SAGUARO Historic Resource Study

D. Monument Development

Although Saguaro National Monument appeared for the first time in April 1934 in Frank Pinkley's Southwestern Monuments Monthly Report, he was less than happy with the notification on March 24 that he had a new area under his control. Since the Park Service did not own what he considered the most attractive and accessible area, administering the park would prove a problem.

Pinkley was told that a salary for a three month temporary custodian would be provided starting July 1, 1934. He, however, did not view a temporary custodian as the answer to the problems. He advocated leaving the position vacant and he would occasionally travel there. He got a custodian anyway. The Washington office considered the months of June through August to be the best period in which to station a person at Saguaro. When University President Shantz learned of such a proposal he notified A.E. Demaray that few people came to the monument in the hot summer months. The greatest visitation occurred from January through March. [49]

The first use envisioned for the monument was to keep it as a research reserve while restricting visitation. Pinkley objected to that approach noting that it would be impossible to keep people away. Not only was there a relatively large population in nearby Tucson, but the Chamber of Commerce had already printed a brochure advertising the monument as an important place to visit. Whether through Pinkley's insistence or for other reasons the concept of a research reserve soon died. At the same time the subject of building a road to Rincon Peak was discussed since the mountain area was the only place the Park Service was free to develop. Regional Director Tillotson, however, felt such an undertaking would be too costly and not appropriate. [50]

The monument remained unmanned until March 1935 when Charles Powell arrived as the first custodian. There were no facilities for him. The University allowed him to use a structure which the Civilian Conservation Corps had built on Observatory Hill. Without a contact point for visitors, he had to remain at the roadway entrances or meet people already in the monument. There were two entrances, one at the northwest corner and the other in the northwest part of section 32. Much of the rest of his time was taken up with preventing cactus theft and wood cutting. [51]

Powell served at the monument through June 1935. While there, Harry Langley, a landscape architect from the Park Service San Francisco office visited to investigate building a Rincon Mountain road. Regional Director Tillotson's opposition to such an undertaking the previous year did not end the proposal. Langley also did not favor a road into the mountains. To build a road into the Rincons would merely duplicate the Forest Service road to the top of the Santa Catalinas. If people wanted to escape the summer heat or have winter recreation they could use that already existing trail, he thought. In addition a Rincon road was not needed for administrative or development purposes and, if constructed, it would leave a visible scar. Langley's report laid the matter to rest until 1948. [52]

Paul Beaubien came to Saguaro on New Years day 1936 as Ranger-in-Charge. He, too, found no facilities. For a time he stayed at the CCC camp just north of the boundary. Then he rented a small house about a mile and three quarters outside the south entrance. Finally the University of Arizona gave him some material to use to convert a storeroom into a residence. Basically, he operated as his predecessor Charles Powell had done. He did get some help from the CCC in counting visitors and in catching cactus thieves and illegal quail and deer hunters. Although he returned to his permanent station at Walnut Canyon in April, Beaubien was back at Saguaro the next November. Again he lived in the converted storeroom. [53]

Because of the uncertainties about whether the former Forest Service land would be returned and about the lack of money to purchase private and state holdings, the Park Service did not attempt to draft a master plan for Saguaro until 1937. Although the master plan never got beyond the preliminary report stage of May 1937, the whole plan was development oriented. It called for roads, an administrative and support area, and one picnic ground. Only two interpretive features were envisioned—an explanatory sign placed at the two lime kilns and a cactus garden near the visitor contact station. This plan called for the establishment of the headquarters area in section 32. Continued uncertainty about the monument allowed only one of the items in the master plan to be carried out. On September 18, 1937 a five-year lease was obtained from the University for the W1/2 of the NW1/4 of section 32, T14S R16E. Here, it was hoped, that the headquarters would be developed. The two most important issues, grazing and forest fire protection, were not covered in the preliminary plan for by agreement the Forest Service administered these items for the Park Service. [54]

The Civilian Conservation Corps began work on an administration building in the fall of 1939 at the same time Don Egermayer arrived as the first permanent custodian. Located on the leased land in section 32 that structure was to be the first of several buildings in a complex. Others included a visitor contact station, custodian's residence, and maintenance facility. The CCC, however, did not complete the office building before it left in December. Work, however, resumed on March 1, 1940 and the structure was completed April 24. Before any construction could begin on the other buildings the CCC departed. Egermayer decided to move from his converted storeroom residence and turn the intended administration building into a home and visitor contact station. No running water was available, so he had a 300 gallon tank placed on a dump truck and made periodic trips to Randolph Park on the east side of Tucson to fill it with water. [55]

Egermayer kept busy providing visitor services and maintaining the graveled Cactus Loop Road which the CCC completed in 1939. He also had to chase cactus thieves, hunters, and wood cutters. He was often unsuccessful in capturing anyone. Usually he only found evidence of such activity, but one night in February 1940 he caught people hauling six loads of wood out of the monument through a break in the fence. In addition to his other duties he found time to plant a cactus garden near the new building. In that same year the Forest Service ended its fire protection agreement and Egermayer began to post a two man fire watch on Mica Mountain in the summer months. [56]

A Master Plan was finally produced in late 1947. It, however, addressed only two issues—the need for a museum and the effect of grazing on the monument. In the latter case it only offered a statement on grazing with no solution. Although not mentioned in the master plan the subject of a mountain road resurfaced the following year. Edward Zimmer, the Chief of the Major Roads Branch in the Director's office, proposed to build a road to near the top of Mica Peak which would terminate in a picnic and campground facility at Manning Camp. He also thought the site had potential for the development of winter sports. Senator Hayden was enlisted in the project to get an appropriation for it. One condition was attached to building a road. The state and University had to relinquish control of their land as a prerequisite to construction of the route. Hayden agreed to use that tack, but he did not gain the consent of the state land commissioner. Eight months later the Park Service still hoped a road could be built to Manning Camp to make it possible for the public to enjoy the monument, but nothing came of this project. [57]

In April 1951 a new headquarters site was selected a little less than a half mile north of the current headquarters. The area was in section 29 near a point where the "new" Old Spanish Trail road intersected with the west boundary. Negotiations to purchase this private inholding were completed in December of that year. Now, for the first time, the Park Service had its own property in the lower part of the monument and no longer needed to renew a lease with the University every five years. A visitor center was completed on the new area in 1953, but the real development came with the Mission 66 program. As money became available in the late 1950s the visitor center was enlarged, employee housing was built in 1963, utility buildings were erected, and a water and sewer system were installed. A boundary fence was also constructed to keep cattle from the cactus forest area. In addition the 1959 Master Plan called for a desert to mountain drive which would run from the headquarters area to Rock Reef Meadow with a spur to Manning Camp. The purpose of this road was to permit visitors to get a view of the desert to mountain transition zones. The 1963 Master Plan discounted this highway scheme and it was never again raised. [58]

E. The Civilian Conservation Corps

The Emergency Conservation Work (ECW) program, as the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was first called, was one of a multitude of agencies established by the federal government to fight the depression of the 1930s. Popularly called the CCC until the name became official in 1937, the ECW provided service jobs for unemployed, single young men across the nation. Several agencies administered the ECW program among them the Park Service, Forest Service, United States Army, and the Department of Labor. The National Park Service not only had CCC men working on land it controlled, but it established a State Parks Division through which it administered an aid program to improve state, county, and city parks. Through that division, Park Service personnel designed and oversaw all construction projects in state, county, and city parks. Recreational facilities were designed to blend with the natural surroundings. In the desert southwest buildings tended to be camouflaged by constructing them of well defined horizontal coursed stone. Roofs were usually flat. Picnic shelters were devised in a ramada style while tables, benches and fireplaces were built of stone.

Emergency Conservation Work funds were provided by the Park Service's State Parks Division for the establishment of CCC camps in and near what later became both units of Saguaro National Monument. Pima County, which operated the Tucson Mountain Park, applied for two ECW camps in August 1933 for that park. The request was approved, and Camp Pima (SP-6-A) and Camp Papago (SP-7-A) were authorized. In April 1935 University of Arizona President Homer Shantz requested a camp whose members would work on the University controlled land that comprised an area within the monument called Saguaro Forest State Park. Out of his efforts came Camp Tanque Verde (SP-11-A), which was established in July 1935 about one mile north of section 10 just outside the current Rincon Unit. These camps were constructed by local men chosen by the Pima County Reemployment Committee. Like other ECW camps, they were initially composed of a set number of frame structures designed to house 210 men. The buildings included four barracks, one mess hall, one kitchen, one recreation hall, one officers' quarters, a hospital, a latrine, and several shower rooms. The operation of the camps was overseen by the United States Army which provided the commanding officer, adjutant, physician, and educational adviser. The State Parks Division of the National Park Service approved and supervised the work projects. During the summer the men were transferred to more, northerly climates such as the Grand Canyon. One exception to this scheme occurred in the 1934-35 period when extra finances were allotted to employ more youth through ECW drought camps. In that period Camp Pima housed a special drought company DSP-1-A in lieu of the SP-6-A group. [59]

1. Tucson Mountain Unit

In October 1933 the enrollees destined for the two Tucson Mountain Camps reached Tucson before their camps were completed. As a result, they were put to work in Tucson for a time. The men of Camp Pima (SP-6-A) were the first to arrive in the Tucson Mountain Park. They established a temporary tent camp on November 17, 1933, and remained there until the permanent camp was completed on December 22 of that year. The site of the permanent camp is located in the northwest corner of the national monument. Some of the men were immediately put to work gathering several hundred tons of rock to be used in the construction of roads, dams, fireplaces and other picnic area projects. Others began to rebuild eight miles of poor desert road. In the meantime enrollees moved from Tucson into Camp Papago (SP-7-A) on December 22, 1933. Owing to a lack of water, half the men in that camp were transferred in less than a month while the rest stayed until May 1934 when the camp was closed. During that period, the men performed road work, but they did build one masonry and two earthen dams. [60]

In January 1934 the men of SP-6-A began to construct picnic ground fireplaces, tables, benches, ramadas and bathrooms as well as some dams. The ramadas were termed "unique and attractive," because the roof support posts with a core of reinforced steel and concrete were covered at the base with stonework while the upper part was enveloped with woody saguaro skeleton. The roofs were also covered with saguaro ribs. Tables were made of uncoursed stone legs to support a concrete top, while the benches were uncoursed stone capped with concrete. The fireplaces were built of uncoursed stone. Bathrooms were sometimes constructed of coursed and other times uncoursed stone. Since the CCC camp superintendent's monthly reports often did not specify which picnic sites were in the process of construction at any given time, one cannot be certain of the specific dates the five picnic areas in the Tucson Mountain Unit were constructed. At best one can only observe that the Ez-Kim-In-Zin and Signal Hill facilities were constructed between January and May 1934, while the Sus, Cam-Bob, and Mam-A-Gah Picnic areas were built in the September 1934 to June 1935 period. [61]

Twenty-six check dams were built throughout Tucson Mountain Park. These dams were basically of two types. Earth-fill dams were placed in the lower reaches for flood control and to store water for wildlife. Masonry dams were constructed in canyons and arroyos to prevent erosion and again to provide water for the fauna. Thirteen such dams were built within the Tucson Mountain Unit boundary. All check dams were completed by the end of February 1936. [62]

When the DSP-1-A enrollees arrived at Camp Pima on August 1, 1934, they were immediately put to work making adobe brick for use in an administration building. The 200 men of the camp were soon apportioned to other projects such as dam building, and road and trail construction. By November 1 the King Canyon Road was completed with heavy boulders set along the road's edge in the most dangerous hillside sections to act as guard walls. At the end of that month the eleven-mile Wasson Peak horse trail was finished. [63]

By June 1935 the DSP-1-A group had departed and the SP-6-A men once more inhabited Camp Pima. The next fifteen months were basically spent working on roads, and obliterating the scars of old mine roads and trails, putting in cattle guards, building barbed wire fence, placing rip-rap to protect roads, banks, and dips, completing more dams, and reseeding sixty-seven acres in various places with native grass. [64]

For the next several years, beginning September 1936, the work concentrated on building an administrative complex and in the southern part of Tucson Mountain Park outside the present monument boundary except for two projects within the current monument boundary. These two undertakings involved the construction of the Red Hills and Dobie Robinson facilities to supply water to game animals and birds. The Tucson Game Protective Association with several other organizations collected $250 by early September 1936 to build one water source in the central part of Tucson Mountain Park. They asked the State Game Department to supply the funds to equip another well in the north portion. The CCC, however, developed the two facilities in 1937. Each site included a windmill and galvanized water storage tank. In 1941 a reinforced concrete water storage reservoir was added to each location. These reservoirs remain along with the windmill tower at the Red Hills facility. [65]

Camp Pima officially was changed from SP-6-A to CP-1 on November 3, 1940. It was this group that built the water storage reservoirs at Red Hills and Dobie Robinson shortly before the camp was abandoned on June 21, 1941. The next year the CCC gave the buildings to the army. The army dismantled the wooden structures and shipped them to Phoenix where they were reassembled in a mechanics' center. Only the concrete slabs on which they were built remain. Adobe structures were left to decay and merely remnants of their walls survive. The only other reminder of this CCC camp which could house 210 men is the circle of saguaro at what was the entrance area. [66]

2. The Rincon Mountain Unit

University President Shantz evidently decided that, since all of the saguaro cactus area inside the national monument would not be developed by the Park Service because that agency did not own it, he would attract the CCC to help with the portion controlled by the University of Arizona. To be eligible for this aid meant that a state park had to be created, for the CCC would not work on state projects without such a designation of the land. As a result the Saguaro Forest State Park was created out of a ten-square-mile area at the western end of Saguaro National Monument.

Although the 1937 Master Plan for the monument stated that the Arizona State Legislature set aside the Saguaro Forest State Park area in February 1934, that was not possible. The legislature only met every other year in odd numbered years. A check of the legislative journal for 1933 and 1935 did not show any action taken to create a state park. At the same time a check of the governor's papers and calendar did not reveal that he signed any bill dealing with a Saguaro Forest State Park. The annual reports of the Arizona State Land Commission, under whose administration such a park would fall, showed no mention of the park or of a budget allocated for it in the period 1933-40. As a result, one has to conclude that University President Shantz merely designated the area Saguaro Forest State Park for his own purposes.

In a letter dated April 20, 1935, President Shantz notified the Director of the National Park Service that he intended to have the CCC work on projects on the University-controlled land within the monument. The CCC endeavors would include water development, construction of a limited amount of automobile road, and the obliteration of old homestead and squatter sites, old roads, and mines. He placed the responsibility for the Emergency Conservation Work with Professor A.A. Nichols, a range ecologist. An advance party of twelve CCC men arrived to occupy Camp Tanque Verde, SP-11-A, on July 20, 1935. [67]

Within a few days the remainder of the enrollees reached the camp and began the process of razing and removing old shacks, filling mine shafts, cleaning up rubbish, and removing old road scars. By the end of March 1936 the men had obliterated twelve miles of old road, filled the Loma Verde mine with 800 tons of cans, rubbish, and debris cleaned from the state park, razed twelve squatters' shacks, destroyed two old picnic areas, removed any trace of thirty prospect holes, and began construction of the road to Observatory Hill. [68]

In the meantime a skyline loop road through the saguaro cactus area was in the planning stage. By the end of March 1936 that route had been surveyed and staked. Construction began soon thereafter and continued as the main project until completed in April 1939. Besides traversing University land, it extended through private property with the owner's consent. Much of the proposed rock work along the road was eliminated in 1937 because of the cost and difficulty of finding adequate rock. One year before completion Camp Tanque Verde, SP-11-A, closed (April 30, 1938) for want of water. As a result, men from a side camp in Randolph Park in Tucson, SP-3-A, finished the road. [69]

Another important CCC project involved the construction of an administration building by a group from SP-3-A. The building site was staked in March 1938, but actual construction did not begin until the fall of 1939. It was completed April 24, 1940, but, when the planned custodian's residence was not built, it became a visitor contact station and residence. [70] The structure was taken down in the late 1970s.

Other work accomplished by the CCC on the University land in the mid-1930s included building a fence along the west boundary, leveling the top of Observatory Hill, and constructing several check dams. The fence no longer remains, the top of Observatory Hill has reverted to a natural state, and ranchers so changed the dams for cattle watering that they are not recognizable as having been built by the CCC.

F. Forest Fire Policy

When the National Park Service gained control of Saguaro National Monument, the Forest Service had administered most of the area for twenty-seven years. In that period of time that agency had developed a forest fire policy to suit its needs. Basically, prevention and early suppression comprised the Forest Service approach to fire. In the forest fire season, which usually ranged from May into September, the Forest Service used the Rincon Ranger Station as a base of operation. From about 1912 to 1922 Spud Rock Cabin was used as the fire fighting and trail headquarters on the mountain. In 1922 the Manning Camp area began to serve this function. Since proper lookout coverage could not be made from only one point, fire protection trails were constructed and two Forest Service fire guards rode a patrol from Manning Camp to Mica Peak via Spud Rock and back twice per day. [71]

When the Park Service officially began to administer Saguaro National Monument in 1934, the temporary custodians who served there approximately four months per year were absent during the fire season. As a consequence an agreement was made with the Forest Service by which that agency would continue to handle fire prevention and suppression. In 1937 Forest Service officials told the Park Service that the practice of riding patrols had not proven to be adequate. As a consequence, the two agencies agreed that the Park Service would purchase a 100-foot steel fire watch tower and the Forest Service would erect it on Mica Mountain. The Park Service did not question the location since no one from that agency had been to Mica Mountain. The unassembled tower was bought and delivered to the Rincon Ranger Station in 1937. It remained there over winter and the next May the CCC moved it by mules to Spud Rock. From there the Forest Service took it to Mica Mountain and began to erect it on June 13, 1938. It was completed by the end of the month. Several years later the Park Service learned that the Forest Service wanted the tower on Mica Mountain because it provided good coverage of the Santa Catalina Mountains which were their territory. It proved of very little use in detecting fires on the national monument. During the forty years of its use Park Service fire watch personnel provided a valuable service to their neighbor. [72]

On January 6, 1940 Custodian Egermayer learned that the Forest Service intended to withdraw all assistance for fire protection on the monument except for cooperation in detecting forest fires. As a result, he hired one man for fire watch duty on Mica Mountain beginning May 2 and a second person to start June 1. They worked until mid-September. At that time the Park Service continued the Forest Service policy regarding forest fires. As indicated in the 1942 forest fire control plan, the "primary aim is to PUT OUT all fires, confining the area burned to the smallest possible minimum, and to KEEP THEM OUT." [73]

The Park Service decided that the existing Forest Service trail system of about fifty miles was sufficient for protection. These traits consisted of the following:

1. Chimenea Trail - twelve miles from the Rincon Ranger Station to Manning Camp.

2. Happy Valley Saddle Trail - fifteen miles from the Rincon Ranger Station to Manning Camp via the Happy Valley Saddle. It was the only trail toward the eastern boundary.

3. Manning Camp - Spud Rock - Mica Peak Trail - six mile trail used by the Forest Service for patrol.

4. Happy Valley Saddle to Rincon Peak Trail - four miles.

5. Telephone Line Trail - ten miles along the telephone line from Rincon Ranger Station to the junction of the line with Manning Camp - Happy Valley Saddle Trail.

6. Lateral trails - several uninvestigated trails leading from the main trails. [74]

Under the arrangement that Egermayer established, the lookout tower man arrived in the mountains about a month before the fire guard patrolman. The living quarters for both men was Manning Cabin as it had been with the Forest Service. Each morning the lookout rode to the tower while the patrolman walked the trail from Manning Camp to Reef Rock to Mica Mountain Lookout to Spud Rock and back to Manning Camp. Telephones at each of the patrol stops kept the two men in hourly contact. Men in Forest Service lookout posts on Mt. View and Mt. Bigelow in the Santa Catalina Mountains watched for fires on part of the monument while the Park Service man observed the Santa Catalina Mountains from the Mica Mountain lookout tower. It was thought that the highest occurrence zone for fires on the monument was in a ten section area surrounding Manning Camp and Mica Mountain. [75]

In 1941 the patrol route changed. Man Head was added as a patrol lookout point and Spud Rock was dropped except in extreme fire danger. At the time of extreme danger the patrol loop was walked continuously. This situation required the aid of a third patrolman. In case of fire, nearby ranchers, who held grazing allotments, could be contacted for men and horses, and help could be obtained from the Forest Service. [76]

The next revision of the forest fire protection plan occurred in 1950. A two man horse patrol now rode a four station loop with observations made at Spud Rock, Mica Mountain, Reef Rock, and Man Head. It was ridden twice daily except in extreme fire danger. Additional fire-fighting agreements were reached with the Federal Prison camp in the Santa Catalina Mountains and Davis Monthan Air Base as well as the Forest Service and ranchers. The area considered to have the most frequent fires was broadened to an eighteen section zone surrounding Manning Camp, Mica Mountain lookout tower, Happy Valley Saddle, and Rincon Peak. Since much of the section of high fire occurrence could not be viewed from the Mica Mountain tower, a new tower was proposed for Rincon Peak. It was thought that such a tower would eliminate the need for patrols, but it was never constructed. [77]

In 1957 an additional lookout was established at Happy Valley Knoll to be used in times of extreme fire danger. Since it was not a part of the patrol loop, fire aids took turns staying there for five days. In 1960 that area was designated a lookout at all times during the fire season. [78]

Manning Cabin was used until 1958 to house lookout and patrol personnel. In that year a modular building was erected at Manning Camp. It contained modern conveniences including electricity supplied by a generator. This situation lasted until the summer of 1977 when Manning Cabin was once more used as quarters for fire fighters and the newer buildings were removed. [79]

In 1963 the forest fire lookout season changed from the period of May 1 to August 31 to one of greater duration. The duty time then went from mid-April to mid-October. Five fire guards were also employed instead of three. [80]

The year 1963 presaged a change in the Park Service's approach to forest fire control. At that time the Secretary of the interior released a special report which stated that fire suppression had severely affected the ecosystems of many forest areas and, instead of suppression, fire should be used to preserve or restore the natural biotic scene. The National Park Service, however, did not adopt that policy until 1971. Saguaro National Monument became the first Park Service unit to which it was applied. Specifically the new policy for Saguaro stated:

1. All man made fires would be suppressed as soon as possible.
2. All fires that threatened cultural resources and physical facilities would be extinguished.
3. Fires would not be permitted to burn in the Saguaro cactus forest excluded from grazing in 1957.
4. Motorized fire fighting vehicles could not be used unless it was necessary to protect human life, cultural features, or property outside the monument.
5. All natural fires were to be extinguished except when all of the following conditions prevail:
   1. The fire occurs between July 1 and September 15.
   2. Accumulated rainfall beginning June 15 for the period exceeds two inches or more at Manning Camp.
   3. Summer monsoon rain pattern fully established.
   4. Buildup index not to exceed forty at Manning Camp.
   5. Spread index not to exceed thirty at Manning Camp. [81]

Several additions were made to the new fire management policy in 1974. One such provision stated that all fires which threatened surrounding Forest Service land would be controlled. The other attachment, which dealt with air pollution, stated that the Pima County Air Pollution Control Department would be notified whenever a decision was made to allow a natural fire to burn uncontrolled. If that local agency declared a pollution alert and requested cooperation, then the fire would be controlled or extinguished. [82]

This approach to forest fire management was reaffirmed in 1978. Surprisingly soon thereafter in that year, the Forest Service adopted the same plan for the forest adjacent to the national monument. This meant that natural fires which occurred on the monument under favorable conditions need not be controlled when they threatened the surrounding national forest. [83]

G. The Park Service Approach to Grazing

When the National Park Service received Saguaro National Monument, it inherited a situation which ran counter to its conservation policy. Livestock grazing on the monument became a troublesome issue even before the Park Service officially accepted administration in March 1934. Ranchers, alarmed at the potential transfer and thus assumed loss of grazing rights, complained to their political representatives of the impending peril. As a result, Park Service Director Cammerer pronounced that the transfer of land from one bureau to another need not eliminate grazing rights and did not affect valid existing rights. This statement gave little comfort to the ranchers who continued to campaign for the return of a part of the monument to the Forest Service. [84]

The uncertainty over whether the Park Service would continue to administer the portion of the monument carved from national forest land or would transfer it back to the Forest Service remained for years. After it gained official control, this unsettled condition caused the Park Service to allow continued grazing. Director Cammerer, however, allowed that "eventually for the protection of certain desert flora, we may want to make some adjustments." [85]

Having determined not to end grazing rights on the monument, the Park Service did not face the issue for a year. In March 1935, however, Forest Supervisor Fred Winn wrote to Pinkley and announced that the five year Forest Service permits which covered a portion of the monument expired at the end of that month. Two of the allotments fell partly on the monument and partly on the national forest. Winn told Pinkley that permit renewal required Park Service approval. As a result, Pinkley asked Cammerer for advice. Should the Park Service allow the Forest Service to issue permits for it or should the Park Service develop its own permit system? Cammerer answered that, if it were impracticable to issue separate permits for the coming season, then Pinkley should allow the Forest Service to administer the program under a cooperative agreement. Pinkley chose the latter course and signed a memorandum of agreement in April 1935. The two agencies consented to let the Forest Service control permits for the 1935 grazing year with the Park Service receiving a proration of fees. If that arrangement were to continue, it would require a yearly agreement. This provisio meant that ranchers no longer could obtain multi-year permits. Each year for twelve years the two agencies renewed the agreement. [86]

The next decision involved whether to allow a grazing permit to be transferred to the new owner of a ranch or to terminate it. In late 1938 J. Rukin Jelks, who held the Rincon Allotment, announced to Frank Pinkley that he had a buyer for his Casa Blanca Ranch (later X-9) if the grazing permit went with it. Although Jelks had been previously informed by the Park Service that permits would not be transferred to a new ranch owner, such a policy, he contended, meant a loss of money because it reduced the value of his ranch. Pinkley asked Director Cammerer if it were possible to forego the regulation and allow the buyer of Jelks' ranch to receive the permit. Cammerer acceded to Jelks' request on the basis that it would not violate policy because it was doubted that the Park Service would retain much of the monument land. Although Jelks did not sell for two more years, the establishment of an exception to the rule allowed Melvill Haskell to market his property and Pantano Allotment in 1939. [87]

Although Park Service personnel noticed the effects of overgrazing which the Forest Service seemingly permitted, nothing was done about the situation until ranch sales with the transfer of their attendant grazing allotments prompted a new policy. In 1941 the Forest Service agreed to reduce the number of livestock permitted to graze on an allotment each time a holder sold his property. Ten percent became the established reduction.

In 1948 the memorandum of agreement for administration of grazing permits was amended to save an exchange of memoranda each year. An addendum permitted the memorandum of agreement to remain in force until terminated by either agency upon sixty days written notice. An additional modification was made in 1956 to allow the Forest Service to issue ten-year permits. [88]

In 1973 the Forest Service decided not to continue administering grazing permits for the Park Service. Although two ranchers had voluntarily relinquished their permits by this time, there were still two active allotments. The Park Service granted the two remaining ranchers special use permits until the end of 1975 at which time grazing would end on the monument. Although a lawsuit allowed one permittee to graze cattle until 1979, he, too, gave way in the end.

H. Presumed Death of the Saguaro

In addition to all the other problems, a great fear arose among many Park Service people in the early 1940s that the saguaros would disappear from the monument as the victims of disease. Consequently, this situation provided some with more reason to question whether the Park Service should continue in its quest to consolidate its control of the monument. Basically, however, it spurred a movement to bring the monument totally under Park Service control.

Custodian Don Egermayer reported in May 1940 that he had observed a large number of saguaro with black spots. Some of these infected cactus had died. Word spread that the saguaro had a serious disease. Despite the assurance of three University of Arizona professors that the importance of the disease was overrated, Acting Region Three Director Milton McColm felt the affliction to be a very serious threat to the saguaro. [89]

In March 1941 other University personnel came to the monument and determined the rot pockets on the saguaro were caused by bacterial necrosis. This bacteria, they decided, was spread by the larvae of a nocturnal moth which attacked the cactus. As a result, a request was made to obtain the services of a plant pathologist from the Bureau of Plant Industry of the Agriculture Department. Dr. Lake S. Gill of that agency appeared on April 4, 1941 to study the problem. He was assisted by Paul Lightle of the University of Arizona. Gill conducted an experiment during the winter of 1941-42. Each of the 12,750 saguaro in section 17, T145 R16E were numbered. The section was then divided in half. While nothing was done to the saguaro in the north part, the plan was to remove and bury every diseased plant in the south portion. [90]

While Gill and Lightle were busy directing the cactus removal, the Park Service Regional Biologist from Santa Fe W.B. McDougall came to view the saguaro. He became dubious of Gill's efforts after Gill told him that he had found references to the disease going back as far as 1886. McDougall felt that if the saguaro had survived for at least fifty years with the disease present then it was not likely they would be wiped out. After looking at the plants, he noted that the only place the disease seemed serious was in the areas of fully mature saguaro. As a result, McDougall recommended that "the National Park Service policy of allowing natural phenomena to proceed unmolested be adhered to." If this were done, he believed the saguaro stand would be thinned, but it would regenerate. [91]

The presumed disease continued to recur the next year, but, because of a labor shortage, these saguaro could not be removed. As a result, it was decided to try another experiment. It was based on an observation that when woodpeckers ate the drone fly larvae which lived in the rot pockets, they would inadvertantly open the pockets and cause them to dry up. James Mielke, who by this time had joined Gill, went about opening the lesions so they could dry. His examinations led him to suspect that the rot only killed very old saguaro or those with low vigor. The situation looked discouraging because saguaro on the monument were primarily aged. Man's activities such as wood cutting combined with overgrazing had reduced the vegetation required to protect saguaro seedlings and consequently there were almost no younger cactus. Mielke, however, never came to a positive conclusion that the disease was merely a natural phenomenon. Instead, he left the impression that the loss of saguaro in 1944 would be higher than the previous year. [92]

Toward the end of 1944, the principal pathologist at the Bureau of Plant Industry offered to spray the saguaro with DDT as a means of killing the moth which was suspected of spreading the bacterial rot. He proposed using an airplane to apply the insecticide every six weeks. The pathologist acknowledged that at the same time all insects would be eliminated, but, he ventured, if the saguaro were valued above all else, the use of DDT would presumably allow them to survive for many more years. Several members of the Park Service opposed the use of DDT at the monument. Chief Forester J.D. Coffman notified the Bureau of Plant Industry that the Park Service would decline the offer. He noted that, since DDT was a potent chemical for which mixtures and dosages had not been established, there was a great potential for harmful effects beyond killing all insects. It was not known what the consequences would be to plants and soil as well as cold and warm-blooded animals. Biologist Victor Cahalane remarked that the saguaros were not the primary concern because the monument had been established to protect all plants and animals within the boundary. He ascribed the major cause of the problem at Saguaro to cattle grazing. [93]

In mid-1946 Gill and Lightle produced a progress report on their study of bacterial rot in section 17. They came to the conclusion that fewer saguaro were dying. Mortality, they noted, was related to size with a higher death rate among the larger plants. They, however, offered only a tentative conclusion for this phenomenon. It was possible, Gill and Lightle thought, that since larger plants were older and therefore in a state of decline, they were less able to resist disease. They would not predict what the future would bring, but others did. Region Three Director Tillotson believed that there soon would be no remaining saguaro and, therefore, recommended abolishing the monument. The Park Service chief of development concluded that, since there was no reproduction under the current situation, the rate of loss meant there would not be any saguaro in fifteen years. [94]

At the same time another school of thought developed within the Park Service that perhaps followed the lead of Regional Biologist McDougall. To this group, the bacterial rot on saguaro was viewed as a natural occurrence and, therefore, should be allowed to take place. What worried these people was the lack of young cactus which they ascribed to the results of grazing. Without vital young saguaro to replace ancient, diseased ones a disastrous situation would occur. To end grazing and thus begin saguaro rejuvenation could only be accomplished by having Park Service ownership of all the monument land. Conditions were so serious, the chief of development thought, that the Park Service had to acquire the state and private land within one and a half years and end grazing on that acreage. This belief impressed Director Drury and led him to contact the University of Arizona President about obtaining that institution's land. This belief then led to the long negotiation which finally culminated in Park Service ownership and the salvation of the saguaro. [95]

While Pathologist Gill finally decided without doubt in 1951 that the rot in saguaro was linked to overmaturity and did not threaten to kill all the cactus, others began to experiment with seed germination. William Bryan of the Bureau of Plant Industry constructed a lath house in which to study saguaro seedlings. Boxes containing different soil nutrients were planted with seeds so that saguaro requirements could be better known. Stanley Alcorn of the Ornamental Plants Section in the Agriculture Department succeeded Bryan in 1955. He transplanted saguaro seedlings to study their survival and note the effects of fertilizing them in a natural setting. The experiments seem to have ended when the lath house burned thus destroying the seedlings. [96]

The breakthrough in understanding saguaro ecology came in the early 1960s. Between January 11 and 13, 1962 University of Arizona Professor Charles Lowe studied the effects of a winter freeze on saguaros. He found that those which had frozen tissue began to decompose. As a result he discovered that bacterial necrosis was not a disease but a natural process of tissue decomposition which developed about two years after freezing. His research uncovered the fact that during the winter of 1937 temperatures fell to twelve degrees, which made it one of the coldest periods in the century. Since it took several years for the frost damage to appear on the saguaro, the discovery of rotting in 1940 led people to assume it was a disease. [97]

Lowe and others recognized, of course, that causes other than freezing had an effect on the saguaro population. Grazing reduced the number of nurse plants as well as caused erosion. Livestock also trampled young saguaro, and destroyed and spread organic matter which provided a good microclimate for germination. Rodents ate seedlings. Killing coyotes allowed an increase in the rodent population which, in turn, meant the loss of greater numbers of cactus. In the past woodcutters destroyed nurse plants and cactus thieves removed large numbers of intermediate-sized saguaro. [98]

I. Second World War Period Aircraft Crashes

Three military aircraft crashed in Saguaro National Monument in the period July 30, 1943 to January 20, 1945. The first plane to go down was a B-24D, Consolidated "Liberator," heavy bomber with all nine aboard killed. Its impact location was approximately three-fourths mile east of Juniper Basin camp. The plane cut a swath about 200 yards by seventy-five feet and burned. The wreckage remained until Donald Harris, who operated a scrap firm, received permission from the National Park Service to remove it. He accomplished that task between April and June 1960. Some small pieces of debris remain at the site and one propellor may be found one-fourth mile northeast. [99]

The second crash involved a UC-78B, Cessna "Bobcat" trainer. It crashed about 1-1/4 miles northeast of Happy Valley Lookout during a rainstorm on November 28, 1944 killing all three aboard. Although it landed in full flight, it did not burn. Helicopters were used in 1979 to salvage the remains which were used by the Pima County Air Museum to reconstruct another plane now on display. [100]

The last craft to crash was a B-25D, North American "Mitchell" medium bomber. It impacted on January 20, 1945 during a snowstorm while enroute from Kelley Field in Texas to Tucson. All five men aboard the plane died when it exploded and burned. The bomber suffered further destruction from explosives after the army recommended that it be destroyed on site. The crash site was located on the east side of Wrong Mountain, in December 1984. [101]

J. Dude Ranches

The first enterprising individual to operate a resort near Saguaro National Monument (Rincon Unit) was James P. Fuller. About 1879 he established Fuller's Springs or Agua Caliente, as it was also called, approximately four miles north of the monument's boundary (Figure 6). Fuller advertised that the resort was for "those who seek temporary recreation away from the heat and business of the city." He had cottages and hotel accommodations as well as medicated water that was eighty-eight degrees. [102]

The real dude ranching in the Rincon area, however, began on October 1, 1928, when James Converse added that dimension to his Tanque Verde Ranch. He remodeled the main ranch house and added guest rooms to the north. Since Tucson was an attractive winter vacation area even during the 1930s, Converse had no trouble filling his guest rooms and the same held true for other dude ranches in the area. [103]

Although a few guest ranches opened during the Second World War, such as the Bar BR near the Rincon Unit, the real boom for such operations began just after the end of that conflict. During that period the Tucson area had about 100 dude ranches. Horseback riding was the most popular sport. Those ranches near the monument east of Tucson, in addition to the Bar BR, which accommodated sixteen guests, included the Arrow H with housing for ten, the Lazy Vee, just south of the monument, with room for twenty people, the Thunderhead Ranch on the western boundary with accommodations for twelve, and the Tanque Verde Guest Ranch to the north with lodging for twenty-four people. During this period, Converse kept about fifty head of horses, used for guest riding, on the cactus area and his grazing allotments. About 1950 the 49ers Ranch Resort came into existence. It advertised camping trips for tourists into the monument. Several small dude ranches such as the Lazy K Bar, Picture Rock Ranch, and Sundancer Saddle and Surrey Ranch developed in the 1940s and 1950s in the Tucson Mountain area. [104]

In the 1960s and 1970s the number of dude ranches began to dwindle until by the 1980s there were less than a dozen. The Tanque Verde Guest Ranch on the north side of the Rincon Unit is the only such operation in that area. Under different ownership since the 1950s, it has greatly expanded to the point that it can accommodate 125 guests. With its stable of 100 horses, riders daily cover the monument for short periods or even go on overnight campouts into the Rincons. Several small guest ranches such as the Lazy K Bar and White Stallion Ranch still exist in the Tucson Mountains. These do not advertise overnight campouts, but riders can go on excursions of up to all day. [105]

Dude ranches and a growing horse-owning population on the monument's boundaries began to cause ecological problems by the mid-1960s, especially in the Rincon Unit. Increased horseback outings with unlimited access to the monument and with no restraint on the riding areas have caused a proliferation of trails with resulting vegetation destruction and erosion. This situation had reached such proportions by 1973 that bridle trail construction was contemplated, but as yet nothing has been done to alleviate the problem. Some limit on the number of riders or restriction on the riding area will have to be addressed to preserve the desert ecosystem. [106]