park, evaded all efforts at control, jumped the Middle Fork of the Flathead, and entered the park. While contemporaries roundly criticized Park Service officials and crews for their niggardly use of equipment, their inability to save private dwellings, and their concern only for government structures, evidence indicated that the magnitude of the Halfmoon Fire, the speed of its approach, and the confusion which it engendered left park officials in an unbelievably difficult position. By the end of the 1929 season, some fifty thousand acres of forest had burned. Most of the Apgar Flats area near Lake McDonald was denuded of its magnificent stand of western redcedar, and only the headquarters area near the Middle Fork was spared. The need for a well-trained, well-equipped fire organization became even more apparent. Thus, during the 1930s, fire training became an annual Park Service task. Criticism notwithstanding, the inability to control fires like the Heavens Peak Fire in 1936, the Curly Bear Fire in 1945, or the Glacier Wall Fire in 1967, lay more in the condition of Glacier's rough topography and in its tinder-dry forests than in its lack of experienced or trained firefighters.

Joe Cosley as a ranger (Courtesy of Glacier National Park Historical Collections)

Concern over park development, various construction projects, or fire fighting, certainly were not the only concern for park officials during the period from 1910 to 1940. The evolution of a trained cadre of park rangers came gradually since most early members of the park force were either local residents or political appointees. An early Glacier legend, which was no doubt slightly exaggerated, indicated that one of these early appointees was so inept that he was told to stay on the Great Northern Railway tracks and patrol the park from there so he would not get lost.

Since Director Mather intended to "get the public excited over national parks," Glacier's rangers had to insure that visitors could enjoy their park stay and travel through the region safely. Fighting fires, searching for poachers, patrolling the back country, and carrying out countless other assignments kept these men busy. Excitement and adventure became a way of life. Examples of their heroics are numerous and their laconic reports revealed either a lack of concern, a lack of time, a certain humility, or possibly a hatred of the bureaucratic paper work. In 1912, the Acting Superintendent R. H. Chapman wrote: "Ranger Cosley [later to become a poacher] . . . when returning to his station after a conference at headquarters, attempted Ahern Pass. While crossing the pass a snow-covered ledge broke off and he narrowly escaped with his life. The horse he was riding and his pack horse were instantly killed, falling hundreds of feet into the canyon beneath." Another brief report in 1933 revealed the experience of Ranger Ben Miller who, while stationed at Walton Ranger Station, was out alone conducting a winter patrol. While on nearby Scalplock Mountain, a snowslide buried Miller and packed him so tightly he could barely move a muscle. Only after frantic tugging and substantial effort was he gradually able to move his arms, remove his pack, dig out around himself, chop off his snowshoes, and free himself from that position. That effort took Miller nearly twenty-four hours. Another such incident occurred in the Belly River area in the 1930s to Ranger Elmer Ness. The brevity of Ness's report displayed an unbelievably succinct account of a three-day struggle for survival against the elements and his effort to overcome a severely broken hip. Ness wrote:

On the fifteenth of November while crossing Gable Pass the writer slipped on a snow bank and slid into a rock with such force that a badly sprained hip was the result. Unable to walk without support of some kind, the writer crawled to the nearest timber, a half-mile away. Two small limber pine were cut and used for crutches. With this aid the remaining three miles were made to the station by the afternoon of the seventeenth. Built a fire and camped each night.

Just as the rangers fought for survival, visitors also began to succumb to the dangerous aspects of Glacier's mountains. While sprains, cuts, and bruises were reported frequently, the first known fatality occurred in 1913 when Dr. Fletcher of Indianapolis was killed by falling ice and snow at the foot of Blackfoot Glacier. From that time on, annual reports noted victims of drowning, falling rocks, slippery snow, falls from cliffs, falls into crevasses, exposure, and the like. The tragedies were bad enough, but on several occasions park visitors simply disappeared. In 1924, two hiking brothers, Joseph and William Whitehead disappeared between Granite Park Chalet and Lake McDonald Lodge never to be seen again. Similarly, Dr. F. H. Lumley disappeared from Goat Haunt Camp near Waterton Lake in 1934 and was never found. As recently as 1963, mountain climber Dave Wilson disappeared from Going-to-the-Sun Mountain and all search efforts proved fruitless. Thus, protecting, rescuing, or finding visitors became a full-time occupation of the ranger force, at least as important as preserving the natural features of the park.

But the natural features of Glacier also drew increasing attention from tourists and the Park Service. As Steven Graham wrote about the park in Tramping with a Poet in the Rockies (1922): "there is a virtue in shoe-leather, virtue in the saddle of a horse. Not much virtue in guides, in hotels. You come to these places to be alone with nature or you do not arrive." Realizing that the visitors should be informed about their natural surroundings, Glacier officials permitted the innovative M. P. Somes to conduct a "Nature Guide Service" near Many Glacier Hotel. On a fee basis, Somes conducted walking tours and gave lectures. Somes generated interest in the "nature guide" idea but he supposedly aggravated a number of visitors for some nebulous reason. The following year, Morton J. Elrod of the University of Montana, gained government support and initiated another interpretive service which included displays at the hotels, trained biologists acting as guides, and regularly scheduled lectures. Elrod's government-sponsored free service forced Somes out of business and the "ranger naturalist" concept began in Glacier. Under Elrod, and later under Dr. George Ruhle, a wide variety of services developed, including daily hikes to the glaciers as well as evening songfests, floral displays in the hotels, museums, pamphlets, tour guides, and instructive material to help the visitor better understand the natural features of the park. The innovative program begun by Somes and adopted by the Park Service grew substantially in popularity during the 1920s, so that in 1929, Superintendent J. Ross Eakin created the position of Chief Park Naturalist and appointed Dr. Ruhle to serve in that capacity. Seasonal and permanent naturalists added substantial meaning and integrity to the national park experience enjoyed by thousands of annual visitors.

During Glacier's first decades as a national park, the ranger force consisted of men scattered at outposts around its periphery. From these ranger stations frequent patrols could he made into the park or along its boundaries insuring some element of protection against infringements like poaching, grazing, illegal fishing, vandalism, or forest fires. In addition, these rangers acted as fee collectors at entrance stations, information dispensers, trail clearers, and were described as "a one-man work force." Typical of these early rangers was Chauncey ("Chance") Beebe, employed from 1917 to 1920. An early homesteader in the North Fork region, Ranger Beebe became particularly skilled in predatory animal control and was stationed with his wife, Eva, and young children at Two Medicine, St. Mary, and Many Glacier Ranger Stations. In the same areas rangers were expected to guard, they found leisure-time attractions abundant. (Courtesy of Eva (Mrs. Chance) Beebe)

Wildlife management meant killing undesirable animals like mountain lions, coyotes, or other predators. It would also mean feeding the animals which visitors enjoyed seeing, such as deer and bear. Today, incidents of deer and bear feeding sometimes occur, but feeding is strictly discouraged by the National Park Service. Predatory animals are no longer eliminated. (Courtesy of Burlington Northern, Inc.)

So the first thirty years of Glacier National Park not only became a period of construction by the government and the hotel company, and a period of evolution for rangers, fire-control specialists, and naturalists, but it also became a period of experimentation, of trial and error, in determining the proper uses and protection of this national park. The experimentation reflected the conservation attitudes of their day as well as the promotional efforts attempted; only a few are necessary to provide adequate examples. As early as 1912, certain park animals were selected as "worthy" of protection from other park animals; so coyotes, mountain lions, and other "predators" were systematically destroyed by hired hunters. That practice also included wolves by 1918, and, as one observer noted: "They are rarely seen even by hunters and trappers, unless caught in traps, and their presence in the park contributes nothing to the interest of those visiting the region." Director Mather noted that in 1922 the Blackfoot Indians continued their "unauthorized killing of elk of the east side of the Park," and on the same page recorded that hunting success in Glacier resulted in "31 mountain lions" being killed. Deer- and bear-feeding areas appeared at various times during these years to protect more well-liked or "interesting" animals from the depredations of nature. Stocking the park lakes with fish, providing summer cottage sites, using meadows for raising hay, grazing cattle during World War I, advocating the reintroduction of buffalo herds on the east side of the park, treating tree diseases like blister rust, fighting forest insect infestations, allowing a boys' camp (called Skyland Camp) at Bowman Lake, all of which were promoted, some of which were developed, and all of which were later abandoned, gave some indication of the experimentation which occurred.

Information for visitors gradually became more available. Museums, information tents, nature-guide services, and finally, during the 1920s, ranger-naturalists supplied informative tidbits for the inquiring public. (Courtesy of Glacier National Park Historical Collections)

Another major experiment which affected Glacier was also to affect many other national parks. The program was part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal and was called the Civilian Conservation Corps. In 1933, almost immediately after this program's enactment, young men from all over the United States were organized into work crews in camps in national parks and forests. Responding to the Depression economy and vast unemployment, Roosevelt intended this labor to enhance the conservation of natural resources while providing a livelihood for indigent young men. Nationwide, over a thousand camps organized by the Army employed some three hundred thousand young men, and in Glacier some sixteen hundred enrollees arrived and eight camps were established in 1933.

The CCC camps supplied the labor for numerous projects which the Park Service officials designated and supervised. Camp members who were stationed near the Apgar Flats area cut the old snags remaining from the 1929 fire, sawed them into logs, or lumber, and eventually cleaned up much of that burned-over region. By 1936, almost two hundred and fifty railroad cars of lumber had been shipped out of the park. Spike camps at locations such as Kintla Lake, Nyack Creek, Walton, Two Medicine, and Many Glacier, became engaged in trail building, roadside cleanup, campground construction, and many other projects. Most of these young men had never been in the mountains before, some had never been out of their home town, and Glacier provided a multitude of projects to keep them active.

Superintendent E. T. Scoyen and other park officials found this an opportune time to engage in construction or maintenance activity which they never had funds or employees enough to attempt before. The 1930s became a time of great efforts in landscaping, building construction, new water-supply and sewer-system development, as well as fence, bridge, campground, and trail construction. The CCC crews also provided readily available manpower for fighting forest fires, for building firebreaks, and for assisting in the general administrative tasks of the park. The CCC remained in Glacier until 1941, and with allied programs like the Works Progress Administration, marked one of the more concentrated efforts toward construction and development in Glacier's history.

Thus, by 1940, Glacier was transformed into a national park adapted to the needs of its visitors. If the visitor wanted to ride a horse, the Glacier Park Saddle Horse Company gladly provided the steeds and the guides. If the visitor wanted to sample Glacier's interior, the Glacier Park Transport Company gladly let the "jammer" drive the visitor over the newly opened Going-to-the-Sun Road. If the visitor wanted to go into Canada, he could not only stay at the beautiful Prince of Wales Hotel, but he could also ride back and forth across the border on Waterton Lake's "International" launch. He could camp at newly developed campgrounds; he could feel safe that no mountain lions or wolves would attack him; and he could rest easy, for the rangers and the fire fighters were on watch. If he desired to be entertained or informed, he could attend the "ranger naturalist" walks and talks. If he wanted exercise, he could rent a rowboat, attend a dance at one of the hotels, or hike any of the thousand miles of park trails. By 1940, the visitor in Glacier had almost every possible desire fulfilled, and a national park besides.

(Courtesy of Glacier National Park Historical Collections)