NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Sonoran Desert National Park, Arizona: A Proposal

UNITED STATES
DEPARTMENT of the INTERIOR

********************* news release

OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY

For Release JANUARY 7, 1966

UDALL ENDORSES PROPOSAL TO COMBINE ORGAN PIPE CACTUS NATIONAL MONUMENT AND CABEZA PRIETA GAME RANGE AS SONORAN DESERT NATIONAL PARK IN ARIZONA

Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall today endorsed enthusiastically a proposal to combine Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and Cabeza Prieta Game Range in Arizona to form the Sonoran Desert National Park. "This area would provide a national park of superlative quality," the Secretary said.

Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and the Cabeza Prieta Game Range, which make up the major portion of the study area, represent the last sizeable expanse of relatively unspoiled Sonoran Desert remaining in the United States. The study area also includes an 80,000-acre extension west of the Game Range which contains the spectacular Tinajas Atlas Mountains. The total size of the proposed park would be approximately 1,242,000 acres, making it one of the largest in the National Park System.

In 1962, the Advisory Board on National Parks, Historic Sites, Buildings, and Monuments urged the Secretary to take positive steps to prevent further damage to the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument from mining activities. A preliminary analysis of the mining problem indicated the need for a broader study covering also the grazing problem and a reevaluation of the purpose of the Monument.

The Sonoran Desert National Park proposal resulted from this broader study. It recommends that the establishment of the new national park be contingent upon the termination of military use of the Game Range, which now precludes public use, and the elimination of grazing and mining activities in the monument which seriously threaten the values which need to be preserved.

The report to the Secretary is based upon investigations made by National Park Service staff members of the Southwest Regional Office and Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and by Weldon F. Heald, Departmental consultant and well-known conservationist of Tucson, Arizona. Norman Simmons, Assistant Manager of the Cabeza Prieta Game Range for the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife, served as guide and consultant to the group throughout its study of the Game Range.

"Copies of this study report will be given wide distribution, to permit the greatest possible number of citizens to develop informed opinions on the subject, and to let the Department of the Interior have the benefit of their thinking," Udall said.

Recognizing the great economic promise of recreation in this part of Arizona, the report describes the area as within an easy day's travel of a great segment of the Nation's population, including southern California with 10 million people and the Phoenix-Tucson area with close to one million.

The 330,874-acre Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in southern Arizona was established in 1937 by Presidential proclamation to protect and preserve fine examples of Sonoran Desert vegetation—especially the organ pipe and senita cactus—plus wildlife and the desert scenery.

The adjoining Cabeza Prieta Game Range—about 860,000 acres—is an area larger than the State of Rhode Island without a single permanent human inhabitant. Administered by Interior's Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife, the Game Range was established in 1939, primarily for the protection of desert bighorn sheep. It also provides an undisturbed habitat for a remnant population of pronghorn (antelope), the collared peccary (wild pig), Gambels quail and white-winged dove.

The Refuge gets its name from lava-capped Cabeza Prieta ("dark head") Peak, 2,650 feet high near the south end. The dappled, pinto-like combination of brown volcanic rock superimposed on gleaming white granite is a spectacular feature of these mountains. Natural rock basins called "tinajas," or "tanks," scooped out by centuries of violent but infrequent cloudbursts, provide drinking water for wildlife. These tinajas have been life savers to desert travelers for nearly 400 years.

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P.N. 73704-662