Re-Creating the Wilderness: Shaping Narratives and Landscapes in Shenandoah National Park Author(S): Justin Reich Reviewed Work(S): Source: Environmental History, Vol

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Re-Creating the Wilderness: Shaping Narratives and Landscapes in Shenandoah National Park Author(s): Justin Reich Reviewed work(s): Source: Environmental History, Vol. 6, No. 1 (Jan., 2001), pp. 95-117 Published by: Forest History Society and American Society for Environmental History Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3985233 . Accessed: 13/01/2013 21:50

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This content downloaded on Sun, 13 Jan 2013 21:50:04 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Re-Creatingthe Wilderness ShapingNarratives andLandscapes inShenandoah National Park

JustinReich

The view at Sawmill ParkOverlook in Shenandoah National Parkencompasses privatewoodlands in the distance, agriculturallands in the valley, and parkforests in the foreground.An interpretivesign at the overlook describes "Shenandoah's PatchworkForest" and explains that the visible differences in vegetation occur because "Non-Parkareas are subject to direct human change which Parklands no longer experience."This waysideprovides one shortpassage in a longerstory told by the National ParkService (NPS)about Shenandoah,a storythat has coevolved with the landscapeduring the lastseventy-five years. This officialstory highlights certain aspects of Shenandoah's historyand shades others, and recent expressionsof the parknarrative have downplayedthe integralrole of human beings in shaping the Blue Ridge Mountains.One does not have to strayfar from Sawmill ParkOverlook to find places where the landscapecontradicts the narrative.At the foot of the sign are rowsof tree stumps neatly cut to maintain the vista. Foras long as they have been inhabited, Shenandoah National Parklands have been subject to direct human change. Homesteads,farms, cattle pastures,and or- chardsdotted the slopes of the Blue Ridge until the NPStook possessionof the lands in 1936,and, to use the landscape architect'sterm, obliteratedalmost all traces of human history.In recent decades, the officialstory of Shenandoahhas been one of "re-creation,"of a wildernesslost to human exploitationand then restoredby natural processes.But naturealone did not re-createa lost wilderness.The NPSand the Civilian ConservationCorps (ccc) created a landscape never before seen oInthe BIlue Ridge, through fire suppression,road construction, wildlife protection, human removal,landscaping, and engineering.Through the variousstages of acquir- ing parklands, establishing Shenandoah, and re-creatingthe landscape,park officials and supporterstold a varietyof storiesthat justifiedboth the "preservation"and the transformationof the Blue Ridge Mountains. Throughout Shenandoah'shistory, storiesand landscapeshave re-createdeach other. This historyof storytellingand land managementin ShenandoahNational Park attemptsto make two contributionsto the broaderstudy of environmentalhistory.

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In unveiling evidence of significanthuman influence in Shenandoah, it suggests that the historiographyof the nationalparks, while focusing on how parkspreserve landscapes,continues to underemphasizehow these places createnew landscapes. This historyhighlights the dynamic relationshipbetween storiesabout natureand the landscapesof a national park.Those storiesthat parkmanagers used to justify significant interventionin the environment, most notablyduring the interwarpe- riod, will be of particularinterest to those seeking historicalanswers to our current "troublewith wilderness." Shenandoah National Parkhas occupied an uncomfortableposition in the historyof the National ParkService. The masternarrative of this history,exemplified by AlfredRunte's National Parks:The American Experience, describesa progres- sioInfrom parksdesigned to preservenattural wonders and scenic grandeurto ones designed to preserverepresentative environments from aroundthe cotuntry.Runte treats Shenandoah as a "transition"between the two types of preservationin the parksystem. He argues Shenandoah "anticipatedthe ecological standardsof the later twentieth century"but could only "approximatethe visual standardsof the nationalpark idea as originallyconceived." He definesShenandoah as a marginalized follower to the "crownjewels" of the West.' Recent historiographyhas begun to addressthe extent to which national parks shaped environmentsinstead of simply preservingthem, though Shenandoah re- mains largelyignored. RichardSellars, Linda Flint McClelland, and Ethan Carr have focused on the essential role of landscape architects and engineers in con- structingthe parksas an experiencefor tourists. Although Shenandoah experienced as much manipulation as any other national park,its storyremains largelytintold throughoutthese works.Carr's work even recapitulatesShenandoah's official narrative when he observesthat "generallyparkland was allowed to succeed back to a condition that approximated(it was hoped) the presettlement wilderness conditions considered appropriatefor national parkscenery."2 Shenandoah's historysuggests that the critique of the national park'sconven- tional narrativebegun by these scholarscan be pushed even frirther.National park scholarshave highlighted numerous ways humans have changed park lands. Though Sellars argues that "ecological preservation"must be considered "the highest of many worthypriorities," his book revealsthe enormous importance of landscape architects and engineers within the national parksystem. Carr and McClelland emphasize the importance of these professionsin shaping areasalong parkthor- oughfaresof travel.Runte observeshow fire suppressionand wildlife management influenced the shape of national parks.Mark Spence's book explainshow the NPS justifiedthe removal of Native American residentsfrom the parksin the West. In Shenandoah, NPS officials brought about all of these changes simultaneously to fashion a new landscape that Shenandoah landscape architect Harlan Kelseybe- lieved would "restoreso far as possible the natural conditions [of Shenandoah], ecologically and scenically."3 After uncovering evidence of human design in the national parks,developing notions of how to shape landscapesbecome as importanta theme in parkhistory as developing notions of how to preservelandscapes. Runte may be partiallycorrect in arguing Shenandoah representsa transitionin national parkpreservation, but

This content downloaded on Sun, 13 Jan 2013 21:50:04 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Re-Creatingthe Wilderness 97 withina narrativedescribing national park development, Shenandoah is not an inadequatefollower but an importantleader. In 1965,A. StarkerLeopold suggested that"a reasonable illusion of primitiveAmerica could be recreated[in the parks] usingthe utmostin skill,judgment and ecological sensitivity."4 Shenandoah's first officialsadopted this goal, ecologically and scenically, thirty years before. The npsdoes not justshape places; it alsoshapes ideas about those places. In his recentbook about tourism in theAmerican West, Hal Rothman writes, "This process of scriptingspace, both physically and psychically, defines tourist towns and resorts.All placeshave scriptedspace. The scriptingof spaceis essentialto the organizingof the physicaland socialworld for the purposesof perpetuation."5 Throughpark rangers, museum displays, maps, brochures, press releases, and waysidesigns, every national park creates a narrativeto explainitself. These narratives areoften part educational and part celebrational. They attempt to explainboth the historyof the parklands and the role of the NPS in preservingAmerica's natural heritage.These narratives are very much built into, or scripted into, the landscape. Thesetwo threads of historicalanalysis-the management of landscapesand the managementof stories-can be woveninto a singlehistory of Shenandoah.Land managementin Shenandoahhas been deeplyinfluenced by the storiesthat park officialshave told aboutnature and aboutappropriate human relations with the environment.At the same time, the official parknarrative has alwaysreflected the contemporarycondition of the environmenton the Blue Ridge.Stories about Shenandoah'snature lead to managementpractices that in turnlead to newstories. Forthe lastseventy-five years, Shenandoah's landscape and story have changed and havechanged each other. Everypark faces a tensionbetween what it is and whatit is supposedto be, otherwisemanagement would be unnecessary.Parks can resolve this tension in two ways:rhetorically or materially.Supporters and officials can eitherargue that the parkmeets the relevantstandards or thatthose standards ought to be changedto includethe park.Or, park managers can materiallychange parklands so theyap- proachthe ideallandscape. This tension between ideal and reality has motivated the evolutionof storiesand land management in Shenandoah. The historyof Shenandoahbegan when the nps firstproposed a parkin the SouthernAppalachians in 1924.Supporters of a siteon Virginia'sBlue Ridge imme- diatelyformed a lobby,and theyargued that their mountains represented a fine exampleof nearlyunspoiled wilderness. To thosewho suggestedthat no placein the Eastcould meet standards for western parks, boosters retorted that eastern scen- eryhad its ownvirtues. In 1936,the Virginialobby celebrated their success at the dedicationof ShenandoahNational Park. With the landunder federal protection, FrederickDelano Roosevelt spoke not of untouchednature but of a landscapeim- pactedby human activities and dedicated Shenandoah to the human "re-creation" of natuLre.In the decadethat followed, Shenandoah attempted to transformthe land- scapeinto a modelof SouthernAppalachian wilderness. So successfulwere landscape architectsin both executingand veiling their effortsthat the following generationof parkmanagers described Shenandoah's re-creation entirely in terms of naturalprocesses. This re-creation narrative is the one thatpresently dominates the signs,guides, and historiesof ShenandoahNational Park. Only recently,as

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Shenandoah officialshave found a renewed interestin the culturalhistory of their park,has the narrativeof Shenandoah begun to again recognize the park'sland- scape as a collaborationbetween human and naturalactors.

CreatingWilderness: Forging Shenandoah's Early Image

Stories create national parks.Parks also require deed transfers,congressional ap- proval,public support,and other effortsto come to pass, but all of these effortsare motivatedin one way or another by storiesthat explain and justifythe permanent protection of land. The creation of Shenandoah National Park required the confluence of argumentsfrom a number of differentconstituencies: citizens, business leaders,philanthropists, and governmentofficials. The parkwas firstdefended as an equal to the parksof the West both in terms of scenic beauty and economic potential, though these rationalesgave way to the re-creationnarrative once the parkwas protected under federal law. These firstarguments in supportof Shenandoah representthe incoherent genesis of the scriptingof the park. On 7 December 1924,Harlan Kelsey rode over the Blue Ridge on horseback, charged with judging the mountains as a potential national park.In January1924, nps Director Stephen T. Mather made the suggestion to establish a park in the SouthernAppalachians, and soon afterSecretary of the InteriorHubert Work created a five-man Southern AppalachianNational ParkCommission to find an ap- propriatesite. Kelsey sat on the Temple Commission, named for Pennsylvania congressmanand chairmanHenry Temple, as a landscapearchitect and memberof the AppalachianMountain Club. He staunchlysupported the GreatSmoky Moun- tains as the firstsite for a southernpark and was the last member of the commission to visit the Blue Ridge.6 When Kelseyand the SouthernAppalachian National ParkCommission judged potential parksites, they considered six qualifications:

1.Mountain scenery with inspiring perspectives and delightfuil details. 2. Areassufficiently extensive and adaptable so thatannually millions of visitors mightenjoy the benefitsof oultdoorlife andcommunion with nature without the confusionof overcrowding. 3.A substantialpart to containforests, shrubs and flowers, and mountain streams, with picturesquecascades and waterfallsoverhung with foliage,all tin- touchedby the handof man. 4. AbuLndantsprings and streams available for camps and fishing. 5. Opportunitiesfor protecting and developing the wild life of thearea and the wholeto be a natturalmuiseLum, preserving the otutstandingfeatures of the SouithernAppalachians as the appearedin the earlypioneer days. 6. Accessibilityby rail and road:

These six standardsembodied the diverseideals of the nationalparks as they had developed in the AmericanWest. The requirementsemphasized outstanding scenery, picturesque naturalelements, and an untouched wildernesssuitable for protecting. The new parkneeded sufficientspace, access, and recreationalactivities to

This content downloaded on Sun, 13 Jan 2013 21:50:04 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Re-Creatingthe Wilderness 99 accommodate millions of visitors. Shenandoah boosters quickly went about defending their area on all frontswith variedand conflictingarguments about Shenandoah'svirtues. Beforeexamining the various arguments for and against Shenandoah, it is impor- tantto considerwhat the BlueRidge Mountains actually looked like in the 1920S. A ForestService report sent to the TempleCommission in 1925 providedan invalu- able glimpse.Forest Examiner R. CliffordHall reported:"At present about 20 percentof thismountainous section is cleared.... Of the 8o percent now in forest, about50 percent is culled and cut over, while thirty percent may be classified as virgin."8 Hall noted that "lumberingis an importantindustry" along with some iron miningand agriculture. He describedthe "erosionand irregularity of streamflow" producedby these activities and observed that "there is muchland on thewest slope which has been clearedand burneduntil it supportsonly a scrubbygrowth of worthlessbrush." Hall concluded that the Blue Ridge"might be consideredas a possible area of third rateimportance."9 HarlanKelsey's tour of the mountainsdid not includeside tripsto burntand scrubbyunderbrush. His guide through the BlueRidge was George Pollack, owner of the SkylandRanch, labeled as "TheOnly Dude Ranchin the EasternU.S." Pollackwas a talentedhiost as well as one of Shenandoah'smost enthusiastic boosters.Pollack and Kelsey rode over freshly cut trailsthrough the leastimpacted parts of the hillsides,and theygazed out onto the Piedmontfrom newly built observa- tiontowers. As the story goes, Kelsey was quite taken with the landscape and insisted on ridingthrough the mountainslate intothe night.On Decemberii, Kelseyre- turnedto Washingtonto meetwith the TempleCommission, and according to a promotionalbook from 1929, he met his colleaguessaying, "Well I'll be damned, that'sall I can saygentlemen." Kelsey decided that Blue Ridgemet the qualifications,and that evening the commissionunanimously cast their votes for the establishmentof ShenandoahNational Park.a0 The nextday, the Temple Commission presented their report to SecretaryWork. Theyurged the NPSto establishShenandoah as the firstAppalachian national park andlater develop the GreatSmoky Mountains. Their report stated that the Smokies "easilystand first because of theheight of theirmountains, depth of valleys,rugged- nessof the area,and the unexampledvariety of trees,shrubs and plants," but the commissionchose the Blue Ridge because it couldserve "a larger number of people in a shorterperiod at lessexpense."'l The reportto Workbegan the campaignto establishShenandoah National Park. As the parkchanged from dream to possibilityto inevitability,park supporters experimentedwith a varietyof argumentsto convincean arrayof audiencesof Shenandoah'smerit as a nationalpark. After the commission's initial recommenda- tion,a conglomerationofVirginia business interests, including the new Shenandoah NationalPark Association, worked to convinceCongress and the publicthat the BlueRidge's wilderness merited preservation. They combined their efforts with the VirginiaState Conservation and Development Commission, headed by William Carson,the NationalPark Service, and numerous regional and national newspa- persto beginpromoting the park.

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Initially,Shenandoah supportersemphasized the scenic and primevalqualities of the parkalong with its recreationaland restorativepotential. A pressrelease from the Department of the Interiorheralded the Blue Ridge's"splendid primeval forests."The WashingtonStar reportedin March 1926 on the rareand variedscenery and the "strikingwilderness." A pamphlet published by the Shenandoah National ParkAssociation declared that the mountain rangehad "beenpreserved in its virgin loveliness." Stephen T. Mather declared that at Shenandoah "the spiritualand mental relaxationfound in the quiet of the shady forests or beside the running streamis almost necessaryin this age of jazz."'-2 Some acknowledgedthe human presenceand potentialin Shenandoah'swilder- ness. In September 1924,a booster article from the Greene County Record an- nounced that "thegovernment wants nature in the most primevaland ... the Blue Ridge meets the requirements.The land is either primevalforest or grazingfarms with but a small area of cultivated estates."One newspaper suggested that "its pasturelands would be well stocked with buffalo, deer and elk"roaming about in their"wild state." The Temple Commissionreport declared that "the greatest single feature"of the proposedpark was a possible skylinedrive atop the mountain ridge. The Shenandoah National ParkAssociation claimed that "camping sites, high- ways,artificial lakes, the restorationand protection of animal and plant life, have been spoken of as logical provisionsof the Government."All of these predictions eventually came to pass.13 The development of Shenandoah National Parktook an importantstep forward in 1926when Congress agreed to accept Shenandoah into the parksystem if Vir- ginia gave the land to the federal government. The lack of federal funds for new parkswas well known, and the Shenandoah National ParkAssociation had started frindraisingefforts in the summerof 1925.14Toutingthe park'sscenic grandeurmight convince Virginiansto favorthe park,but civic organizationsneeded to provethe financial benefits of wilderness for the citizenry to invest in the promise of Shenandoah. To explain the potential of the proposed park to a skeptical public, boosters began an aggressivepublicity campaign to raisefunds for the park.The Shenandoah National ParkAssociation produced the pamphlet Virginia'sProposed National Park,which pronounced that "the value of Virginia's scenery crop can best be predictedby comparisonswith resultsin the west,"where more than one million touristseach spent hundreds of dollars. Civic organizationsalso took out ads in county papersto encouragea widerarray of citizens to purchasepark lands. One ad in a Harrisonburgpaper with the bold headline "ShallWe Lose the Park?"argued thatnearly everyone -farmers, grocers,lawyers, doctors, land owners,wage earners, hotel men, housewives,and workingwomen-stood to gain fromthe new parkand should invest in Shenandoah.15 While explaining the financial benefits of a parkin the Blue Ridge Mountains, supporterscarefully noted that these mountains had no other value. Supporters characterizedthe proposed parkarea as "worthlesslands." One Greene County residentwrote, "Whatenterprise now can anyone in the Blue Ridge get money out of? The principalpart of the chestnut oak barkis gone and all the best timber has been cut on land where teams can be used."6

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The propositionthat wildernesscould be the Blue Ridge'smost profitableland use ralliedVirginians behind the Shenandoah National Parkproposal. As earlyas February1926, the sixteen counties adjacent to the proposed park raised almost $200,000 to purchase land. In general, the parkenjoyed the supportof Virginia's Piedmont and valley residentswho riskedlittle by investingin the potentialrewards of Shenandoah.Few remainedto resistthe parkexcept the landownersthemselves.17 In 1928, the Virginia General Assemblyadopted a resolution allowing the con- demnationof proposedpark lands and forcingreluctant owners to sell."8Theimme- diate challenge to this resolutionin the pressand in the courtsonce again changed the public discourse about Shenandoah. With the imminent threat to people's homes, objections to Shenandoah stepped up considerably,and regional papers published the dissent. B. I. Bickersled a typical campaign of parkresistance in Greene County. Even before the condemnation resolution, Bickers saw the threat Shenandoah represented to landowners.He found that of Greene County's 45,387 acres within the park'sproposed boundaries, there were 567 homes, of which 138held more than 1o0 acres of land. Grazing farmsand timberlandsamounted to almost eight thousand more acres. Bickerswarned that the government'sprices for the lands were unfair, and the whole county would sufferwhen taxes from these productivelands were lost. From Bicker'sstandpoint, "30,000 people [are]to be deprivedof their homes fora playground,"though his estimatesproved to be about 25,000 people too high.19 The resistanceto the parkfailed. One landownerlost a challenge to the condemnations in Virginia'shighest court in 1928, and the Supreme Court dismissed a second test case in 1931.20Opposition to the park afterwardwas negligible. The variouscivic organizationsthat coordinatedShenandoah's fundraising found that their argumentsfor the park'seconomic and recreationalpotential produced sub- stantialresults. The purchaseof the parklands was only a few yearsaway. Discussion of Shenandoah in the papersquieted, and supportersturned their attention away from defending the parkand towardcompleting the process. Shenandoah National Parkstayed mostly out of the headlines during the early 1930s,but one burstof presscame during fall 1932.Construction of Skyline Drive began in 1931 as a federal drought relief project, and in September 1932,Virginia offered a tour of the partiallycompleted highwayto a government conference on parksand planning.2"In October, the state opened a section of the highwayto the public for five weeks, and those who had lobbied for the creation of a parkway drove along the highway they had imagined. The press gave both events positive coverage, reflecting many of the explanationsand justificationsfor the park. A pressrelease from the Departmentof the Interiorrevived depictions of the park as a place of "scenicpanoramas of high mountain peaks,forest-clad slopes, and vast stretchesof historic Shenandoah Valley."In a speech to the conference delegates, Horace M. Albright,Mather's successor as National ParkService Director, empha- sized the economic benefits the construction brought to local residents. He de- scribedSkyline's development as the opening of a practicallyvirgin forest, protected from the depredations of vandals. Free from the criticism of detractors,all the park'svirtues could be revived:scenic grandeur,pristine or mostlypristine wilderness, recreationalopportunity, and economic benefit.22

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One more significantargument for Shenandoahappeared in Albright'sspeech: a predecessorto FDR's re-creationnarrative. At the Septemberopening of the Skyline Drive,Albright proposed the parkshould "beallowed to revertto the care of Mother Nature with every effort being bent to help Nature reclaim and repopulate the region as she sees fit."23 Albright'scomment was uot the firstof its kind. Othershad suggestedthe notion that ShenandoahNational Park would rejuvenate the wildernesson the Blue Ridge. In a 1928 speech to a Richmond audience, SecretaryWork argued the country should "protect[Shenandoah] and let Nature restore it as God left it."24But this story never rose to prominence in the way that notions of Shenandoah's scenic grandeuror economic potential did. Why did the re-creationnarrative fail in the late twenties and earlythirties and then define the parkfor the next six decades?In part,the timing waswrong. During the mid-1920s,when scenerystrongly influenced nationalpark politics, arguing that Congress should accept Slhenandoahso the lands could be healed wouildbe un- thinkable. Later, as park supporterstried to sell the park'seconomic potential, Virginia'sinvestors wanted to hear about the park'smerits, not its flaws.Restoring nature might be a reasonablegoal for a wildernessthe nation alreadyhad, but few were interestedin purchasingdegraded land in orderto heal it. More importantly,the assumptionsabout wildernessthat made the re-creation narrativeconvincing had not yet been developed. Albright'snotion that people should "help Nature reclaim"the Blue Ridge assumed a wildernesswhere people have a role as healer. This tenet of New Deal conservationism,developed in reac- tion to the Dust Bowl and other catastrophesof the early 1930s, was only nascent when Albrightspoke in 1932. An inadequate nature did not mesh well with the scenic or recreational ideals celebrated in the decade preceding Shenandoah's dedication. In 1934,Virginia gave the Blue Ridgeto the federalgovernment, and the NPS took official control of Shenandoah National Park. Along with taking possession of Shenandoah'slands, the NPS inheritedShenandoah's story. Between accepting the new park in 1934 and its dedication in July of 1936, the Park Service faced the responsibilityof reinterpretingthat storyto explain Shenandoall'spast and give the park meaning within the nation's present and future. In the years prior to Shenandoah'sofficial opening, the NPS preparedsuggested dedication speeches for Secretaryof the Interior Harold L. Ickes and President Roosevelt.25These docu- mentsprovide insight into the earliestdevelopments of Shenandoah'sofficial narrative. The ParkService revivedmany of Shenandoah'snarratives to explain its frIture. Each speech touched on the spiritualvalue of nationalparks, the benefitsof recreation,and the economic opportunitiescreated by nationalparks. One speech forthe presidentwove all three together:"We realize that lives withoutplay are warped.... Too long we have thought of recreationas a luxury.We should realizethat national parksand parkways,for instance, are a legitimateand profitableform of land use.":6 The dedications also recounted the park'shistory and recognized Shenandoah's importantsupporters and philanthropists.The draftsportrayed Shenandoah as the most recent of Virginia'smany contributionsto the nation.

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The preservationof sceneryanid wilderness played prominently in each speech, as well as the developmentof those areas.One draftemphasized "the importance of preserving"national parksand "theneed to conserve ... snpreme wildernessscen- ery."The speeches praisedthe ccc's "attractivelandscaping" in the parkand her- alded the "magnificenthighway" spanning the Blue Ridge.In the conclusions,each speech reflected the duality of the NPS'S mission; as one put it, "I dedicate the Shenandoah National Parkto those twins of nationalpark integrity-conservation and hulmalnuse."27 Ickes accepted most of the ParkService's stuggestions, but the president'sspeech took a differentrhetorical route. ForFDR, the human and naturalsides of wilderness were not twin but integrated.FDR envisioned Shenandoahas a place where people could both play and workin the wilderness. MR'sspeech at the park'sdedication in 1936began by celebratingShenandoah's ccc camps. By putting "idle people to the task of ending the waste of our land," Shenanidoahended both the "involuntaryidleness" of the ccc's young men and the "idlenessof ShenandoahNational Park."For FDR, Shenandoah offered an opportu- nity to emphasize the social welfareand conservationdimensions of the New Deal. The ccc camps representedthe rejuvenationof human lives through their active rejuvenationof parklands. He expressedhis passionfor planning, a key element of New Deal conservationism, and envisioned the fruits of this planning as a Shenandoah where vacationerswould find a national park"good for their bodies and good for their souls."2' FDRended by emphasizinghis vision of conservationas including human devel- opmenit.He called the national parks"in the largestsense a workof conservation." He contended that "throughall of them we are preservingthe beautyand wealth of the hills"and "maintaininguseful workfor our young men."Though the NPSdrafts included both preservationand development, FDR'sspeech knit them more closely together.FDR concluded: "I,therefore, dedicate Shenandoah National Parkto this and succeeding generations of Americans for the recreation and the re-creation which we shall find here."29 On 5 July1936, the WashingtonEveningStarprinted an articletitled "Shenandoah Afterthought."An editorialistwrote, "[Americans]know that the naturalresources of the country cannot be expropriatedwastefully without penalty. Policies which once devastatedareas vastly larger than Shenandoah have been halted. Decades, howeverwill be needed to restorewhat has been lost."3 Two daysafter the dedication, a storyof Shenandoah as a place where humans could re-createa lost wilderness had beguinto replacethe earlierstories of Shenandoahas a primevalwilderness that had sold the park.

Creating the Re-Creation:The Landscaping of Shenandoah

On 2 July1936, Harlan Kelsey rode by automobile over the Skyline Drive, charged with judgingthe condition of the Blue Ridge. He was now a Collaborator-at-Large for Shenandoahwith greatinfluence though no actual authority.Shenandoah was safely protected, and Kelsey'srole shifted from booster to constructive critic. In

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1924, Kelsey found the Blue Ridge's wildernessworthy of national parkstatus, in 1936 he observedthat "naturehas been badly upset, but it should be and can be restored."31Kelsey still believed that Shenandoah should meet the highest park standards,but now he was free to transformthe parknot merely in people's minds but on the land as well. The standardsKelsey understood in 1936differed significantly from the six qualifications used by the Temple Commission in two ways. Where the Temple stan- dardscalled for environments"untouched by the hand of man,"Shenandoah was embarking on a program of intensive re-creation. Roosevelt's New Deal conservationismdepended extensivelyon humans workingto restorenature. Pare Lorenz concluded his 1939film, River,"We had the powerto take the valleyapart; we have the power to put it together again,"and such sentiments could apply equally to the ccc effortson the Blue Ridge Mountains.The second key change in Kelsey's thought at this time was that the forest succession model of Frederick Clements now deeplyinformed his ecologicalunderstanding. This model explained how disturbedenvironments succeeded backinto theirnatural state, and Clements's idea of a "climaxcommunity," the associationof plants inevitablystemming from undisturbedforest succession, provided Kelsey with a goal forhis re-creationefforts.32 In the reportof his 1936trip, Kelsey concluded: "Itis an erroneousand fatalidea to consider that the free, proper use of the axe is violating nature-it is merely aiding nature in its struggleto over come man's destructiveoperations of the past. The object is to restoreso far as may be possible, the naturalconditions, ecologically and scenically, that once existed in the area."33Theimmediate future for Shenandoah, as Kelsey saw it, involved humans workingwith nature to re-create Shenandoah.He instructedShenandoah officials to restorethe Blue Ridge'sclimax community as it existedbefore humans impactedthe environment.The qualifica- tion that Shenandoah be restored"ecologically and scenically"allowed Kelseyto deviate from the Clementsian ideal to maximize Shenandoah'sscenic potential for visitors'recreation and enjoyment. The confluence of the NPS's recreational mission, the New Deal conception of human/environment relations, and the Clementsian story of forest history guided the remarkable transformationof Shenandoah. If Kelseycreated the vision for Shenandoah as a landscapearchitect, then engineer JamesLassiter executed that vision on the ground. Lassiterbecame involved with Shenandoahas the EmergencyConservation Work-ccc engineer in chargeof the SkylineDrive project from 1933 to 1936.In 1936,NPS DirectorArno B. Cammerer made Lassiterthe park'sfirst superintendent, and Lassitermanaged the initialgrowth of the parkuntil his retirementin 1941.During his termhe oversawthe creationoffthe SkylineDrive and the firstcrucial phases of the park'sdevelopment.34 The transformationof the Blue Ridge began with the removal of the park's inhabitants.As Mark Spence observes, "nationalparks enshrine recently dispos- sessed landscapes,"and Shenandoah was no exception, though the removalof the mountaineers from the Blue Ridge was not alwaysan assured event.35For many yearsthe "mountainfolk" occupied a borderbetween naturaland human, just as NativeAmericans did in the West,and some believed people could remainas a part of the park.A newspaperfrom Grand Rapids, Michigan, predicted:"Attractions will

This content downloaded on Sun, 13 Jan 2013 21:50:04 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Re-Creatingthe Wilderness 105 be, principally,the wild scenery of a timbered area largelyravaged by lumberman and the picturesquenatives.... It is assumed the mountain folk will not be moved from their shacks. They are local color and proof of the untamed nature of the park-just as deer or bear might be in Michigan or Alaska."36 NPS policy on inhabitantswavered during the park'sdevelopment. In 1929, Secre- tary of the Interior Ray Lyman Wilbur maintained that the government could permit tenantson the Blue Ridge as lessees, under a strictset of regulationsforbid- ding hunting, logging, injury of "naturalfeatures," and opening up new land for farming.The NPS laterfound human inhabitantsincompatible with the mission of the nationalparks, and in 1934,Arno B. Cammererdeclared that the federalgovernment would not accept any populated lands.37 A 1934census declared that 465 families lived on the Blue Ridge, although we may never know how many left before then. Afterthe Virginia State Commission on Conservationand Development and Lassiterremoved these families, the Blue Ridge Mountains had no permanent inhabitantsfor the firsttime in recordedhis- tory.Europeans and Native Americanshad shaped the Blue Ridge Mountains for millennia, and the Shenandoah removals marked the beginning of a new landscape on the Blue Ridge.38 If human removalswere the most significanterasure to transformShenandoah, then SkylineDrive was the most prominentaddition. During the park'searly years, Shenandoah and Skyline Drive were synonymous.In 1933,a critic of Shenandoah called the park"nothing more than a wide rightof way for the Skyline Drive."The ma'jorityof Shenandoah'sfirst visitors interacted with the parkexclusively through the highway. Shenandoah'sfirst publication was "ShenandoahNational Park:A Motorist'sGuide."39 The construction of Skyline Drive reflects the importance of landscape architects and engineers in the NPS. The engineers of the Bureau of Public Roads and their subcontractorstook responsibilityfor the road'sconstruction, and the NPS'S landscape architects determined the highway'sroute and replanted roadsidesto blend with the forest.Skyline Drive wasa remarkableengineering feat. Even a short ten-mile section from Black Rock to JarmanGap took an entire year to build, required excavating 558,581cubic yardsof earth and laying down 52,000 tons of stone, and a cost of $267,992.40 The result was a careful human constructionthat showcasedthe ShenandoahValley and the peaksbeyond. The excavationand banking of the road left the roadsidesdenuded, and in his 1936report, Kelsey outlined a plan forreplanting the edges of SkylineDrive. Kelsey's firstpriority was restoringthe "originalgrowth"of the Blue Ridge. He remindedhis colleagues "thatprimeval plant growth in this parkarea has been manhandled to such an extent that a large partof the area is covered with ... an entirelydifferent nature from what it was originally."He argued that an "ecological study"could reveal the original growth lost to "cuttingand resultingrobber growth." With this knowledge the proper"plant associations," Clements's term for a regional climax community, could be restored.41 At the same time, Kelsey did not intend for this original flora to grow freely. Uncontrolled tree growth crowded the road "giving a monotonous and shut-in feelingwhich shouldbe avoided."The ParkService planted roadside plant associations

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along a gradientso taller growth remained closer to the forest. Lassiterdescribed these associationsas "transitionalborders ranging from closed forestbackground to the annuals,perennials, and lowershrubs and herbsfound immediatelyadjacent to the roadside."Lassiter employed the ccc in restrictingthe "ever-encroachingforest cover along the Skyline Drive to alleviatethe tunnel effect"and keeping the highway "cleanedof weeds, grass,and overhanginglimbs and brush."This landscaping pattern allowed the "original"growth of the Bluie Ridge to return and offered touiristsa "clean,"wide, well-lit highway.The restultwas, and still is, masterfuil,and at 35 mph the roadsidesshow no hint of their careful planning.42 To complete the effect, Kelseysuggested scenic vistasbe clearedand open spaces caused by constructionor pasthuman disturbancebe left open. Kelseyemphasized that new cuts should be done under "expertsupervision" so that the bordersof the vista "mayhave a permanent, naturalisticappearance." He also claimed the areas alreadycleared "must be preservedand augmented,"and the viewsshould be "actually opened up still more."Through the maintenance of these scenic vistas,visitors gazed at the distantmountains or the pastoralvalley at the foot of the Blue Ridge.4, In a phrasecaptuiring the essence of the SkylineDrive, Lou HenryHoover offered Director Albright "heartiestcongratuilations to you and your department for so workmanlikea job and so splendida workof naturalart."44The drive embodied the intricaterelationship between humans and their environmenton the Blue Ridge. From their cars along an evenly graded highway, motoristslike Hoover looked throughcleared spaces in the well-managedforest and down on the farmsand fields of the ShenandoahValley. The job was at once a human effortand a natturalrestult, a workmanlikepiece of naturalart. The same landscapingprinciples that guided Skyline Drive towardsits impressivedevelopment also guided projectsalong the highway'ssides. While constructingSkyline Drive, the NPS developedfacilities for motortourists. Some were no more than a "comfortstation" to provideweary motorists a place of respite.A few, such as Skyland,provided a fuller arrayof services:camping, dining, and lodging.The NPSplanned some in conjunctionwith scenic vistas,nestled others on the edgesof forest,and placedseveral alongside the park'sopen areas. Most of the preservedopen spaces of Shenandoah had been pastuiresbefore the park'sopening. In 1938,Associate Director and ActingDirector of the NPS,Arthur E. Demaray asked Lassiterto "providefor maintenance in an open condition of a reasonablenumber and acreageof existingopen areas."45Maintenancewas the key word.Without consistenthuman intervention,the pastureswould eventuallygrow shrubsand trees until completely forested.Mowing pasturelandmay not have fit the park'splan "ecologically,"but it did "scenically." The vast majorityof touristsenjoyed Shenandoah National Parkthrough the SkylineDrive, campgrounds,comfort stations, scenic vistas,and open grasslands.It was not until April 1939that Lassiterremarked on the "noticeableincrease in the number of visitorsuising trails." On one day he observedthat two partiesof more than thirtyand several other groups hiked along Shenandoah'strails. That same month 62,240 people entered the park.46Such a comparison indicatesthe domi- nance of Skyline Drive as an attractiondturing Shenandoah's early years.

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The ParkService's efforts focused on the spine of the Blue Ridge,but landscapers and ccc workersalso affected the slopes of Shenandoah. In the distantareas, the relationshipto Skyline Drive was still of primaryimportance; a projecttagged with the phrase "directlyvisible from the drive"received top priority.47But even out of sight of the highway,the NPS powerfullyaltered the land. Harlan Kelsey proposedan ambitious plan for replantingthe Blue Ridge. "For the present and as a starter,you ought to plant at least the following where the naturalindications for them are quite apparent: 25,000 CanadaHemlock, 25,000 FraserFir, 10,000 Table Mountain Pine, and ioo,ooo White Pine." These trees, more appropriatefor the Great Smoky Mountains than the Blue Ridge, were to replace the "robber'tree-weed' growth" which dominated disturbedparts of the mountains. In his 1936report, he statedemphatically that "a'laissez faire' attitude ... would be disastrouis"and the i6o,ooo-tree planting programwas his elaborate solution.48 Kelsey'ssuggestions prompted a 1938report from Lassiterentitled "Restoration of Original ForestGrowth: Shenandoah National Park."To give his supervisorsa sense of the enormityof his task,Lassiter reported that "cleanup"activities, including removing downed timber and scatteringor burning brush, had gone on since 1933 and covered only 8,714 acres. "This treatment is exceedingly slow and the acreage apparentlyendless," he lamented. Lassiter'splan for restoringthe Blue Ridge's climax forest involved planting associationsappropriate for the different regionsof the park:hemlock and white pine in the coves, white pine and oak on the slopes with increasingred spruce, and Blue Ridge fir towardsthe summit. Lassiter noted the immensityof such a programand suggestedinitial treatmentreach areas of greatestneed and furtherprojects extend to more isolated areas.49 Nowhere near the extent of Kelsey's plan for the entire park was completed duringLassiter's term. The ccc camps had theirhands full plantingalong the miles of highway. Lassiter'smonthly reportsreveal several notable plantings. In March 1938,the NPS planted 3,600 Black Locusts and 1,200 FraserFir. Other noteworthy plantingsinclude 1,390 FraserFir transferredfrom the nurseryin Augustof 1937and iooo BlackWalnut seedlings planted in November 1938.According to a recent NPS estimate, the ccc planted more than 300,000 trees along and around the Skyline Drive.5? Insectsand tree diseasesquickly joined tree-weedgrowth on Shenandoah'slist of forestryconcerns. Lassiterconfronted numerous infectionsand infestationsduring his term: walking sticks, pine twig beetles, locust leaf miners, leaf beetles, leaf scorch, and White Pine BlisterRust. In June 1937,Lassiter declared, "WhitePine Blister Rust work was begun, with a total of 130 acres bring treated with initial eradication."In 1938,he mounted a more aggressivecampaign, and using 350 man- daysof ccc labor,the NPS "cleaned"720 acres.Over the next threeyears, the NPS and the StateBureau of Entomnologyand PlantQuiarantine treated another 7,480 acres.51 While the ParkService tried to keep insects and infections out of the park,they encouragedthe returnof other wildlife to Shenandoah.In 1929, a botanistfrom the Carnegie Instituteof Washingtonwrote "the animals and birdshave been decreas- ing in numbers due to excessive hunting by mountaineers and people from the valley.The Virginiadeer has long since disappearedfrom the mountains.The Blue

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Ridge can supporta large quantityof game if the animals and birdsare only given a fair chance." His appraisalproved accurate. With human removaland hunting restrictions,the fauna of the Blue Ridge returnedto the mountains. In April 1938, the superintendent claimed that "squirrelsseem to be rapidlyincreasing and are seen constantly,"indicating the East'smost ubiquitousrodent was once a noveltyat Shenandoah.In October1939, Lassiter wrote: "An unusual sight to workersin the southern sectionwas that of threedeer grazingin the same spotfor several hours." By 1940, Lassitercould confirmthat "wild life [sic]appears to be on the increasein the Park."52 The returnof Shenandoah'swildlife representedanother contiguous phase in the human management of the Blue Ridge. Native Americans promoted game habitatusing fire and Europeansettlers hunted severalspecies such as deer, off the Blue Ridge. Wildlife reclaimed the mountains in the 1930S and 1940s because humans again encouragedtheir presence. Hunting restrictionsprotected terrestrial animals and rangersaggressively enforced these regulations.During one particu- larly hard winter, the parkeven set up feeding stationsto help birds endure the season.5 Along with protectinganimals, Shenandoah officials reintroducedseveral spe- cies to the park.Even before Shenandoah became a park,thirteen deer were re- leased within its boundary.During March 1938,Shenandoah releasedeleven wild turkeysfrom George Washington Birthplace National Monument into the park. Perhapsas a result of the success of the wild turkeys,Shenandoah embarkedon a more ambitious project later that year. In October, Lassiterreported a plan to introduce a pairof beaversfrom Bear Mountain State Parkin New York.54 November 1938proved a bittersweetmonth for Shenandoah'swildlife introduc- tion efforts. ccc enrollees watched twelve wild turkeyswalk along a fire road, confirming their continued success. The beaversdid not fare so well. Rangersre- leased the pair on the fifth and on the ninth reportedthe beaverswere eating bark from elm trees and alder buLshes.On the tenth, in an event revealing competing notions about properinteractions between humans and natureon the Blue Ridge, it was discoveredthat Jesse Henry of Browntown,Virginia, had shot the male bea- ver. The judicial system was not entirely sympathetic to Henry's conception of human-environment relations, and he spent three weeks in a Harrisonburgjail. Lassiterobserved in December thatthe female adjusted"herself to the new environment in spite of the factthat her mate waskilled" and had constructeda dam twenty feet long and two feet deep.55 While effortsto reintroduceterrestrial animals may have been limited and sporadic, Shenandoah worked closely with Virginia officials to stock Shenandoah's streams.Though parkofficials forbade hunting, they made fish a marketablecom- modity. Rangers and ccc enrollees yearly assisted state wardens in stocking Shenandoah's streams and between 1938 and 1941the park received more than so,ooo trout.56 If parkofficials were concerned about wildlife, they were obsessed by fire. In a 1932 letter to Kelsey, Albrightwrote, "The comparativelyslight scar such a road [SkylineDrive] would make is nothing comparedto the terriblescars of fire already apparentin many places in the parkarea." Preventing such scarringreceived top

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Figure i. Fire Suppressionin Shenandoah National Park,1936-1941.

Year # of Fires AcreageBurned Time Spent on Suppression 1936 26 744.95 718 worker-days

1937 12 185 5 1,208 work-er-days 1938 3 55 20gworker-days 1939 8 164.2 1,985 worker-hotirs 1940 4 3.8 537.5worker-hoturs 1941 13 68.25 2,963.6 worker-houirs

Sotirce: Shieiandoalh monthly reports, 1936-1941. prioritywithin the ccc camps. In April 1940, fire danger remained so high that it was "necessaryto retain a large proportionof these crews on standbyin camp or working on projects within a few minutes call." That construction was compro- mised not justfor fire but forthe possibilityof fire indicatesthis issue'simportance.57 The ccc controlled fire using multiple tactics. They attempted to clean out areasof the forestwith considerableundergrowth and decomposing material.This provedan impossible taskfor the parkas a whole but was useful in targetingareas with a high probabilityof fire. The ParkService staffedfire towersthroughout the park,especially during the most dangerousspring months. ccc enrollees also received trainingin and practicedfire preventionand suppression.58 During the course of Lassiter'sterm, the effortsof the ccc dramaticallyreduced the incidence of fire within the park.Numerous firesthat burned significantacre- age markedLassiter's first year, and 1936was not an atypicalyear in termsof weather. The following yearssaw a decrease in the number of firesand the acres burned. Resourceextraction for constructionprojects further altered Shenandoah's environment.The parkmaintained a "RockCrusher," which producedover 13,000 tons of crushedrock for roadsduring 1939. The NPSalso ranseveral sawmills, and in one month ccc workers milled 39,960 boardfeet of timber and dragged another 40,000 feet of logs out of the forest. Park officials then used the wood for fences and buildings, and once Shenandoah exported9,250 Chestnut rails and 550 ridersto other national parks.5') Parkofficials treated water as anotherof Shenandoah'susable commodities.Just as the NPS managed fish differentlyfrom the park'sanimals, so did they consider waterin a differentcategory from terrestrialsystems. In May 1939,Virginia Gover- nor James Price discussed the possibilityof developing tennis courts, swimming pools and golf coursesat Skylandwith JohnWhite, who servedas acting directorof the NPS while Cammerer recuperatedfrom a heart attack.White dissuaded him from most of these "urbanizations"but did consider the pool, partiallybecause other pools had been developed in the West. He reportedto his supervisor,"with regardto a swimmingpool, perhapsit might be possibleto design one in the stream in such a way as to not appearas artificial,much as we have done in Sequoia in the Lodgepole Camp."60

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The ParkService alreadyhad created similar pools in severalof Shenandoah's streams. By August 1936, they had built five dams in Big Run and its left fork. Shenandoah'sAssistant Landscape Architect, Scudder Griffing,described the ob- jective: "The purpose is to back up the water to a sufficient depth to make an attractivepool and at the same time be deep enough to allow trout to 'summer over' . . . The dams are simple and naturalistic."Photographs of the dams reveal little of the landscaper'sinfluence.6 Throughout the park,the ccc developed watersupplies for campgroundsand comfortstations. In September1938, ccc camps workedon seven differentsprings within the park.In May 1939,these alteredsprings fed the reservoirsthat enrollees were building at Big Meadows, Front Royal, Turk Gap, Loft Mountain, and at Dickey Ridge. These reservoirswere quite large. Front Royal'shad a io,ooo-gallon storagecapacity, and anothersupply at Sexton Hill Picnic Areahad a 20,000-gallon capacity.62 Shenandoah'sstreams did not receive the same ecological considerationas the trees along their banks,and White's letter indicates that this phenomena was not isolated to Shenandoah. If one sees the national parksfor the trees, then a storyof the parksthat emphasizes preservationcan be developed. Seeing the parksfor the streams-and observingthe many other human interventionsin the wilderness- allows a differentstory about the creation of landscapesin the parksto emerge. When the myriadforms of exacting control of the Blue Ridge are considered, theirmagnitude measures on the orderof thousands.Thousands of people removed from the hills. Thousandsof tons of earthmoved for the Skyline Drive. Thousands of tons of rock quarriedand crushed for pavement. Thousands of trees planted along the highway'ssides. Thousandsof vines drapedalong guardrails.Thousands of trout added to the stream. Thousands of squirrels claiming the Blue Ridge. Thousandsof hours spent suppressingfires. Thousands of forestedacres treated for disease.Thousands of boardfeetof timberharvested. Thousands of gallons of water stored and diverted.These thousandsof changes created a new landscape on the Blue Ridge.They revealthe powerfulhuman influence on ShenandoahNational Park.

Re-creatingShenandoah: Finding a Place for the Park

Over time, successivegenerations of Shenandoah'sstewards have reinterpretedthe re-creationnarrative. Kelsey's model for re-creationguided the parkuntil World WarII limited resourcesfor Shenandoah. The warcreated a kind of dormancyfor Shenandoah,where the park'sfederal funding and numberof visitorsboth dropped drastically.The parkhoused trainingfacilities for troopsduring the waryears and even stored some of the Smithsonian'scollection. When Shenandoah again received resourcesin the 1950S and 196os, Shenandoah officialscontinued using the rhetoricof re-creation,but the same language began to tell a differentstory.63 Where the re-creationnarrative justified human effortsto restorethe Blue Ridge, recent interpretationsof the re-creationnarrative explain Shenandoah'sre-creation as the resultof naturalrecuperation, not human restoration.As a typicalguidebook explains, "ratherthan an attempt to preservea healthy landscape, Shenandoah

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National Parkbecame a long-termexperiment in the recuperativepowers of nature on a severely damaged landscape."64Shenandoah was originallydescribed as an attemptto preservea healthyenvironment, and the park'sre-creation was not due to nature'srecuperative powers alone. This re-creationnarrative superficially seems similarto FDR'S ideas, but human effortsin Shenandoah have been edited out. The Park Service video, The Gift, shown at the Big Meadows Visitor Center codifies a similar re-creationnarrative, one without human intervention,into the official storyof Shenandoah:"Though the Shenandoahwilderness was interrupted not once, but repeatedly,[the Parkis] a symbolof rebirth.... [The Parkwill] slowly return to its naturalstate, with only mute evidence of man's yearsof settlement, grazing,logging, and farming.Given time the wildernesswill returncompletely."65 Through Darwin Lambert'sThe Undying Past of Shenandoah National Park, the re-creationstory has become Shenandoah'shistory as well. Lambertably re- counts Shenandoah'searly human historyand mentions ccc effortsto restorenature in the park,but his narrativeleaves the overwhelmingimpression that nature, by and large, restoreditself. He reportsthat Shenandoah'ssuperintendent during World War II believed "thatnature was now restoringthe landscape better than 1,200 CCC boys could ever have done."Lambert also assertsthat the park"really was a superb example of the wild and natural Southern Appalachians"and that "the wilderness has returned,strongly demonstrating the healing 'miracle'of nature." Such statementsdownplay the importance of humans in creating Shenandoah's landscape, a storythat is an essential partof Shenandoah'spast.66 Such storiesare not meant to deceive Shenandoah'svisitors. In partthey merely reflect the changes in Shenandoah'senvironment and American ideas about nature. Signs built in the 196os and 1970S along SkylineDrive describingShenandoah as a "recycled"park reflect both the growing influence of environmentalismand the fact that natureon the Blue Ridge bore farfewer marksof human impact. The landscape architects of the 1930S and 1940S successfully shaped the Blue Ridge Mountains while concealing the evidence of their handiwork.Shenandoah's first re-creation narrative shaped the landscape, and the landscape then shaped Shenandoah'snew narrative. Within the last few years,park officials have begun to once again consider the official story of Shenandoah. A Shenandoah National Park Symposium in May 1997 spawned an issue of the NPS'S journal CuilturalResource Managementtitled "Shenandoah:Managing Cultural Resources in a NaturalPark." Articles discuss the landscaping and human historyof Shenandoah, the management of cultural resources, and the need to better understandand explain Shenandoah'shistory. In one article, Cultural Resource Specialist Reed Engles claims "thatno areawithin immediate view of the Skyline Drive, in fact, is natural"and that the historyof the ccc in Shenandoahchallenges "ourtraditional definition and understandingof.. . natural'parks."67 The new insights of Shenandoah'sofficials into the human historyof the park have changed the park's management and narrative. A pamphlet handed to Shenandoah'svisitors describes how fees help "preserveand restorehistoric views on SkylineDrive" and "continue research for the restorationof BigMeadows landscape [sic]."The centerfoldof the Shenandoahissue of CuiltuiralResouirce Management

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describeshow vistarestoration crews hope to "turnback the restultsof twentyyears of deferred maintenance."Another article describes a plan for "reclaimingand maintaining the general character"of an overgrown cottage garden north of Skyland.68 The re-creationnarrative appears to be in the midstof anotherreinterpretation as Shenandoah embarksupon a new management strategyand embraces a new wilderness ideal, one where humans have a place and a past. In the 1930s, the re- creation narrativejutstified the landscaping of the park;in the 1960S, it obsclured those efforts;and now in the 199os, the languageof re-creationshifts again to justify a restorationof the landscapecreated by Shenandoah'sfirst landscape architects. It remainsto be seen whethera culturallandscape can be re-createdany more successfully than naturallandscapes. More likelythe NPS Will continue to shapeand change Shenandoah to meet its visions and needs, just as humans have done on the Blue Ridge for centuries. The question of Shenandoah'sbroader significance hinges on whether or not what has happenedon the Blue Ridgeover the lastseveral hundred years represents a unique set of circumstancesor reflectslarger trends. While Shenandoah'stransfor- mation may have been unique in its degree, it was not unique in kind. Examplesof every interventionin the Blue Ridge landscape-human removal, roadconstruc- tion, fire prevention,wildlife management-can be readilyfound within national parkhistoriography. Shenandoah's history reveals the powerftilinfluence of these forces in concert and suggeststhe potentialfor this type of analysisin other parks.A nationalpark narrative focusing on these human interventionsmight conclude that insteadof simplypreserving landscapes, the NPS shapesand changes places to meet its visions and needs, justas humans have alwaysdone. Perhapsthe most intriguing insight from Shenandoah'sre-creation is that this national parkhistoriography, which environmentalhistorians have recentlytaken much responsibilityfor maintaining, is not merely a record of parkhistory but an actor in it. Stories-whether as waysidesigns, newspaperarticles, ecological mod- els, or academic histories-shape and are shaped by landscapes.Shenandoah officials long understoodthe NPSas preserversof naturalenvironments, and they shaped the lands of the parkso thatthe landscape,as much as possible,met theircriteria for a naturalenvironment. As Shenandoah officials have come to understandthem- selves as protectorsof a cultural landscape as well, the actual, physicalland of the Blue Ridge Mountains has felt ripples of change: forgottengardens bloom again and anthropogenicfires release the seeds of the Table Mountain Pine. It is impossible to predicthow a re-creatednational park historiography might affectthe Park Service, but no doubt we would see the changes not just in books and signs but on the land itself.

Justin Reich juistfinished his master'sdegree in U.S. historyat the Universityof Virginia. This article is his firstpuiblication.

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Notes

I wotuldlike to gratefullyacknowledge the assistanceof the manypeople who helped bring this projectto fruition.Thanks go to EmilyMinor for the genesisof this researchand to Tico Braun,Tamara Giles-Vernick, and PatilStutter for their insightftul critiques. Special gratituidegoes to Ed Rtussellfor his uinwaveringstupport and encouragement. i. AlfredRtunte, Nationial Parks: The American Experielce, 3d ed. (Lincoln:University of NebraskaPress, 1997), 114-18. 2. EthanCarr, Wilderniess by Designi:Lanidscape Architectture and the NationalPark Service(Lincoln: University of NebraskaPress, 1998), 203; LindaFlint McClelland, Buildinigthe National Parks: Historic Lanidscape Design aind Constrlctionl (Baltimore, Md.:Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998); Richard Sellars, Preserving Natuire in the NationalParks: A History(New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1997). 3. Sellars,Preserving Natuire in theNationial Parks, 290; Runte,National Parks, 201-7,130- 140;Mark Spence, "Dispossessingthe Wilderness:The PreservationistIdeal, Indian Removal,and NationalParks" (Ph.D. diss.,University of Californiaat LosAngeles, 1996);Harlan Kelsey, Collaborator-at-Large, toArno Cammerer, National Park Service Director,July 14, 1936(hereafter, 1936 Kelsey Report); Shenandoah National Park; File No. 207, Parti; Shenandoah:Administration & Personnel:Reports: Kelsey; Cenitral ClassifiedFiles, 1933-1949 (hereafter, CCF 1933-1949);Records of the NationalPark Service,Record Grou'p 79 (hereafter,RG 79); NationialArchives at College Park, Maryland(hereafter, NACP), 5. 4. A. StarkerLeopold et al. "WildlifeManagement in the NationalParks," in Transactiolns of the Twenty-eighthNorth Aiimen'cani Wildlife anid Nattural Resouirces Conferenice, ed. JamesB. Trerethen(Washington, D.C.: Wildlife Management Instittute, 1963), 32. 5. Hal Rothman,Devil's Bargainis: Tounrism in the TwenitietlhCenxtury Amiiericani West (Lawrence,University Press of Kansas:1998), 12. 6. There are severalgood accountsof the establishmentof the SouthernAppalachian NationalPark Commission and the efforts of Virginia's businessmen to currytheir favor. See DarwinLambert, The UndyinigPast of ShenandoahNational Park (BouIlder, Colo.: RobertsRinehart, 1989), 188-207; DennisSimumons, "Conservation, Cooperation, and Controversy:The Establishmentof ShenandoahNational Park, 1924- 1936," The Vir- giniiaMagazinie ofHistoryanidBiography89 (1981): 387-92; and H. J.Benchoff, "Report to ArnoB. Cammerer,Director, National Park Service, Washington D.C.," Auigtust 20, 1934;Shenandoah National Park, File No. ioi, Part1; History:Shenandoah History; NationalParks: Shenandoah General - io0; CCF 1933-1949;RG 79; NACP. 7."Reportin Ftullof SecretaryWork's Appalachiani Nationial Park Committee," National ParklsBu'lletin 42 (1924):7. 8. The report-R. CliffordHall, Forest Examiner, "Report oni the Reconnaissanceof the BltueRidge in Virginiabetween Simmons and ManassasGaps" R.E.C. Report No. i, September1914 (hereafter Hall Report)-wasenclosed in a letter:P. J. Paxton,Acting AssistantDistrict Forester, Forest Service: Eastern District to Colonel Glynn Smith, Secretary,Souithern Appalachian National Park Commission, October 21, 1925;Gen- eralNational Park; File No. 0-32;General file; National Parks: Shenandoah 0.32; CCF 1907-1932;Entry 7; RC 79; NACP,2. 9. HallReport, 7. 1o. Lambert,The UndyingPast of ShenandoahNationial Park, 201-2; ShenandoahNa- tionalPark, Official Pictorial Book (Harrisonburg, Va.: Shenandoah National Park Toturist Btureaui,1929).

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"Reportin Full,"7; "ShenandoahNational Park Named by Committee," National Parks Btulletin42 (1924):1 12. Departmentof the Interior,MemorandLm for the Press,December 14, 1924; General NationalPark, File No. 0-32, Parti, Marchii, 1g1g-March30, 1926;Parks General: ProposedParks: National Parks: Shenandoah 0.32: CCF 1907-1932;RG 79; NACP. "ShenandoahPark Value anid Beatuty being Urged Here" Washington Star, 25 March 1926.Shelnanidoah: A National Parknear the NationsCapital, pamphlet published by the ShenandoahNational Park Association, Inc., n.d. (1925?);General National Park, File No. 0-32; Clippings;National Parks: Shenandoah 0.32: CCF 1907-1932;RG 79; NACP.Stephen T. Mather,National Park Service Director to Dr.William J. Showalter, AssistantEditor, National Geographic Society; General National Park, File No. 0-32, Part1, Marchii, ig9g-March30, 1926;Parks General: Proposed Parks: Shenandoah; NationalParks: Shenandoah 0.32: CCF 1907-1932;Entry 7; RG 79;NACP. 13. "Partof Madisonmay be in NationalPark," Greenie Cotunity Record, September 25, 1924. "BluteRidge Site LikelyChoice for Vast Federal Park," Washilngtonl Sulnlday Star, September-21,1924, 1. "Report in Fuill,"8; Virginia's Proposed National Park (Shenandoah NationalPark Association, Inc., n.d.) [receivedby NationalPark Service on Marclh9, 1926] GeneralNational Park; File No. 0-32; Clippings;National Parks: Shenandoah 0.32; CCF 1907-1932;Entry 7; RG 79; NACP,sec. III. 14. For moreon frmndraisingefforts for Shenandoahand the historyof the Shenandoah NationalPark legislation, see Simmons,"Conservation, Cooperation, and Controversy," 392-97. 15. Virginia'sProposed National Park, sec. V. "ShallWe Lose the Park,"advertisement, DailyNews-Record, Harrisonbturg, Va., November 21, 1925,3. i6. Runte,National Parks, 48-64. W. A. Hawkins,"W. A. CrawfordTells of GreatPark Benefits,"Greene Cotunty Record, Febrtuary 25, 1926,1. 17. "Workfor the ParkDone byVirginia Counties," Greenie Corinty Record, February 25, 1926,3. i8. Formore on condemnationlegislation see Simmons,"Conservation, Cooperation, and Controversy,"396-97. 19. B. I. Bickers,"'Park will Despoil,'says Mr. Bickers," Greene Couinty Record, October 7, 1926, 1; and B. I. Bickers,30,000 Peopleto be Deprivedof their Homes for a Playground,"Greeiie County Record, August 26, 1926,1. Interestingly,Bickers himself neverlost any land to the condemnations. 20. Formore about the legal resistanceto the park,see Lambert,The UnidyingPast of ShenandoahNational Park, 227-40. 21. Simmons,"Conservation, Cooperation, and Controversy," 397. For an earlyaccount of SkylineDrive's origins, see ArthurDavidson, "Skyline Drive and How It Came to Virginia,"Report of the VirginiiaCommission on1Con7servation7 and DevelopmIenlt l926- 34 (Richmond:Virginia Government Press, 1934), 75. 22. Departmentof the Interior,Release for Afternoon Papers, November 12, 1932; General NationalPark, File No. 501-03,Part i; Shenandoah:Publicity and Statistics:Publicity: NewspaperArticles (Press Releases): National Parks: Shenandoah 304-611; CCF 1907- 1932;Entry 7; RG 79; NACP;"City Planners See ShenandoahPark in IdealWeather" The Evenilg Star;Washington D.C., September24, 1932, 1. 23. "CityPlanners See Shenandoah,"i. 24. "Speechof HubertWork, Secretary of the Interiorat RichmondVirginia, January 31, 1928;" General National Park,File No. 0-32, Part 3, September 8, 1927-December 29, 1928;Parks General: Proposed Parks:Shenandoah: National Parks:Shenandoah 0.32: CCF 1907-1933; Entry 7; RG 79; NACP, 4.

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25. The niationalpark archives contain one draftpresented to Ickesand two to FDR. Al- thotighthe authorremains anonymoLus, Acting Director Arno Cammerer approved the drafts.The speechesincluide "Suiggested: Address by PresidentRoosevelt at the Dedi- cationof the ShenandoahNational Park, Virginia, at Big Meadows"(hereafter Draft President'sDedication Speech, 6/11/36) and "Suiggested:Address by Secretaryof the InteriorHarold A. Ickesat the Dedicationof the ShenanidoahNational Park, Virginia, at Big Meadows,"both of which haveno date,buLt notes on them indicatethey were finishedby 6/11/36.Another draft, "Address of the Presidentat the Dedicationof ShenanidoahNational Park, Virginia" (hereafter Draft President's Dedication Speech, 6/3/36)was sent by Albright to Ickeson1 6/3/36. All threecan be foundin the samefile: ShenandoahNational Park, File No ioi-oi, Part1; Shenandoah:History (General): Dedicationis;CCF 1933-1949;RG 79;NACP. 26. DraftPresident's Dedication Speech, 6/3/36, 8. 27. DraftPresident's Dedication Speech, 6/11/36, 8-9; DraftPresident's Speech, 6/3/36, 7. 28. AssociatedPress, "Text of Roosevelt'sAddress at ShenanidoahPark Opening." [fotund in clipping file, newspaperuinknown]; Sheniandoah Nationial Park; File No 101-01; ShenanidoahNational Park Dedication- Clippings; National Parks: Shenlandoah Gen- eral- 101; CCF 1933-1949;RG 79; NACP. 29. "Roosevelt'sAddress." 30. "SShenandoalhAfterthoughlt," The EveningStar, Washingtonl D.C., 6 Jtily1936. 31. 1936Kelsey Report, 5. 32. The River,written anid directed by PareLorentz, Farm Secuirity Administration, 1939. Videocassette.For more on thestate of Clemaenitsianecology in the thirties,see Frederic E. Clemenits, "ExperimenitalEcology in the PuiblicService," Ecology I6, no. 3 (Jully 1935):342-63. 33. 1936 Kelsey Report, 5. 34. Dturinghis term as suiperintenident,Lassiter produiced both anntualand monithlyreports for hlissuiperiors in the National ParkService. Annuial reports from 1934-1940fiscal year (hereafter,Shenandoah annlllalreports) can be found in: Shenandoah National Park, File No. 207-01.4; Shenanidoalh National Park: Shenandoah: Reports (General) SuLperintendenit's;CCF 1932-1949; RG 79; NACP. The monthly reports from February 1936 until Lassiter'sretirement in November of 1941(hereafter, Shenandoah monthly reports)can be found in National Parks,Shenandoah: 207-02.3; United States,Depart- ment of the Interior:National Park Service: Shenandoah National Park: Superintendent's Monthly Report;CCF 1933-1949;RG 79; NACP. Another uisefulsoturce from this era are the monthly reportsof Shenandoah's resident landscape architect HarveyBenson (hereafter, Benson reports) and the more sporadic reports of his assistant Sculdder Griffing (hereafter,Griffing reports).These cani be found in Monthly NarrativeRe- ports, 1936-1938: Region 1: (March- September 1936, October to December 1936, Janularyto Februlary1937, March to April 1937, May to Jtune 1937, Jtulyto Auiguist1937, September to December 1937,January to Jtuly1938, JuLly to December 1938);Records of the Branch of Plans and Design; Entry 3o; RG 79; NACP. 35. Spence, "Dispossessingthe Wilderness,"6. 36. "Shenandoah Park,"Granid Rapids Press, 28 ALuguLst1930. 37. Raymond Wilbtur,Secretary of the Interior to William Carson, Chairman, Virginia State Commission of Conservationand Development, October i8, 1929; General Na- tional Park, File No. 0-32, Part4; ParksGeneral: Proposed Parks:Shenandoah; CCF 1907-1932; Entry 7; RC 79; NACP. Charles and Nancy Perdue, "Shenandoah Remov- als,"Appalachian Joirnal (autuminil/winter1979-80): 90.

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38.Lambert, The UndyingPast of ShenandoahNational Park, 241. The firsthalf of Lambert's historyrecounts the variotus ways Native Americans and Europeans used the land before the park.See pp. 1-187. 39. "RestrictingPark Area Works Hardships on MountainLandowners," Greene Coulnty Record,9 February1933, 1. ShenandoahAnnual Report, Fiscal Year 1938. 40. The BensonReports from December 20, 1937to December20, 1938,chronicle the developmentof thisstretch of highway. 41. 1936Kelsey Report, 2, emphasisin original.For more on plantassociations see Frederic E. Clements,Plant Suiccession: An Analysis of the Developmentof Vegetation(Wash- ington:Carnegie Institution of Washington,1916), 128. 42. 1936Kelsey Report 5. Lassiter, "Restoration of Original Forest Growth"; also Shenandoah monthlyreport, July 1939. 43. 1936Kelsey Report, 3-4. Emphasisin original. 44. Lou HenryHoover, First Lady, to HoraceAlbright, Director, National Park Service, 6 December1932; General National Park, File No. 630, Part3; Shenandoah:Lands, Buildings,Roads and Trails:Roads: Skyline Drive; National Parks: Shenandoah 630; CCF 1907-1932;Entry 7; RG 79;NACP. 45.A. Demarayto JamesLassiter, January 3, 1938;National Parks: Shenandoah 120 - 201-06 ShenandoahNational Park, File No. 207;Part i; Shenandoah:Administration & Person- nel: Reports:Kelsey; CCF 1933-1949;Entry 7; RG 79; NACP. 46. Shenandoahmonthly report, April 1939. 47. Shenandoahmonthly report, June 1938. 48. FromHarlan Kelsey, Collaborator-at-Large toArno Cammerer, Director, National Park Service,JUly 24, 1936;Shenandoah National Park, File No. 207, Parti; Shenandoah: Administration& Personnel:Reports: Kelsey; National Parks: Shenandoah 120 - 201-06; CCF 1933-1949;RG 79; NACP.Interestingly, Kelsey's combination of treeswould probablybe much moreappropriate for the GreatSmoky Mountains than the Blue Ridge.Fraser Fir does not growon the Blue Ridgeunless planted; it usuallyoccuirs ftirthersouth. 1936 Kelsey Report, 3. 49. Lassiter,"Restoration of OriginalForest Growth." 50.Shenandoah monthly reports, October 1937, March 1938, August 1937, November 1938. ReedEngle, "Shenandoah: Not Without the ccc," CuiltuiralResouirce Management2l, no. 4 (1998): 23. 51.Lassiter comments on insectsand treediseases throughouit his reports.Summaries of yearlyefforts can be foundin Shenandoahmonthly reports, April 1938, May 1939, May 1940,and September1941. 52. SheinandoahNational Park, Official Pictorial Book, n. p.;Shenandoah monthly report, April1938; Shenandoah montlhly report, October 1939; Shenandoah monthly report, April1940. 53.For more on NativeAmericans on the Blue Ridge,see Lambert,The UndyingPast of ShenandoahNational Park, ii. Lambertalso describes a travelerin 1671seeing wolves, deer, and beavers,which were all hLuntedoff the BltueRidge. See Lambert,The UndyinigPast of ShenandoahNational Park, 26. Shenandoahmonthly report, February 1939. 54. HtughCrandall and Reed Engle, Shenandoah:The Storybehind the Scenery(Las Vegas,Nev.: KC Publications,1997), 33. Shenandoahmonthly report, October 1938. 55.Shenandoah monthly report, November 1938. 56. Shenandoahmonthly reports, March 1937, April1937, January1938, January1939, Februiary 1939, FebrLary 1940, March 1940, April 1940, February 1941 and March 1941,

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57. HoraceAlbright, Director, National Park Service to HarlanKelsey, Collaborator-at- Large,29 November1932; General National Park, File No. 630, Part3; Shenandoah; Lands,Buildings, Roads and Trails: Roads: Skyline Drive; CCF 1907-1932;Entry 7; RG 79;NAPC; Shenandoah monthly report, April 1940. 58. Shenandoahmonthly report, January 1938. 59. For rock crushingsee Shenandoahannual report 1939; for the timbermilling see Shenandoahmonthly reports April 1940; for railroad miiaterial see Shenandoahmonthly reportsMarch 1941. Other examples of resouirceextraction can be fotundthroulghotit Lassiter'sreports. 6o. JohnR. White,Acting Director, National Park Service, to A. E. Demaray,Director, NationalPark Service, May 17, 1939; Shenandoah National Park, File No. 201-15, Part1; Shenandoah:Administration & Personnel:Policy; CCF 1933-1949;RG 79;NACP. 6i. GriffingReport, Jtlly 1936; Benson Report, 1/20/37-2/20/37; photo #589f. 62. Shenandoahmonthly report, Sept 1938;Shenandoah monthly report, May 1939; Shenandoahannuial report, Fiscal Year 1939, GriffingReport Atug 36, pictuLre#488d. 63. Lambert,The UndyingPast of ShenandoahNationial Park, 265. 64.John A. Conners.Shenanidoah National Park: An Interpretive Glide. (Blacksbuirg,Va.: McDonaldand Woodward, 1988), 90. 65. TheGift(National Park Service) shown in BigMeadows Visitor Center at Shenandoah NationalPark. 66. Lambert,The UndyinigPast of ShenandoahNational Park, 265, 269, 272. 67. ReedEngle, "Shenandoah: Not Withotutthe ccc," CuiltuiralResouirce Management 21, no. 1 (1998): 23, 24. 68."WhyFees? We need youLrsuLpport." Pamphlet distribtuted at ShenandoahEntrance Station.(Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1997); centerfold, Cuilttural Resouirce Managemenlt, 21, no. 1 (1998):20-21; ShatunEyring, "Juidd Gardens-Between Culture and Nature," CuiltuiralResoturce Management21, no. 1 (1998):19.

In Memoriam

Morgan Sherwood, a founder and past president of ASEH, died at his home in Davis, California, on the evening of October 31, 2000. The cause was bronchial and esophageal cancer. Morganwas a fighter,and not sentimental.He was also brilliant,witting, and deeply caring.He was in his office on the Davis campus on the Friday before his death. He wrote friendsa few weeks ago saying he'd alreadyvoted absentee in the Calfornia elections, noting with glee that his vote would be counted whetherhe wasaround or not. He said it remindedhim of the fellow who wanted to be buried in old Mayor Daley's Chicago so he could remain politically active. He was true to form to the last.

-Steve Haycox

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