Chapter 5
The War and Postwar Years, 19401963 (continued)
The Public Hunting Crisis and a New
Look at National Parks
As the Park Service faced the loss of its recreation programs, it
was drawn into a heated debate over whether or not to allow another type
of recreational activity in the parkssporthunting. The most
publicized controversy yet to arise over park wildlife, the debate would
precipitate major reassessments not just of wildlife policy, but of the
Service's overall natural resource management policies.
Elk research conducted in the 1950s by biologist Walter Kittams had
indicated that even though population control had been under way since
the mid-1930s, elk still overgrazed Yellowstone's northern range.
Relying on Kittams' recommendations, the Service planned to make a
special effort to reduce the herd's population from ten thousand to five
thousand head. [151] This planned
reduction, unprecedented in size and, as before, to be conducted by park
rangers, prompted demands from sportsmen's organizations and from state
game and fish commissions to allow hunters to participate in the kill.
Their demands soon expanded to permit big-game hunting in all national
parks.
Reduction programs of lesser magnitude than Yellowstone's were being
carried out in a number of parks, for instance in Zion, Rocky Mountain,
Sequoia, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Acadia, and Grand Teton. In all but
Grand Teton, the reductions were the responsibility of park rangers,
sometimes assisted by state game and fish personnel. Yet some precedent
for public hunting in national parks had been established with the 1950
act adding Jackson Hole National Monument to Grand Teton National Park.
Located just south of Yellowstone, Jackson Hole lies along the migration
route of Yellowstone's southern elk herd. Early in the century,
biologists came to believe that human settlement had interfered with the
migration and with the animals' winter range. To prevent mass starvation
of elk unable to reach their winter range, Congress in 1912 appropriated
funds to purchase an area (the National Elk Refuge) near the town of
Jackson, and the Biological Survey initiated a winter feeding program
for the herd. The program continues today. But in 1950, when Grand Teton
National Park was expanded to include Jackson Hole, Congress provided,
as a concession in the bitter struggle over park expansion, that
"qualified and experienced hunters licensed by the State of Wyoming"
could be allowed to hunt in the park when the Service and the state
determined it necessary for "proper management and protection" of the
elk herd. This condition Director Newton Drury reluctantly accepted to
secure the addition of Jackson Hole to the national park. [152]
In Grand Teton, elk reduction was to include sporthunting, with
hunters to be "deputized as park rangers"a means of avoiding the
appearance of ordinary recreational hunting in the parks. But, as Park
Service biologist Robert H. Bendt reported in the early 1960s, public
participation in the park's elk reduction effort did not turn out to be
"as great as anticipated." Throughout the decade following initiation of
Grand Teton's reduction program in 1951, only about fifty percent of the
approved hunting permits were used; and an average of only twenty-seven
percent of the hunters managed to kill an elkan overall success
rate of about one in eight. [153] Despite
such low success in Grand Teton's hunt, when Yellowstone announced plans
to increase reduction of its northern herd in 1962, sportsmen's
organizations and state game and fish commissioners used this
opportunity to seek the opening of all national parks for big-game
hunting.
There had always been interest in sporthunting in national parks. But
in the early 1960s, pressure from hunting advocates became, in the words
of Grand Teton superintendent Harthon L. ("Spud") Bill, "stronger and
more disturbing" than before. Still, in his January 1961 recommendation
to his regional director on the hunting issue Bill equivocated. He
stated that "basically" he did not favor sporthunting in national parks
and added that the Service should consider an appeal to the public
before "capitulation to the proponents of hunting." Yet he also asserted
that the Service had been "maneuvered into a difficult position by the
rigid no hunting provision where we have had situations which might have
been alleviated by public hunting." Bill advised that the Park Service
must be flexible. What worked in one park might not work in another, and
the Service must "be in a position to determine when public hunting is
necessary." [154]
The Grand Teton superintendent's position was reflected in Wirth's
important policy analysis of the issue in February 1961. In a letter to
Anthony Wayne Smith, the National Parks Association's executive
secretary, Wirth wrote that the Service's ongoing elk reductions were
not in the category of mere recreational hunting, but were the result of
a "forced situation": with damage from overgrazing, reduction was the
only means available for adhering to the Service's mandate to leave the
parks unimpaired. He noted that the 1916 act establishing the Park
Service allowed "destruction" of animal and plant life that was
"detrimental to the use of the parks" and, further, that Fauna No. 1 had
recommended keeping native animal populations in line with range
carrying capacity. Moreover, Wirth feared that the great public interest
in sporthunting would prevent any more national parks from being created
unless hunting was allowed. He noted that biologist Lowell Sumner had
already recommended that a portion of the proposed Great Basin National
Park, in Nevada, be designated a deer management area, with the public
to participate in a reduction program overseen by the secretary of the
interiora plan similar to that for Grand Teton. [155]
Wirth then focused on perhaps the heart of the issue, recalling that
since the mid-1930s rangers had been carrying out reduction programs, a
"disagreeable and time consuming" task for which there was seldom enough
manpower or funding. Now, after a thorough review, he believed that
public hunting could be conducted in a "controlled and limited" manner
to assist the rangers. "On the basis of practical results," public
hunting was likely "the most effective [method] to follow in some
cases." He emphasized that it was merely a "method" for reducing surplus
populations, not a policy that condoned public sporthunting in the
national parks. Concluding his analysis, Wirth stated that the Service
"must be progressive and we must be realistic" in park management and
use "modern knowledge and techniques to further the basic aims of the
Service." He asked, "Why, then, should we not permit [public
participation in reductions]?" [156]
Publishing Wirth's letter along with Smith's reply in its monthly
magazine, the National Parks Association strongly objected to the
director's position and threatened to sue the Service to prevent public
participation in the reductions. The association conceded that
reductions were "in all probability" necessary, yet believed they should
be carried out mainly by the "paid staff of the Service." In a slam at
Mission 66, the association cited Wirth's expressed concern for funding
and manpower in wildlife management and habitat protection, then pointed
out that construction funding was far more than that allocated to
"management, protection, interpretation, and research" combinedan
"imbalance" that needed readjusting. Furthermore, allowing hunting in
new parks such as the one proposed for Great Basin could result in a
dangerous relaxation of restrictions against public hunting in the
older, established national parks. [157]
The association's views were shared by other conservation groups,
such as the Wilderness Society, which agreed that reduction was
"necessary" yet opposed all forms of sporthunting in the parks. Howard
Zahniser, the society's executive secretary, stated this opinion to
Olaus Murie a month after Wirth had made his statement. Later that year,
the Audubon Society concurred with Zahniser's position. [158]
Opposition to Wirth's policy statement also came from within the Park
Servicefrom none other than Yellowstone superintendent Lon
Garrison, probably the Service's most influential park manager. In a
memorandum of March 24, 1961, with the notation "NOT FOR PUBLIC
RELEASE!" across the top of the first page, Garrison wrote that with the
director's public hunting statement, one of the "keystones of the
National Park Service suddenly crumbles and the cause of pure park
conservation . . . loses much of its vitality." Garrison argued that
public hunting would damage the park, with hunters illegally killing
other big-game species and generally wreaking havoc in the vicinity of
hunting camps. Also, Yellowstone would in essence be in competition with
the Grand Teton hunt, where so far hunter participation was less than
expected. With the low success rate of those that did take part,
Garrison estimated that to reduce Yellowstone's northern herd by five
thousand head, twenty thousand hunters would have to participate. In
direct contradiction to Wirth's public hunting proposal, he stated that
for Yellowstone "this is not the answer here." [159]
Raising a fundamental point, Garrison wrote to his regional
director, Howard W. Baker, questioning if in all this controversy the
Service had sufficient information to justify the targeted five thousand
population figure. He then answered his own question: "Of course not."
Garrison judged that the Service might even have "misled the public"
into believing that the park had detailed knowledge of the northern
herd, when in fact much more information was needed. The ecological
relationships among bison, elk, pronghorn, bighorn, deer, and beaver
were, he stated, "subtle and not very well known," and Yellowstone's
wildlife should not be managed "on the basis of hypothesis and sheer
guesswork."
Garrison called for a "long-term study, perhaps five years," into the
"ecology of Northern Yellowstone big game species." He summarized the
seriousness of the situation by arguing that if the Service did a "good
job based on professional research" there would be "no valid criticism."
But the stakes were high. In Garrison's opinion, "a mediocre job based
on uncertain knowledge spells failure and will provoke a continuing
storm of criticism that will jeopardize far more than elk management at
Yellowstone. We simply cannot risk failure." The Yellowstone
superintendent's recommendations were forwarded to Wirth by Regional
Director Baker, with a cover memorandum opposing public hunting in the
national parks. [160]
On September 14, probably after extensive deliberations, Wirth
issued a statement on "Wildlife Conservation and Management," a major
policy reversal that brought him in line with Garrison's
recommendations. He declared that public hunting was "neither the
appropriate nor the practical way" to carry out the Service's wildlife
management objectivesit was "irreconcilable" with national park
purposes. Given the tremendously complex ecology of the parks,
"competent and adequate ecological research" was necessary. In the "long
view," Wirth declared that "management of the natural environments must
be based on complete and exact knowledge of all factors involved, and be
guided by a program of continuous appraisal of wildlife and other
natural conditions." [161] Despite the
strength of Wirth's pronouncement, it would prove altogether as
rhetorical as the initial Mission 66 commitment that national park
management would not be built on guesswork but on scientific
knowledge.
The director apparently issued this statement without clearance from
Secretary Udall's office, which sparked friction between the two
officials. Wirth argued that his statement merely reflected a
long-standing national park policy. But hunters' associations and state
conservation officials in the West reacted angrily to his new position.
Wirth's reversal back to the nopublic-hunting policy created a "crisis
in public relations," as Udall's assistant secretary, John A. Carver,
later recalled. [162]
Park Service rangers carried out Yellowstone's massive elk reduction
in the winter, killing more than forty-five hundred of the northern
herd. Smaller numbers of elk were shot in Rocky Mountain and Glacier,
and deer in parks such as Acadia, Sequoia, and Grand Canyon. In 1962
opponents of the policy introduced a bill in the U.S. Senate requiring
the Park Service to consult with state officials on the need for
reductions, and authorizing the secretary of the interior to use hunters
in reduction programs. Attacked by conservation organizations, the bill
failed to pass. [163]
With the Service beset by critics, in April 1962 Secretary Udall
called for thorough studies to be conducted on its science and resource
management. The studies would address concerns expressed long ago in
Fauna No. 1 and by wildlife biologists such as Lowell Sumner and Adolph
Murie concerns now echoed by conservation organizations and by
high-level Park Service managers, including Daniel Beard and Howard
Stagner. In one request Udall asked the National Academy of Sciences to
undertake a review of the "natural history research needs and
opportunities" in the national parks. In another he called for a "blue
ribbon" committee of highly respected wildlife specialists to study the
Service's wildlife management policies and practices. The National
Academy selected William J. Robbins, a prominent biologist with the
National Science Foundation, to chair its study. Secretary Udall
personally persuaded A. Starker Leopold, professor of biology at the
University of California at Berkeley and son of the late ecologist Aldo
Leopold, to head the wildlife management review. [164]
In response to the "crisis in public relations," and coming nearly
half a century after establishment of the National Park Service,
prestigious committees from outside the Service were to undertake
in-depth reviews of research and wildlife management policy. Never
before had this happened. Originating within the Service, Fauna No. 1
had lacked the clout that could be derived from reviews by prominent
scientists and wildlife specialists brought together by a secretary of
the interior. Imposed by Udall's office, these reviews by influential
outside experts were awaited by a large and increasingly vocal
conservation community.
Looking forward to the reports, Lowell Sumner wrote to his friend and
professional colleague Starker Leopold in May 1962 expressing belief
that the upcoming studies were probably the "biggest and most hopeful
development since George Wright's death cut short the evolution of the
original Wildlife Division" in the mid-1930s. [165] And indeed the wildlife management study
(referred to as the Leopold Report) and the National Academy's research
review, both presented in 1963, would call for a potent infusion of
science into national park management. They would constitute an
important restatement of the Service's basic goals in managing natural
areas of the national park system.
At a 1968 meeting of Park Service scientists, Lowell Sumner took a
long look back and asked the question, "Why, among NPS activities, did
biology alone fail to recover" after the end of World War II? One of the
Service's most experienced scientists, Sumner believed that "the heart
of the matter" had been the Park Service's "reluctance to acknowledge
the ecological importance of the parks." [166] Indeed, the period during and after World
War II was marked by two phases of national park management, both of
which witnessed steady resistance to meaningful improvements in the
Service's scientific capabilities and its knowledge of the parks'
natural resources.
Newton Drury had overseen a period of minimal growth and development
during the war and early postwar years. His cautious outlook and
preservationist leanings meant that he was timid in advocating park
development for tourism and opposed to extensive involvement in
reservoir recreation. Commenting on Drury's conservatism, former chief
biologist Victor Cahalane recalled that the director was a "state's
righter" who believed the federal government should have a very limited
role in managing park lands. Drury differed markedly from Mather,
Albright, Cammerer, and Wirth, whose aggrandizing ways contributed much
to the expansion and development of the national park system. [167] In resource management issues Drury often
supported the wildlife biologists, who pressed for decisions based more
on ecological considerations than on the desire to satisfy park
visitors. Yet he made no determined effort to enhance the biologists'
authority in the Service.
Under Conrad Wirth, the next phase of national park management
featured Mission 66the kind of long-range, expansive program Drury
never earnestly pursued. National park facilities had badly deteriorated
and the parks were strained to the limit by public use that had more
than quadrupled between the end of World War II and the mid-1950s. Even
the vehement Park Service critic Ansel Adams once admitted that Mission
66 was an "excellent program of providing 'necessities' in terms of
expected travel increases." From a "bureaucratic viewpoint," he added,
it was "one of the better undertakings of recent years," its purpose
"undoubtedly well intended."
Despite widespread criticism of the program, Wirth came to believe by
1961 that the Park Service had not "planned big enough." He later wrote
that "instead of having the urgency behind us, we were facing a new
dimension an action program was required that would dwarf the
first five years of Mission 66." In fact, Mission 66 funding during its
last half-decade amounted to considerably more than during the first
five years, the grand total reaching just over one billion dollars by
the end of the program. [168]
Many current and retired Park Service employees view Mission 66 as a
kind of Golden Age of the national parksan exciting time of
growth, expansion, and development of the system. Mission 66 was the
culmination of the vision of Stephen Mather and Horace Albright, who had
sought to develop the parks and make them accessible for the benefit and
enjoyment of the people. The program was a high point of what might be
termed the "landscape architecture approach" to national park
management, when, under landscape architect Wirth, development of the
parks for recreational tourism dominated national park affairs and went
largely unfettered by natural resource concerns. With huge sums of
money, Congress backed Wirth's policiesin effect confirming the
Service's long-held belief that the basic purpose of the national parks
was public enjoyment, rather than scientifically based preservation of
natural resources. Appropriation of a billion dollars for park
development demonstrated that Mission 66 was what Congress and the
people wanted for the parks.
Yet this Golden Age brought changes to National Park Service programs
that did not please Wirth and his associates. After building its
reputation and leadership in park management and recreational tourism,
the Service witnessed its control of national recreation planning given
over to the newly created Bureau of Outdoor Recreation, and its
administrative discretion over the parks' backcountry threatened by the
wilderness bill. Moreover, the Park Service was at odds with the rising
tide of conservation. Wirth's comment in early 1958 that some of the
conservationists believed that the "Service is the enemy" and "cannot be
trusted to preserve the parks" reflected his apprehension that the
bureau was losing ground with that important and vocal part of its
constituency. [169]
At first, the criticism regarding the deteriorated condition of park
facilities that helped bring about Mission 66 was aimed largely at a
parsimonious Congress, rather than at the Park Service. Once Mission 66
began, however, the Service itself came under intense criticism from
conservationists who argued that the program's construction and
development were too extensive, too modern, and too intrusive. Finally,
by the time Mission 66 passed midcourse, critics increasingly aimed at
another target: Park Service failure to build a science program and to
consider the ecological impact of park development. The focus had
shifted from, for instance, Bernard DeVoto's early 1950s article
identifying a crisis in terms of deteriorating national park facilities;
to widespread concerns about modern, inappropriate development under
Mission 66; then to "Get the Facts, and Put Them to Work," defining
crucial park needs in ecological and scientific terms.
Intended to commemorate the Service's fiftieth anniversary, Mission
66 marked a major transition in national park history. The era that
brought to culmination the Mather and Albright vision of developing
parks for public use and enjoyment would also witness the resurgence of
George Wright's vision to protect, or even restore, the integrity of the
parks' natural resources a vision shared by those wildlife
biologists who continued after Wright. Once the studies requested by
Secretary Udall from the Leopold Committee and the National Academy of
Sciences were released in 1963, the Park Service truly would enter a new
era, in which park management would be judged far more on ecological
criteria. Yet this era began at the height of national park development
under Mission 66 and would confront a half-century of Park Service
tradition emphasizing recreational tourism.
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