SITKA Administrative History

Chapter 4:
SITKA NATIONAL MONUMENT, MIDDLE YEARS (continued)

Initial National Monument Planning

The housing problem was one of several indications that the park service needed to plan for Sitka development. In March of 1940, Thomas C. Vint, the service's Chief of Planning, brought Director Cammerer up to date on the planning he had instructed Region IV headquarters in San Francisco to initiate for Sitka. The region had replied that the only available data was a map accompanying the proclamation that had established Sitka National Monument and Been's October 1939 "Report of Inspection of Sitka National Monument." J.D. Coffman, Chief of Forestry, Earl A. Trager, Chief Naturalist, and Ronald F. Lee, Supervisor of Historic Sites, all reviewed the available documentation.

Lee's comments were the most vital and addressed issues of long-term significance:

Since the totems at Sitka are without exception exotic [to the Sitka area], they can be located in the park in accordance with landscape principles or principles of good design. . . . The replica of the old Russian blockhouse has no special historical value since it is not on the original blockhouse site.

There is no need to continue work on this replica; nor, on the other hand, should it be pulled down as someone has proposed. It is an interesting feature and may as well be retained as one of the features of the park.

Lee also noted that the service might employ authority granted by the Historic Sites Act of 1935 as a basis for cooperative agreements for preservation of Saint Michael's Cathedral and other old Russian or early American structures at Sitka. [203]

Vint summarized the comments of Coffman, Lee, and Trager in a memorandum that apparently constituted Sitka National Monument's first master plan. Logical projects for Sitka included a new entrance motif, replacing enameled signs with wood signs, replacing frame benches with benches of rustic design, continuing totem pole restoration, constructing toilet facilities, controlling Indian River erosion, and establishing a custodian's residence and garage, probably in Sitka proper.

Cammerer responded to the Sitka plan by noting that it showed 15 totem poles and there were actually 18. Two additional poles were at the entrance to the park and another was adjacent to Lovers Lane, just south of three poles in a clearing. [204]

Although Vint later noted that he signed a master plan for Sitka on August 30, 1940, and recommended it to the director, there is no documentary evidence that Sitka's first master plan ever evolved beyond the letter summarizing the recommendations of the various branch chiefs. Its recommendations were to be revived, the first time coming in 1946 when Miller again brought up the idea of constructing an information center at the entrance to the monument. [205]