Mojave Administrative History

Interpretation

While the law enforcement rangers and park firefighters provide protection for both visitors and resources, interpretive rangers are charged with explaining those resources to the visiting public. Interpretive programs at Mojave National Preserve face special challenges that stem from the nature of the park itself. The single most important factor shaping interpretation in the Preserve is the desire of the public, codified in the General Management Plan, to have a "sense of exploration and discovery" in the park. This means fewer signs and less development, especially off paved roads. With fewer signs giving visitors information, the interpretive focus is instead directed toward portable media, such as brochures. During BLM management of the area, a "sense of discovery" was a clearly stated goal of bureau interpretive programs for the East Mojave National Scenic Area. The same phrase was used in the earliest articulation of BLM management philosophy for the EMNSA in 1981. The "sense of discovery" was a useful concept for several reasons. BLM did not have and could not expect the kinds of resources for interpretation that are taken for granted at most national parks, so a minimum of signs and a "sense of discovery" were easier to achieve given extant financial resources. This laissez-faire interpretive approach also fit appropriately with the other elements in BLM's multiple use mission. If visitors were required to be at least partially self-reliant, fewer intrusive spectators would result, and other users of the landscape would be less likely to be disturbed. Those other users of the land, especially ranchers and miners, still held much of the power in the BLM, and the less antagonistic they were toward BLM's new recreation programs, the better. A "sense of exploration and discovery" continued, deliberately or otherwise, as the Park Service's approach to the area after passage of the California Desert Protection Act in 1994. At first, a lack of funding precluded other systematic approaches, but even after resources increased, it was clear that visitors preferred the Preserve to remain underdeveloped. The Advisory Commission, among others, helped steer the park in that direction during the formulation of the General Management Plan, and specific language to that effect was inserted in the preferred alternative, which was eventually adopted by the park. [300]

This approach, combined with a lack of dollars for interpretation programs, meant that the landscape of the Preserve has not seen much development for interpretive purposes since the Park Service received the territory. As of 2002, of four hiking trails in the Preserve, only one was created by the Park Service; the only point inside the park staffed with interpretive rangers on a regular basis, the visitors' center at Hole-in-the-Wall, was built by BLM (as were the two campgrounds nearby, the only ones in the Preserve); and some BLM interpretive signs were still in place in remote locations. [301]

Illustration 18 - The Spanish-Revival style Kelso Depot is an architectural landmark in the heart of Mojave National Preserve. (Photo by Eric Nystrom, 2001.)

Beginning in 1999, interpretation began to receive more attention at Mojave National Preserve. Chief Ranger McGuinness requested funding for the development of an interpretive plan, and the Pacific West Region identified it as a major priority. Sam Vaughn, a planner from the Denver Service Center, was detailed to lead the project, in cooperation with Lynn Nakata, of the Pacific-Great Basin Support Office. Vaughn led several meetings to receive input, beginning in April 1999 and continuing through March 2001. During these meetings, Vaughn, Mojave staff, and community members worked to identify interpretive themes and recommendations of ways of putting those themes into practice. At the same time, interpretation personnel discussed plans for the Kelso Depot. Since the complex exhibits slated for the Kelso Depot were planned simultaneously with the park's Long Range Interpretive Plan (LRIP), the park's major interpretive presence will closely align with the LRIP's goals.

The Long Range Interpretive Plan, published in penultimate draft form in mid-2001, identifies six primary interpretive themes, describes prominent park resources, and lays out preferred interpretive tools. The primary interpretive themes identified by the plan are deliberately broad, and encapsulate almost everything that makes the Preserve a special place. [302] Park resources described in the interpretive plan include all of the classically awe-inspiring sites of Mojave National Preserve: specific wonders such as the Cima Dome, Kelso Dunes, and Cinder Cones areas, and vast landscapes like the Lanfair Valley and Soda Lake. The LRIP identified a "sense of discovery and exploration" as one of several goals for visitors, another pledged that one function of Mojave's interpretive program was to orient visitors to the unusual desert environment. The plan called for interpretive programs and media only in the few existing developed areas in the park, and for wayside exhibits to be kept to a minimum outside pulloffs and trailheads. [303] When plans come to fruition in 2003, the Kelso Depot will become the focal point of interpretive activities in Mojave National Preserve. The depot was still operational and open for business when the East Mojave National Scenic Area was established in 1980, and between its closing in 1985 and its eventual acquisition by BLM in 1992, one of the chief arguments for the depot's salvation was its suitability as a visitors' center. BLM never had enough funding or time to convert the building into the center that they wanted, but the bureau made stabilization of the depot a priority. In 1993, the agency repaired the roof, constructed a fence around the building, repaired damaged stucco, and installed plexiglass over the windows, which ensured the continued structural integrity of the depot. [304] The Park Service made the building's conversion into a functioning visitors' center an articulated priority in the General Management Plan. With help from Jerry Lewis, the Congressman who tried to kill the Preserve with a dollar budget in 1995 but who was also instrumental in saving the depot from the wrecking ball in 1985 and repairing the building in 1993, the park was able to secure over five million dollars in FY01 funding to restore the building. Lewis's deep concern with the history of the eastern Mojave benefited the park in the push to restore the depot. Because of extenuating circumstances, the restoration was postponed several times. On May 31, 2002, the park finalized the contract for restoration with Pacific General, Inc., a contractor experienced with NPS restoration projects, and actual work on the depot began in July 2002. [305]

One potential problem with the plan to restore the depot was the building's location in a floodplain. Executive Order 11988 directed federal agencies to avoid development in and modification of floodplains when possible. Since the General Management Plan alternative preferred by the National Park Service included restoration and stabilization of the depot, Mojave planners created a Floodplain Statement of Findings for the Kelso Depot and included it with both draft environmental impact statements issued by the planning team. Additionally, a copy was included along with the official Record of Decision for the General Management Plan, signed by NPS Pacific West Regional Director John Reynolds in late September 2001. [306]

The document noted the high risk of damage if the existing levee were to erode or vanish. Computer models showed that if flood waters broke through the levee along the Kelso-Cima Road to the east, the downhill slope and the railroad berm would serve to channel the water straight at the depot at high speed. The Park Service proposed to raise and "armor" the levee, to enable it to withstand greater floods with less likelihood of giving way. Furthermore, the plan called for regular maintenance of the levee and a reinforced drainage channel on the north side of the levee to help prevent small floods from eroding the berm. Finally, an early warning system would be created in consultation with the National Weather Service to provide park employees and visitors at the depot time to escape a threatening flood. [307]

Not all of the traditional conservation community was supportive of the plan to restore the depot as a visitors' center. During public comment on the General Management Plan, the National Parks Conservation Association and other commentors were not in favor of the plan to fully restore the building. They believed that such funds should instead be spent on resource protection, acquisition of private lands inside the park, and other more pressing issues. In their view, the many threats to the ecological integrity of the park, including grazing in desert tortoise habitat, should have been a higher priority than providing services to visitors and fully restoring one particular building. [308]

The depot visitors' center is integral to Mojave National Preserve's future interpretation plans. The depot will become a focal point for park users, providing orientation to the resources of the Preserve. Permanent exhibits for the depot were planned in conjunction with the Long Range Interpretive Plan, and explicated all of the interpretive themes for the park that the latter document identified. The plan stated the situation succinctly: "rehabilitation of the Kelso Depot is crucial to the successful functioning of this new park." [309]

In the first several years of the park's existence, the interpretive staff concentrated much of its efforts on distributing information about the Preserve and on community outreach. Developing a map for park visitors was a major priority, especially because of the swirl of misinformation about the closure of roads due to wilderness designation. Alan Bowser, Public Affirs director for the Auto Club of Southern California, contacted the Preserve and volunteered his organization to pay for creation and printing of a map. On December 8, 1995, just before Marv Jensen's departure, Bowser met with park staff, including Jensen, Martin, Buono, Dennis Schramm, Talken, Moore and Reetz to make plans for the map content. Schramm and Talken worked with the Auto Club over the following months to ensure that reads depicted on the map were not in wilderness areas. The map, printed on a single 11x17 sheet, carried travel information on the reverse side. The Auto Club agreement filled a crucial gap in interpretive materials at no cost to the financially-strapped Preserve. [310]

Mojave's information centers served to distribute park information and increase positive interactions with the public and desert residents. By the end of 1995, Mojave's information center at the base of the World's Largest Thermometer in Baker housed a successful operation, fueled by the hordes of passers-by on the interstate. A 1995 agreement with the Death Valley Natural History Association kept shelves stocked with books and other materials for visitors. The visitor center was well located to draw traffic from I-15, but some believed that the building, with the World's Largest Thermometer dominating an oversize frying pan complete with plastic eggs owned by local restaurateur Willis Herron, was perhaps less than ideal aesthetically. Tacky surroundings aside, the information center in Baker effectively introduced the park to a tremendous number of people.

Illustration 19 - The NPS visitors' center at Hole-in-the-Wall harmonizes with its surroundings. (Photo by Eric Nystrom, 2001.)

Almost immediately after the Dollar Budget controversy ended, Mojave management explored the feasibility of locating a visitors' center in Needles, California. Planners anticipated that a Park Service center in Needles could draw a substantial stream of traffic from the I-40 freeway. Unfortunately, the historic downtown storefront location eventually chosen was too far from the freeway to garner even a fraction of the visitation received by the Baker center, a situation only exacerbated by inferior freeway signage. [311] However, the Needles information center served a very important community relations role. The NPS officially opened the new information center on December 13, 1997, as part of the annual Needles holiday celebration, a fact that highlighted the important outreach role. The Preserve rented its Needles office space from Bill and Nita Claypool, who had been stridently anti-park and reportedly originally suggested the Dollar Budget idea to Congressman Lewis. Years later, after extensive NPS outreach efforts, the Claypools were much more supportive of the park. James Woolsey, the interpretive ranger hired to open the Needles Information Center, can be credited with some of the change in attitude. Woolsey, a native of Twentynine Palms, California, could identify with residents of the small desert town, and they in turn could identify with him. Through newspaper articles, Woolsey made clear the potential for positive economic and social impacts that came with being a gateway community for the Preserve. The Needles information center served the community as much as the trickle of visitors who found their way from I-40. [312]

A modular building at Hole-in-the-Wall housed BLM interpretive programs and personnel prior to 1994, and after the passage of the CDPA, has been staffed by the Park Service according to seasonal demand. Most visitors to Hole-in-the-Wall were aware that they were in a park, and are often looking for more specific recommendations, unlike visitors at the Baker center. An amphitheater, constructed originally by the BLM adjacent to the Hole-in-the-Wall center, provides the only in-park facility for larger group interpretive programs. The building itself houses a small interpretive display and a selection of items for sale. Through 2002, the information center at Hole-in-the-Wall is the most traditional Park Service-like visitors' facility in Mojave National Preserve.

Wayside displays, constructed at roadside pulloffs, trailheads, and particular points of interest, are a major component of interpretation at Mojave National Preserve. Waysides require little maintenance or additional expenditures after their initial installation, a key feature in a short-staffed park like Mojave. Many wayside exhibits have been installed at key points of interest, such as the Kelso Depot, Zzyzx, and the Kelso Dunes. Preserve officials allowed some waysides installed by BLM to remain in remote areas of the park, especially if most of the information was accurate. Mojave officials typically ordered multiple copies of new interpretive displays, because of the above-average rate of replacement due to fading in the hot desert sun, as well as the occasional vandalism that seems endemic to remote locations. [313]

Portable media, such as brochures or guides, are especially suited to Mojave National Preserve interpretive activities. Many desert users are already accustomed to utilizing guides to help them find their way through a landscape without signs. One of the most successful ongoing recreation programs in the eastern Mojave utilized a portable media approach to interpretation. Dennis Casebier and the Friends of the Mojave Road developed a mileage-keyed guidebook for users of the Mojave Road recreation trail, which was first published in 1983. The group consciously rejected placing signs along the road, instead favoring rock cairns at irregular intervals. The purpose was to force travelers to utilize the guidebook to travel the trail, with the idea that visitors educated in desert etiquette by a well-written guide would be less likely to damage resources through irresponsible and reckless behavior. The experiment proved a success, and the group later developed a four-part 660 mile loop trail known as the East Mojave Heritage Trail. This second route proved to be a source of major friction between the Friends of the Mojave Road and the Park Service when CDPA-designated wilderness severed pieces of the trail and invalidated the labors and expenditures of the volunteers. The Mojave Road Guide remains one of the most popular interpretive guides to park resources. [314]

Since the creation of the park, more than thirty different brochures on a variety of topics have been created by park staff for interpretive purposes. Other interpretive brochures and trails are in the works. One proposal uses an existing network of roads and trails in the Ivanpah Mountains to link the mines of the Standard Mining District in an interpretive loop. The area's resources contain a full spectrum of mining methods and technologies, from equine-powered arrastra to cyanide heap leach open pit mining, and can explored in chronological succession with help from an interpretive brochure. Development of a unigrid map and brochure for Mojave National Preserve, a standard interpretive hand-out in national parks, began in FY 2000, and as of 2002, is in final stages of preparation. [315]

The Preserve's interpretive rangers disseminate information to the public through park publications and the park website. A park newspaper has been published annually since 1997, to deliver important information to the public that might otherwise be contained on a unigrid brochure. Maureen Lynch, a park volunteer, drafted the first issue with guidance from Sean McGuinness. The issue was later finalized and published by James Woolsey. Production and authorship duties were assumed by Woolsey for the second issue as well. After Woolsey left, Linda Slater took over its publication, and has produced two additional issues to date. Woolsey also wrote a semi-regular column for the Needles newspaper, and other interpretive staff have also contributed articles to local media. The Mojave National Preserve's park website provides supplemental information and interesting articles about specific incidents in Mojave's past, such as the experience of black homesteaders in Lanfair Valley. Woolsey constructed the first website for the park, and Slater later assumed the task of providing new content and quarterly updates. [316]

Recruitment and use of volunteers in Mojave National Preserve has also helped interpretive and other staff accomplish more without additional resources. Chris Burns, interpretive ranger at the Needles Information Center, coordinates the volunteer program for the Preserve. Volunteers act as campground hosts at both Mid Hills and Hole-in-the-Wall, and assist NPS operations at all three visitors' centers. One reason for locating the volunteer program at the Needles office is to make it easier to recruit help among the large numbers of retirees who spend winters along the Colorado River in the Laughlin / Bullhead City / Lake Havasu area. Retirees have traditionally been of tremendous support to national parks across the nation, and Mojave also benefits from the generosity of retirees and other volunteers. [317]

Mojave National Preserve interpretive rangers conduct a variety of educational outreach activities. Programs for schoolchildren were developed and met with excellent response. Schools in the area around the Preserve, including the Barstow and Apple Valley/Victorville area, have historically been underserved. "These schools haven't had a lot of attention, so any time a public speaker comes in with a little bit of enthusiasm, they love you - it's pretty easy to win them over," explained interpreter Linda Slater. [318] Typical programs are designed to help kids learn about the plants and animals of the Preserve, especially the desert tortoise, and to use that knowledge as specific examples of bigger themes in natural science. The human history of the area is also represented in Mojave's school programs, and classes frequently get to take field trips to the park itself, to see the natural and cultural resources firsthand. The Preserve's educational outreach programs have benefited tremendously from those developed by older desert parks, especially Joshua Tree NP and Lake Mead NRA. Sharing resources with neighboring parks has kept costs down and enabled the Preserve to conduct educational outreach activities which might not otherwise have been possible.

Educational outreach programs at Mojave National Preserve are not limited to K-12 classes. A large number of college students are served by the park's interpretive program. Study centers at Soda Springs/Zzyzx and to a lesser extent at Sweeney Granite Mountains Research Center concentrate collegians and researchers at the Preserve, and park interpreters are commonly called upon for informative presentations. Biology and geology courses at nearby colleges and universities make use of the Preserve as a live laboratory, one that is especially useful because of the diversity of geologic and other natural resources in close proximity to one another. Though the interpretive staff has little to do with formal research projects conducted by advanced students in the park, the results of that research are interpreted by park staff for the education of the general public.

In 2001, park managers highlighted the importance of the interpretive program for Mojave National Preserve by creating a separate administrative branch for interpretation. Mary "Jeff" Karraker, a Park Service veteran with more than two decades of service, arrived to oversee the new team. Before the split, both interpretive personnel and visitor protection forces were administered by Mojave's Chief Ranger, in an arrangement that harkened to a time in the Park Service's history when all rangers performed both interpretive and law enforcement functions. Sean McGuinness was hired as Chief Ranger in December 1996, after the Dollar Budget crisis contributed to the departure of Bill Blake, his predecessor, but like Blake, McGuinness's background was in law enforcement and visitor protection. Interpretation made large strides under McGuinness, conducting school programs, planning for the Kelso Depot, and creating the Long Range Interpretive Plan. With a myriad of responsibilities stemming from Mojave's acute law enforcement needs and a long chain of command occasionally hampering communication with the interpretive forces, it was clear that interpretation needed its own team to allow McGuinness to concentrate on the park's visitor protection services.

The history of interpretation at Mojave National Preserve has in many ways mirrored the larger history of the park itself. Budget constraints limited growth initially, though eventually new projects resulted in a growing organization and divisional independence. Early efforts concentrated on community education and outreach, while users asked for and received a promise of less development of most of the Preserve, so as to retain the "sense of exploration and discovery" that sets the park apart. Planning efforts, nearly complete, codified the future of interpretation at the park as being intimately tied to the rehabilitation of the magnificent Kelso Depot as a visitors' center, a prospect that will signal the start of the next phase of interpretive activity for Mojave National Preserve.

Together, resource and visitor protection and interpretation provide the public face of Mojave National Preserve. Both teams face challenges created by the size of the park, the diversity of Preserve resources, the park's proximity to the LA area, and tight budgets. Innovative and flexible uses of existing resources and partnerships with other agencies have proven successful strategies to increase the coverage and efficiency of interpretive services and law enforcement patrols. With recent developments such as the rehabilitation of the Kelso Depot and the use of horses for backcountry patrols, both teams are planning for larger roles in the future of Mojave National Preserve.