John Eliot Allen

John Eliot Allen Oral History Interview

Interviewer: Stephen R. Mark, Crater Lake National Park Historian

Interview Location and Date: At John’s office, Portland State University campus, Cramer Hall, Portland, Oregon, September 24, 1991

Transcription: Transcribed by Darci G. Gomolski, with assistance from Anton Briefer, 1994

Biographical Summary (from the interview introduction):

John Eliot Allen is an emeritus professor of geology at Portland State University. While a graduate student, Dr. Allen spent the summer of 1935 as a ranger naturalist at Crater Lake. The interview centers on that experience, but attempts to put it in the context of a career largely devoted to teaching Oregonians about the geology of their state. Died 1996.

Materials Associated with this interview on file at the Dick Brown library at Crater Lake National Park’s Steel Visitor Center”:

Taped interview along with notes. Donated a considerable amount of CRLA related file material and photos. I interviewed him in his office at Cramer Hall. There we indulged in some “time travel” and he gave me a number of items which pertain to the geological story of Crater Lake. Most of these can be found in the park’s history files. The others are housed in the park’s library, where several of his more than 200 publications can be found.

To the reader:

I interviewed him in his office at Cramer Hall. There we indulged in some “time travel” and he gave me a number of items which pertain to the geological story of Crater Lake. Most of these can be found in the park’s history files. The others are housed in the park’s library, where several of his more than 200 publications can be found.

Stephen R. Mark

Crater Lake National Park Historian

March 1994

This interview follows an outline that I’ve sent Dr. Allen about a week ago. Our first topic will be his background and early work prior to 1935 when he came of Crater Lake for one season.

I was born in Seattle in 1908. At my age of five, my father had been editor of the Seattle P.I…. and he was asked to come down to the University of Oregon to establish a department of journalism there in 1912. I was raised in Eugene and went to University High School. In 1926 I entered the University of Oregon as journalism major because I was the oldest son and naturally I went into journalism since my dad was head of the department. It was then a department, but later became a school, a very eminent school. I majored in journalism for two years but I took a course from Warren D. Smith there that “turned me on.” And after a trip back visiting various departments of geology all the way to the east coast. I decided that I wanted to become a geologist, and I changed my major. Graduated in ’31 and took a master’s degree on the geology of the Columbia River Gorge which has been my specialty ever since, particularly since I came back to Portland State University and started the department here in 1956. I’ve written two books on the Columbia River Gorge and served as a field trip guide for twenty years.

The 1935, job at Crater Lake came after spending three years working on my doctorate at Berkeley, which I didn’t complete at that time. Dr. Smith got me the job as ranger naturalist. He was there along with a very eminent group of eight scientists on the ranger naturalist staff that summer, a poet, a biologist, an artist, and three or four geologist. It was an instructive group of people; we had study sessions and worked together: it was very interesting.

Dr. Smith then got me a job at the end of the season with Rustless Iron & Steel and I worked for them for three years. I then joined the Oregon State Department of Geology and worked for them for nine years and finally went back and finished my Ph. D degree in 1944.

So, you didn’t get your doctorate until almost the end of World War II.

Yes. And I decided within a couple of years that the job in Oregon was no longer worth while. They had a new director that I didn’t work with very well, and so I decided it was time to go into teaching. I went back to Penn State and taught there for two years and discovered I wasn’t an easterner! And so I got a job in New Mexico and I spent seven years at the New Mexico School and Bureau of Mines working as head of the department of geology, and then later as a senior geologist for the New Mexico Bureau of Mines. Similar to the work I’d been doing at Oregon. And then in 1956, my friends here at Portland State called me up and said, “Look, we want you to come here and start a department of geology.” And so that’s what I did.

Was this campus at this location in 1956?

It was in the old Lincoln High School, twenty eight hundred students in one building.

So, it had moved from Vanport because of the flood and then was on S.W. Main.

They were just finishing up the northwest quarter of Cramer Hall. They built this building in four sections and we didn’t move into this until 1971. This quarter of the building expanded. We were all in the northwest quarter of the basement: this is the northeast quarter. In fact, we have this whole floor now.

I made some extra notes yesterday as I was going through some of your publications. And what led to your publication in 1939, First Aid to Fossils?

Well, I got wind that people were going out and destroying good fossil localities by not treating them right. When I first went with the state department of geology, Earl Nixon was a very practical economic geologist who had worked for Iron and Steel companies all over the world. He was hired to start this department in 1936, and I was hired in 1937. He said, “John, I’m going to put you over into eastern Oregon in the Baker office and I expect you to visit and examine all the mines in eastern Oregon to write a mines handbook. But there’s two things I want you to remember, all your advancement and promotion will depend on: 1) the number of new ideas you come up with; and 2) the amount of overtime you put in.” Which to my mind is about the best formula for success that I know of and I’ve more or less followed it all my life? In doing these mine examinations and I visited some 300 mines during those two years I was over in Baker before I was called back in the senior geologist in the Portland area. I had a little spare time on the weekends, so I wrote this book on fossils because I saw so many cases of people who were destroying good fossil localities, not taking care of it. That book, by the way, was republished three times and it was used back east in several colleges as a textbook.

I just found it in the OSU library in Corvallis. Warren D. Smith also had something to do with the State’s Department of Geology as one of the people that promoted its creation.

They hired him to supervise mapping the Wallowa Mountains. Nobody had ever mapped the northern Wallowa Mountains. So he got a crew, most of them graduate students, and a couple of geologist from the state survey, myself included. I was his chief assistant because I was a representative of the state survey and he was in charge. The twelve of us mapped the entire northern Wallowa Mountains in one and half season. It was difficult because it takes you till noon before you even get to work, on the top of the ridge where you can see out.

Lostine area?

The southern part had been mapped and a bulletin had been published on it a few years before.

Because of the mines at Cornucopia?

Yes. Because of the mines. We mapped the northern part and it was a fascinating job. In fact, my most recent publication, which only came out last week, is a result of some of that work. I’ll give you a copy of it; they sent me a whole bunch of extra copies of it.

When we were mapping up there we found gravels way up on top of the mountain.

With some of the work being done over in northeast Oregon at the time, did you have any contact with Luther Cressman and some cooperative projects instigated by John C. Merriam in ’37 and ’38?

No, I didn’t have much contact with them although I did do some of my first teaching from Baker. I ran weekly classes in several towns there because I could time my field trips in other parts of the country every Friday night for maybe six or eight meetings. We’d had a three hour session on how to prospect, and elementary rocks and minerals for prospectors, and this sort of thing. I taught courses for the Extension Division which helped out a little bit.

And that was the beginning of your career as an economic geologist.

That was the beginning of my career as a teacher, too, you see. Theoretically, I was an economic geologist working for the state department of geology, but I was doing this on my own time.

So, it was a lot like extension work?

That’s right, it was extension work.

I was going to ask you about the Geological Society of the Oregon Country, wasn’t that begun about that period?

That was by the end of 1935 and I was not a charter member, but I joined as soon as I got back to Portland in 1938 or ’39. I joined and I was elected president in 1946. I served as editor of the News letter for a year. That is a very unique society; it’s probably the oldest non-professional geological society in this country at the present time. And it’s probably the only one that had a newsletter which has been published continuously all that time.

You mentioned in your first volume of Time Travel that bringing the technical down to where people could better understand it was one of your interests.

I have a bibliography of over 200 publications, and I’d say that 75% of them are for the layman rather than for the professional. Even this last one that I handed you, see, it semi-professional. That’s a publication to needle geologists to go out and do something that needs to be done. I propose an outrageous hypothesis which I fully expect to be shot down, but I do it because that’s the way to get things done these days. If you’re brash enough, people will take notice just to shoot you down.

Sort of like your Columbia River work and I remember the outrageous hypothesis of the cataclysms in the Columbia.

I have another one that got a lot of attention. Was the case of the counter-clockwise river? The Nehalem you know starts out and flows east and then northeast and then north and then northwest and then west and then southwest and then south and it comes back within 12 miles of its headwater! So I proposed some outrageous hypothesis to explain that.

With your interests about bringing it down to the layman level geology, can you attribute any of that to your experience at Crater Lake?

Oh very definitely! You see, my teaching had been mostly as a teaching assistant at Berkeley, and I taught in several classes for three years. One class we had 1,000 students in Wheeler Auditorium. “Norman Ethan Allen Hines/ upon the screen in Wheeler shines/lantern slides of various kinds/to amuse the feebler minds/among his class of clinging vines.” We had seven teaching assistants for that class and we each met seven times a week, so 50 sessions of lab in that class. Well, that was just one of the classes they had down there. We had field trips there of 1,000 students, 30 busses. This gave me a lot of background in interpreting things to people who knew very little about geology. So, when I came to Crater Lake I had a real background, and I enjoyed giving the talks and making the diagrams. Dr. Hodge at Oregon, too, was very great at doing chalk work with colored chalk on the board. And I even was able to take two courses from William Morris Davis.

Oh, you were?

He was there in Oregon for a summer teaching two courses, and I took one for credit and audited the other and was very careful with colored pencil to copy down all of his colored diagrams. He too was a great teacher!

What year?

Oh, this was 1931. I believe. So, you see. I had quite a background in interpreting to the public, and this, as I say, has been a lifelong effort. And I’ve enjoyed it every minute, up till about a year ago when I had a very bad accident and lost much of my hearing. Totaled my Volvo car and it’s hard to total a Volvo, you know. And I lay my life to the fact that I had my seatbelt on and it was a Volvo, not another car, because it rolled me several times.

I gave lectures, up till that time, on an average of two or three a mouth. I have a list in my autobiography of some 100 different titles that I’ve given lectures on to all sorts of organizations, from the City Club of Portland to Elderhostel groups. When I got back from a year in Pakistan on a sabbatical, I gave a talk to the City Club on “Johnny Can’t Read.” Do you remember they were talking about that a few years back? “Johnny Can’t Read,” but Muhammad Khan Reads and Speaks Three Languages!” In the area where I was teaching, at Peshawar, we had the tribes and they could speak only Pashto, and couldn’t speak Urdu, so they spent their grade school years learning to speak Urdu so they could go to high school and they spent their high school years learning to speak English so they could go to college because college was taught in English. So it was a very difficult situation there. And I thought it was fascinating and the City Club did, too.

Did you ever think of yourself as retired once you officially left in ’74?

No, heavens no. I’ve been busier… well, the main thing about being retired is you don’t get any holidays!

So you don’t ever take any time off?

I’m down here often on Saturdays and Sundays, until I got a little feeble in the last couple of years. I’ve had this asthma during the last six months, and that’s cut down on that work. And my desk begins to pile up, you know! But, I lay a lot of my ability to continue to produce on the computer. I got my computer way back in 1982, you see, and it is an antique now, it’s completely obsolete. It goes on CPM! But it’s perfectly all right for what I use it for.

I was just thinking about some of the things that I’d come across and wondered about some personalities, such as Ira Allison, is he still alive?

No. I think he died just very recently.

Because I saw his Fort Rock paper yesterday in the DOGAMI (1)library.

Yes. I’ve been keeping in touch with Allison. We wrote some joint papers, and even ten, twelve years ago he was really an active person in the field; I went out on some field trips with him. He wrote one of his papers on the gravels in the Portland area. He was the one that did the work on the erratics in the Willamette Valley that furnished one of the major proofs for the Bretz floods, you see. I call them “Bretz floods,” they call them Spokane Floods, you know, those Missoula floods. And he found 350 (I think it was) localities of where melting icebergs had dropped piles of rocks from British Columbia in the Willamette Valley as far south as Eugene.

It was more than just the one state park, it was many more?

Oh yes! In my book (2) I have a map showing the location of the erratics, taken mostly from Allison. And then I added to it a number that I’ve located and other people have located.

I know in his paper he mentioned about Fort Rock and his cooperative work with John C. Merriam and Cressman….

In those days we all worked together. Several of the geology students worked with Cressman. Have you seen Cressman’s biography?

Yes. I just read part of it this weekend.

Very interesting. And have you seen Thomas Condon’s biography?

We have it in our library, but I haven’t read it.

Oh, that’s fascinating too. Thomas Condon was the one that started this idea of interpreting science to the public. Thomas Condon gave talks to the people down on the beach, you know, in Newport. And we have pictures of him lecturing the whole group of people on the geology. Thomas Condon and the Two Islands, you remember, that was the name of his first book on Oregon geology. Warren D. Smith caught that from Condon and Warren D. Smith’s students have carried this idea on of interpreting geology to the public. I was the president of the National Association of Geology Teachers one year, because I was interested in this sort of geology teaching and interpretation of geology. I got the award for being the outstanding teacher for 1972. It’s called the Neil Miner Award; it’s given every year to an outstanding teacher in geology.

Do you think we’re too specialized now?

More and more about less and less until we know everything about nothing?! Yes! Well, we need generalists; we need people like well, the British. They are a lot better at that than we are in generalizing, but we have a few people like Gould. We need more people like Gould. And the astronomer, Sagan. And we need a lot of those, because this is a technical world, a scientific world, and how can we vote if we don’t know the problems. For instance, this hassle about the spotted owl. It’s too bad they had to pick on one organism because it’s the whole ecology that counts, not just the spotted owl. It’s all the different organisms that live in those old forests. This is one thing that really frightens me is the way we’re ruining Oregon and Washington and the northwest. Why, you take a flight over, they’ve even clear-cut 25% of the Bull Run preserve which was supposed to not be touched at all. And we’re having to fight like black death to keep them from logging off more of it.

When did you meet Howell Williams for the first time?

Well, he was at Berkeley when I went down there. And I took everything he had to offer, because I came from volcano country, you know. So I took everything he had to offer. He was a great old guy and a lot of fun!

He was doing his field work at the same time….

That’s right, he was there.

He was at Newberry, and then he must have come to Crater Lake the year after.

He’d done most of the field work at Crater Lake, I think, before I knew him, but he hadn’t published on Crater Lake in ’35. So my work on the domes there, I don’t know whether he used it or not.

What encouraged you to pursue that idea of the domes?

Well, when we were studying under Howell Williams I wrote articles on domes and I wrote term papers for him on domes and on calderas. I have one paper on calderas that I wrote for him and it summarized all the literature on calderas. He wrote several papers on calderas, too, you know.

What was your view about the so-called backflow when you were a naturalist at Crater Lake?

I had the idea that it was where a vent came up rather then being a backflow. And it shows that in one of my cross-sections, I think.

Were you caught in the middle concerning what happened at Crater Lake having studied under Smith, and then being around Williams?

I don’t know what the answer is yet. I’m not at all sure that Bacon has it right.

What allowed you to pursue publication of your article?

I left Crater Lake that winter. You couldn’t do winter field work in Curry County hunting for chromites, which was what my job was, when there was a couple of feet of snow. So, I was snowed in for weeks at a time. And that’s when I wrote it.

Your chromites work in Curry County would have been in the interior. Did you do a lot of work on the coast?

No. It was mostly in the interior, we worked out of Agnes for one whole year. I had a crew of about nine Indians that I hired to prospect for me. And every week I’d go out with a park train and bring them their supplies, check what they’d done, and then pay them off, and then come back in, you see.

Did you go out on the coast and make some field investigations on your own?

No. I was pretty busy on the chromites job. I moved over to Grants Pass later and then made trips to Washington to chromites deposits up there. The reason I left after three years was that I had discovered an excellent deposit at High Plateau right on the border of California and Oregon and I dickered with the owner to buy it for $8,000, and he’d agreed with me. And m boss back in Baltimore decided that he’d better send somebody else to help this young fellow that had been working there. So he sent somebody out and lost the deal and that made me so mad I quite. I really didn’t have to quit because I’d already been asked if I’d serve on the State Department of Geology, but anyhow, I was glad to quit. Later they mined a million and a quarter dollars worth of chrome out of that mine.

That would have been during WWII?

That was during WWII.

There was another question I was going to ask you in regard to Smith and Schwartzlow, they mentioned at one point that there was an island in the Tonga Group that was supposedly identical to Crater Lake. Do you remember that?

No, I don’t remember that. Of course, there are a lot of calderas that are more or less similar to Crater Lake.

They wanted to compare…

Not many have water in them.

They said these one ad two islands in it and I think it was Niuafoou in the Tonga chain.

Well, could be. Let’s see, the four geologists were Schwartzlow, Smith, Dutton, and myself. Four geologists out of that crew.

Carl Dutton also wrote something out of that. I think it was the physiographic of Crater Lake.

I don’t remember. Carl Dutton became one of the top-economic geologists in the country, you know.

[Steve hands him book] Oh yeah, so he did, that’s right.

Well, I pulled that out of the files. In fact, you can have that.

I don’t remember this. Is this published in the…

The rough paper, it may be one of those things that were too long for the Nature Notes so, it was stuck in the file. I pulled it out and made a copy for you.

Oh, you mad this for me? I’d be glad to have it.

But he was also doing some research, as you were…

Oh yeah, we all tried to o a little research because we recognized that your reputation depends on your publications, as a young geologist. And besides, you’re always in an associate Sigma XI until you publish a paper, and then you can be a regular Sigma XI. That’s the science honor society.

So, it’s like what the British would term as being “blooded”.

That’s right! That’s not a bad idea, till a guy gets a good publication they don’t want to elect him.

You stayed in touch with a lot of the work done, subsequently, at Crater Lake and the various parks. One that comes to mind is Ralph Mason’s idea that the eruption of Mazama might have happened in January instead of June.

Oh, I don’t remember that, but that’s good! Ralph is a life long friend of mine. In fact, I hired Ralph on his very first job when I was with the State Department of Geology, we were sent down to Coos Bay to map the Coos Bay coal field again, and I hired Ralph as my assistant engineer. He was second in command on there for two years. Well I never saw that, that’s fascinating.

I’ll make a copy for you. I pulled that out of the file, but I wasn’t sure if you’d seen it or not, there are also some transmittal letters that are interesting.

You stayed in contact with people like Applegate and some of the other…

No, I didn’t. I never saw Elmer again after that summer down there. I don’t know what happened to him. I really don’t. He was a sweet guy; we were very fond of him.

I know he published, finally, his book on plants in ’49. And we had one letter in the file where he was protesting against the Ribes eradication because the Crater Lake current was at risk and there wasn’t much proof that the rust was using Crater Lake plant as a host.

Well, he was a good ecologist.

Were there other people interested in botany at the time?

Well, Coopey was a biologist.

So, he would have been more in fauna?

Yeah, I got the bird and mammal identifications from him, I think.

Did you see any of the people…

Coopey came to Portland and taught at Portland State for several years before he retired. He was a little older than I am.

Were some of the people from the Washington or Berkeley offices coming through at the times?

I really don’t remember any real visitors except, of course, our friend with the motorcycle, Dave Griggs. He made a mark on all of us! But, visiting firemen, they’d buzz in and buzz out, you know and we’d never get a chance to talk with them very much.

So, you didn’t visit with Harold Bryant or Washington Office people?

No. Of course we all got to meet the big man…Merriam. But, really, I don’t remember any off the others.

Now, did he come during the time where you were training, was he giving you a talk about…

No, we didn’t have much training. I mean, we were given a briefing by Swartzlow who was the chief ranger-naturalist. And Swartzlow said this is what you’re going to do and he says, you have so much time off, you can do your own research if you want to, but everybody will rotate on all these things, so everybody will get a chance to give lectures in the lodge. You’ll all get a chance at the “head of the lake trail,” you’ll get the boat trip; you’ll get the rim drive, and so on.

So that was between the times that Warren Moody had been in that position?

I don’t remember the name Warren Moody, that wasn’t the name of the chief ranger?

He was a seasonal who, I guess, after Libbey left, was his fill-in for one summer, and then John Doerr came in ’36.

That was after me, you see, I was ’35. I don’t even remember the name of the chief ranger.

Canfield…

Canfield that was it!

He would have been superintendent because Solinsky got himself into trouble.

I remember the name Canfield, but, we never met the ranger staff, we had our own little group of ranger-naturalists, which one of the neat things about it… Swartzlow handled it and they never interfered with us. Swartzlow did the job of getting cars for us, to run the boat, getting people to run the boat, and that sort of thing, you know.

So he did a lot of the logistic things?

Yeah. Well, that was what he was hired for, I guess.

I know something about the rim caravan being an all day kind of …

Oh yes, and the boat trip was an all day.

But that wasn’t established route for them.

No, it wasn’t, but they wanted it.

They explained that to your successor, but were very hurt that it was shut down.

He [Robert Benton] didn’t have to shut it down.

It was already shut down by your order.

Four of us went up to Sun Notch so that they could be assured that I had, in fact, covered it. They didn’t like armchair decision making, you know. We went back and then up north along the east boundary to Diamond Lake, and to the rim from the North Entrance and back. We maintained snowmobile access as it was (21).

So you didn’t snowmobile from Munson Valley to Diamond Lake on the Rim Drive?

From Munson Valley up the road? Oh, no. That was in their [the snowmobile supporters’] plans. The route that I accompanied them on was what I just explained. Roger Rudolph was with me and we had dinner over at Diamond Lake with the group. In fact, I have a slide from somewhere on the east side of me and my snowmobile and the leader of the snowmobile club down on his hands and knees. I can’t remember his name, but the background was Mt. Scott, and it was all in fun.

So Rutter had made that decision before you were down there?

Yes. The only deviation from established access was for rescue and we would call on them. We had an incident concerning a snowmobile that went over the rim on the north side, so we posted a sign that said do not go beyond this point.

Yes, we still have that one.

He bailed out just as it went over. The snowmobile went down there about 80 yards or so before it finally came to rest. Lucky the guy survived. He managed to jump off and out of the way. We finally charged him and sent him a bill for the removal. We used a winch to help retrieve that snowmobile, and that helped us further justify restricting access.

How did planning for rehabilitation of Park Headquarters come about?

As you well know, the project around headquarters, the upgrade of seasonal quarters, and even Steel Circle developments are something where the regional director set priorities and are somewhat limited by funding that might be available. When money is available even NHPA could sometimes be twisted around. What I’m trying to say is that various factors enter into this. Sometimes striking when the iron is hot pays big dividends. Priorities for maintenance funds or whatever are meshed with other parks within the region. Sometimes you almost feel like some other park is getting all the money, especially when I think back to Crater Lake and those seasonal quarters. That Sleepy Hollow project just kept being kicked down and we kept trying to push for replacing those seasonal quarters. It was really gratifying to me to finally see that come to pass. The need was recognized, but it was slow in coming.

I’m trying to remember who was ram-rodding historical preservation in the regional office (22). I ‘d like to take some credit, but I can’t take that much praise. We were trying to preserve some of those building, especially that dormitory at headquarters. Early in the planning phase some studies come into play. Don Peting headed one study at the University of Oregon (23). They came down and did some studies about the tail end of my tour as superintendent. I was involved in doing some of the initial programming for that project. As for the specifics of some of the designs, I went up to Portland one time to meet some architects—Zaik/ Miller, Di Bennidetto. I went to review some plans, especially for the remodeling of the interior of the Administration Building. I played a role in trying to facilitate the project. Other disciplines entered the picture, and they probably had more influence than I did.

How did planning for rehabilitation of Park Headquarters come about?

Was the closing of the Klamath Falls office a big factor in the administrative people coming back up to the park, since they needed office space?

It was a factor but not all that important. Under the Klamath Falls group, the administrative assistant was in Klamath Falls and our personnel specialist would not have been a personnel officer. Those administrative forms were processed through the Klamath Falls office. Prior to my arrival, Crater Lake was under the I & RM concept. They finally moved away from that but there was an interpretive specialist in Klamath Falls that assisted the chief ranger, who was chief of I & RM (24). The interpreters were getting short changed under that kind of program, so this eventually split into two separate programs, under a chief of interpretation and a chief ranger (25).

Natural resource management was just beginning to come on the scene and was being recognized Service wide. I was very strong on natural resource management and so we were recognized as being a park suitable for adding a resource management trainee to our staff (26). We were able then to get John Jarvis. We almost had a fight with Bill Dunmire, who was superintendent at Carlsbad Caverns. Jarvis hadn’t been there a year yet, but because this was a special program just being initiated, Bill had to go along with it. We got Jarvis without facilities to accommodate him, such as suitable quarters and office space. The thing that started the ball rolling toward closure of the Klamath Falls office was the realignment of the regional boundary. Lava Beds was placed in the Western Region, and no longer reported to the Klamath Falls group (27). Klamath Falls just served Crater Lake, Oregon Caves, and John Day Fossil Beds.

How many people were in the Klamath Falls office? Did closure affect more than a couple of people?

Closure made some people choose to retire or relocate. Jeff Adams, for example, chose to retire. He stayed on as a kind of consultant for awhile. The interpretive specialist moved on, and when he did, they never filled his job. Jim Blaisdale then moved to the regional office as wildlife biologist. They brought the administrative officer up to Crater Lake (28). Ernie Borgman was offered a position in the regional office if he wanted it, but he chose to retire (29). I wish he hadn’t, because he was so young. Ernie could have accomplished much more. Russ Dickenson expected that Ernie and I could make things work (30). I would spend time once a week in Klamath Falls with Ernie. I would make it the day that the Rotary Club met in Klamath Falls. Quite a distance, and my travel there probably raised some eyebrows since here was this superintendent driving all the way into Klamath Falls to go to a Rotary Club meeting. But I was also working with Ernie and the group. I was also encouraged, and could see the need, to foster and promote external relations that had not been the best.

Wasn’t there encouragement for all superintendents to get involved with Rotary and other community organizations at the time?

Yes, we were urged to become involved with, and participate in, neighboring communities. I had been in Rotary when I was at Colorado National Monument. It is a good way to cultivate an image with the public. It probably has some of the employees saying that I’m wasting my time, but it pays off-it gets you know and it gets the park known.

We had these remote parks with no outside contacts. I think we needed to go beyond the superintendent, and in some ways Rotary isn’t sufficient, but it was at least a first step. A good way to get those contacts going.

In some areas it is easier to connect with the outside than others. Take the superintendent at Olympic, for example. He can just swing into that mode real easy. Here at North Cascades it is relatively simple. I was able to bring John Reynolds in and introduce him, so it wasn’t long before he was active (31). I also got Bill Paleck involved in Rotary here (32). It pays dividends. When it comes to public support why, hey, the public can feel warmer toward you. Another advantage is that we’re not dropping our plan on them cold turkey like we used to do when we made the decisions in-house. We are communicating what our mutual needs are on a regular basis in trying to work together. It’s much easier to get them to help you when you are friends, at least acquaintances.

Was there any thought about a friends group at Crater Lake while you were superintendent?

The first I heard of “friends” or something like this, was while I was at Crater Lake. But this was something that was initiated at Santa Monica Mountains in California, where it was probably resulted from budget constraints. At least that is where I first heard of such a thing. They felt they needed more money to do some of the projects that they wanted to get done. I think they initiated a catalog where people could donate so much money for a particular cause and it would be used for that purpose. Some of us looked at it with some skepticism, going out to the private sector. It seemed to catch on at the Golden Gate, but we didn’t really see much of it in this region until a little later. I know they have a friends group at Crater Lake now and it is probably working very well. This is something that came of age. While I was there, there were people who I made a special effect to contact because of their known interest and past support of Crater Lake. It wasn’t for any particular funding but just to gain their support and keep them informed. They expressed many years of interest and concern- – but not as an organization body, the climate wasn’t quite right yet. As far as external bodies, there was just the NHA board.

I’d like to back up to when you were appointed superintendent of Crater Lake in 1978. What were the circumstances behind that?

Okay! Well, I think we have covered a little bit of the background with the group office in Klamath Falls. During that period, of course, there was the water system fiasco that got national attention. Out of that grew some special project and funding for improved water and sewage utilities at Crater Lake. We gained a water treatment specialist for testing the water system. We also acquired a water lab which you probably still have going. We even gained a full time nurse on the staff.

Oh really!

Yes, as a result of that sickness. When I arrived there, employees were taking advantage of having a full-time nurse on board. The nurse happened to be the wife of one of the equipment operators. That was very convenient, but it was a result of a reaction to the Water Crisis. There was some good that came out of it, with increased employee morale. They’d come a long way, but there were some other things that weren’t moving along as fast as we would have liked.

Was that one of the reason why Russ Dickenson sent you down there (33)?

Part of it perhaps, yes. Again, this was kind of a programmatic thing. It wasn’t just me and Frank Betts, who was the superintendent of Crater Lake at the time. Frank was kind of anxious to have another bone to chew on, so to speak. There was a employee morale. They’d come a long way. But there were some other things that weren’t moving along as fast as we would have liked.

Was that one of the reasons why Russ Dickenson sent you down there (33)?

Perhaps that was it, yes. Again this was kind of a programmatic thing. It wasn’t just me and Frank Betts, who was the superintendent of Crater Lake at the time. Frank was kind of anxious to have another bone to chew on, so to speak. There was a superintendent at Mount McKinley who was looking for a different climate. I had not been aggressively seeking a new position at that point. Russ was aware that my interest lay in a full time park management position. There was a kind of four way deal which Russ arranged that came about through a series of phone calls to all four of us in one evening. It allowed for Dan Kuehn, superintendent of Mt. McKinley, to replace me in my role at the regional office. I would be going to Crater Lake while Frank Betts would be going to Mount McKinley. There was another individual involved, but that part of the four way dual didn’t work out. This just included the three of us, so it didn’t involve applying for the job. Everybody seemed to be pleased with these moves.

It was just a lateral transfer?

Yes. It gave everybody a little bone to chew on, rather than being due to anybody’s deficiencies or something like that. I think it was good for the health of the Park Service in general.

Did you have some priorities that you wanted to go after right away?

I was very familiar with the park objectives, as I explained earlier, because I had worked with several park superintendents and Ernie [Borgman] in developing management objectives as Crater Lake, but also at Oregon Caves and John Day Fossil Beds.

Was the general management plan something that you were directly involved with?

At that point in time we did not have a GMP. We were still living under the old master plan approved in 1974, I believe. I felt there was a need for a master plan or a GMP update.

One was approved in 1977 under Frank Betts.

Okay, but it didn’t address enough things. I felt the need for a new one. I was told we just had one and it is too soon. I felt a need for a new GMP, I really did.

Was it difficult to orchestrate CPSU studies?

Frank and I did all we could to encourage research programs. One of the things that I had grown increasingly concerned about was the lack of sound scientific data based on the ecology of Crater Lake itself. There had been a lot of people who had done studies of the lake, yet what piqued my concern was an article that compared large bodies of water like Lake Tahoe with Crater Lake (35). These big bodies of water have thermoclines, though I may not have the right term. The zones or strata in these lakes are somewhat stable, and I don’t remember the depth of distance, but something like the upper 500 feet is such that it just stays constant and the strata below that, the next 80 feet or 100 is a different zone and stays stable. But there wasn’t enough solid scientific evidence to support this theory. There was also the concern about geothermal activity. Was the bottom of Crater Lake completely dormant, or is something still going on? There just wasn’t enough information. USGS was already doing some work in the park, and they found an ideal space to study.

Under Charlie Bacon?

Yes, Charlie was on site at that time. I had this growing concern about the lake and the lack of knowledge to really be basing long range management decisions. We had been concerned about the effect of an oil spill, or the loss of a boat in the lake, or a fuel line break. There was a time when the concessionaire offered row boats for rent on the lake. With the wilderness program, I thought there was going to be a lot of clamor and concern about the boats being there. That was one of the things that surprised me as wilderness coordinator. When we got to Crater Lake, I fully expected the Wilderness Society and Friends of the Earth to come out screaming, “Get those boats off the lake,” but that wasn’t the voice that we heard, and it surprised me. The public seemed to accept those boats on the lake. I don’t know if you heard Jeff Adams comment about it.

Oh, yes!

His opinion of the lodge, being something about a wad of gum on the Mona Lisa. But back to my everlasting concern, the purity of that lake and the lack of sound knowledge. When this matter of legislative adjustment of boundary was in process, one of the my early Park Service friends, Clay Peters, called me. He was in Sequoia and Kings Canyon at the same time I was, about 1960. Clay worked in the House of Representatives as the park and recreation advisor to the chairman of the House committee on National Parks (36). He was aware of Senator Hatfield’s proposal to adjust the boundary. Clay and I were on the phone quite a bit and I stressed to Clay, “Can we get some studies on this lake?” I’m pretty sure I talked to our research scientist, Jim Larson (37). I’m sure he knew that Clay and I were talking, so Clay was able to put a requirement in the legislation. We now had a ten year study to try to gain more knowledge about the lake. It may have come about without my conversations but they certainly didn’t hurt. I was glad to see that come to pass, but I never did get to see any of the reports.

I can show you those.

I like to see them. I also attended some evening programs that Charlie Bacon gave exclusively to the park staff.

In going back to the boundary adjustments, we talked about Rare II being thrown out of court (38). Was the park expansion something that Senator Hatfield’s office initiated?

Well, yes. The senator concluded that the Forest Service would have unmanageable small tracts of wilderness under RARE II. That would not be of any value to them other than as wilderness. It would also cause an extra administrative burden for them. If these small tracts were next to the park boundary, and if they were going to be preserved as wilderness anyway, why not have them managed as part of the national park? He directed the supervisors of the three national forest around the park to meet with the Park Service. The park superintendent and three supervisors of the adjoining forest were to get together to recommend those lands in the area under study that would be suitable to be added to the national park. We met and there was some give and take. The supervisors were very knowledgeable and cooperative.

Ernie Borgman participated in this, too, didn’t he?

No, this was after Ernie retired. At any rate, it worked out pretty satisfactorily as far as I was concerned. I felt good about the resources that we were able to get into the park the ones we chose not to include. We may have missed a few good ones. There was, I think, a compromise on the southwest side. If you look at the boundary, there’s a diagonal line that goes from one corner to another. I remember when we were working on wilderness planning, part of the requirement was that the boundary that you developed has to be a manageable unit that you can describe. The preferred boundary of a wilderness would be natural terrain features, a hydrographic divide, a ridge, a stream or something like that. If that is not possible, then a second choice would be from known survey points. The natural terrain features were the preferred way, whereas a contour line on a topographic map was the least desirable. The only way I could get a manageable boundary in the particular case was to go from one section corner to another half section or something. That’s the reason for the diagonal but for the rest of the boundaries, we tried to work along natural terrain features.

Was the CPSU study of Sphagnum Bog helpful to make the case for all of it being inside the park?

I didn’t refer to it (39). We talked earlier today about these various land classifications. Planners and park staff probably defined the area of Sphagnum Bog as class four, which has unique natural features. I had the judgment of others to fall back on for that being of value and I knew there was some adjacent to the park. I wanted to get as much as I could for a buffer.

That section east of the Pinnacles is very nice to have.

I went down the canyon as far as I could. That road closure at the East Entrance occurred in about 1972 or 1973. It wasn’t in the master plan, because the 1968 plan still had the four entrances: north, east, south, and west. The East Entrance got very little travel, but there was a question of staffing it when the planning team was considering the one-way rim drive. How would that fit into the scheme of things? Would the people who wanted to go out the East Entrance would have to go all the way around, or could they go across from the south to the East Entrance? We realized why there was so little travel- it was because the state maintained the little spur road for only about four miles. It was a maintenance headache for them. By closing it they could eliminate that road from maintenance, and it was agreeable with us. I don’t know who initiated that idea, but it was a win-win situation for everyone.

Were they also concerned about elk and potential poaching?

It helped our protection program to by not having to worry about that access. It was a good move and we were glad to see it.

Late in your superintendency you wrote a memorandum about two way travel on Grayback if part of the East Rim Drive were closed.

Okay, that rings a bell!

I was interested because you had corresponded with Francis Lange, the landscape architect (40).

I think he was the guy that made the sign at Vidae Falls.

I met him.

So did. I suspect it was probably a service wide move to try to reduce maintenance of park roads. I remember now we were directed to look at the feasibility of closing the road from Cleetwood Cove to Sun Notch.

Kerr Notch or Sun Notch.

It concerned that whole east side, as I vaguely recall. If we did that, it would be reasonable to convert the Grayback Road into a two way route.

So it still would provide access to Pinnacles and Lost Creek?

Yes, and an optional loop, if you will. Fortunately we never had to go that way. That’s the last segment where you have to do snow removal. They felt we could reduce our budget quite a bit if we didn’t have to maintain it .

Did you meet Mr. Lange as a result of that CCC reunion (41)?

I made an extra effort to find any CCC alumni. This is just coming back to me now, I believe he was living some place in California.

Yes, Vacaville.

That is it. I don’t believe he came up for that event. I tried to generate a good bit of publicity and I was hopeful that we would get more people to turn out. I remember that he came up and he told me about the sign that we still have at Vidae Falls. He is the only one that I recall of the CCC alumni.

I was reading some of the annual reports that were done during the time that you were superintendent. One had to do with the onset of computerization. How did that go?

As far as the first steps the Park Service was taking with computers, I think they had some hotshot’s computer salesman that sold them a bill of goods. One idea was that they would be able to have the same kind of computers in the regional office as in the various park offices, and thereby have a link to the monthly balance of funds. Computers were envisioned mainly for budgets at that initial stage. I was all for anything that could streamline them, but this entailed Mount Rainier, Olympic, and us getting a special kind of computer that matched what the regional office had. At that point we had to dedicate on room for the computer, and assure that it was smoke free and had outside ventilation. We had some administrative staff who smoked, and at that time smoking wasn’t regarded as taboo. We had the non-smokers quite adamant about the smokers bothering their health, so I had a little tizzy going. The smokers were the one that would be using computers at that point in time, so the room had to have this special ventilation. The computer system didn’t realize the potential we had expected in getting results that first year, but within a few short years it began to be more productive (42). With the establishment of our resource management program, things began to come of age. We were then able to get better computer systems and modems.

Was the power line project related to computers?

Not necessarily. We had a generator. Before the power line was placed underground there were many times when we didn’t have electricity, so we had to kick up that generator (43). Many of the park residents had electrical appliance problems that resulted from the power surges. Having a reliable source of power was something we needed to survive in this modern world. I’m sure they’ve got that pretty well solved by now. We were constantly working with the power company. Does the park still have a full time electrician?

Yes, or at least we try to cover those duties on a full time basis. Where did you live in Steel Circle when you were superintendent?

There are three little garages (44).

So that has been pretty constant.

I think it has.

What where the main things that you emphasized in trying to improve living conditions at Crater Lake?

We tried to have a good strong community activities in the school building. In fact, when I first visited Crater Lake in my regional staff position, they still had a school at Crater Lake. That was convenient for the employees that had kids there. Without a certified teacher and probably other factors, kids had to ride the bus to Chiloquin. Another little problem that came about relating to housing was required occupancy. About the time that I came on the scene all the employees were living in the park under required occupancy. Some GAO report said that is not necessary for all the people to be required occupants, but I think we were making special allowances after that water fiasco. About the time I got there the clamp down started on this required occupancy. We had to go through quarter’s appraisals, an evaluation program, and all.

Did you have a policy so that employees could bid for housing?

No. We tried to have housing based (as much as possible) on position and family needs, so it was flexible. We didn’t have the bidding process they had in Yellowstone and some of these other parks. It worked okay. With the tightening of the screws on required occupancy, I remember it got down to only four positions. In the mean time, the rent kept being jacked up higher and higher. We had to deduct for invasion of privacy, on the basis that some people would come into our residential area at various times. The remote location counted a lot. GAO was watch dogging this, and it seemed to be pinching our people. We tried to put our emergency response guys out near the front of Steel Circle. In case of an emergency, the people would come in and contact them first.

The quarter’s situation became quite a concern. Families with kids had a real problem with the distance to school. It handicapped them when they got into high school and wanted to participate in extra curricular activities. I remember granting Pat Smith, the chief of interpretation, permission to live in Klamath Falls because he had two boys in high school.

He had to commute every day?

We made an arrangement that he could stay in the park during the week but the housing situation is awkward with kids in school. The Prospect school situation developed after I left. During my last year or so, there was a family sending their kids to Prospect, but I think they were riding down on their own. I hope things are working okay now. Housing has improved, especially in the new Sleepy Hollow. Would you believe that one Easter Sunday morning, at that time we had a record for snow on the ground, there was close to 22 feet on the ground (45). You can imagine how high it was on some of those flat roofs in Steel Circle (46).

That was the record year, 1983.

I called on all employees to help us that Easter. We had our crews out and people on the roofs shoveling snow. The sun was out, but here we were shoveling frantically when people elsewhere were picking up Easter eggs. What an experience!

You also asked if Jarvis or Forbes had any difficulty integrating with the protection rangers. Both of them had been rangers, and I tried to foster rangers being resource management oriented too. They worked together hand in glove.

Did you attend those early meetings for the lake project? I know some of them took place in Corvallis.

Yes! In fact I had them out to my house. See, I had a home in Corvallis (47). Yes, we had people there from a number of institutions. It was a very good meeting. We were getting things started, so I attended. I can’t remember who initiated it, but it was something that we felt would be essential to the research program having credibility (48).

Were there problems with Oregon State having been selected as sort of a host institution? I knew Doug Larson lost out as principal investigator to Gary Larson.

The news media somehow got a hold of Doug. He suggested that there might be pollution from the sewage lagoon below headquarters. The news media contacted me and I tried to explain the situation. I was convinced that this was not the case. Well, the reporters didn’t stop at that. They went back to Doug and said that the superintendent doesn’t agree. He came back with something like that is a crock of baloney. Forbes might have come in my office when I was getting a call from one of these reporters and I said, “Well, you can contact USGS if you want to. I’m not disputing what Mr. Larson with might be, but I’m soundly convinced otherwise.” At any rate, Doug had done some very good research, but it wasn’t in the same direction that we were going in the ten year program. He probably felt like he was left out. I remember a meeting with Jim Larson. We felt that the way Doug was oriented was not the course we believed was needed for Crater Lake.

I have a question about union representation. Was that a complicating factor in the park operations?

It became that. I can’t give you the particular date. It was probably about 1982. This came about when we selected a carpenter to come on board. I tried extremely hard to talk with people coming to Crater Lake to let them know the living conditions, and what it was like in the winter so that there wouldn’t be any surprises. There was a non-Park Service man coming to the park from Veterans Affairs. He was a qualified carpenter and I guess the best that the register had to offer. He wasn’t there long before he started agitating other employees as to the value and benefit of them having a union. He couldn’t understand why there wasn’t an employee union all ready in place. To his way of thinking, management would just run roughshod over employee right without a union. This appealed to maintenance employees, so contact was made with a union group in Portland. I met with the union leader (49). Unions were being pushed in a number of park areas at the time. The managers and those who work with them needed to have training in collective bargaining, so the department set up some training programs. We selected various employees to complete this training course. I attended a week long seminar in Denver on collective bargaining. We worked things out and a contract was drawn up. I can’t remember which union it was, but we worked out some kind of an agreement (50). I don’t think we had any problems after that.

Did it only cover the maintenance employees?

Yes, nobody else got in on that.

Did the visit by Director Whalen result in any operational changes?

He came out to welcome me. That’s the only time he was there. I had not taken my place at Crater Lake yet, but I met Whalen and we stayed overnight in Crater Lake Lodge. Whalen spoke to the press at the Sinnott Memorial. After that I was introduced to the crowd. We toured the Rim Drive. The next day we went to Klamath Falls and flew to John Day.

For their park dedication?

Probably.

That was August 1978.

Okay, it all ties in. I had been pretty involved with John Day at that point, so I went along (51). I came back to Seattle, then moved to Crater Lake. Whalen’s appearance was simply public relations, introducing me to the public.

One of the changes you noted in your first annual report was that the YCC program had improved.

They were using the building you have as offices for a dormitory and took their meals in the Messhall.

Their numbers were far greater in those days… today it is only five or six kids.

Yes, it was a popular thing that had some presidential endorsement. YCC coordinators worked with the park staff, usually the maintenance chief and the chief ranger. Resource management people worked to develop projects for the YCC folks. They were not supposed to be doing things that would mean eliminating position that was funded under maintenance or rangers. They focused on projects that you otherwise couldn’t get done. It wasn’t difficult to come up with projects. They worked with our maintenance staff and in resource management doing revegetation. They also did trail work. It was a good program.

Were there other employees that ate in the Messhall in addition to them?

Just the YCC!

A question about interpretation, that being the John Wesley Hillman portrayal.

I really thought that was great! We had Marion Jack and a few other rangers do it. He taught in the schools down in Jacksonville, I believe. This was already an established program. I don’t know whether Frank Betts gets credit for it, or whether he just endorsed it, but it was in place. Marion used this stock and we paid him rent for the horses. We worked out a site where he could keep them. His stock was available to us for backcountry use when we need them.

Were the stock kept in Sleep Hollow?

Yes. I remember this mounted ranger bit. About 1960 at Sequoia and Kings Canyon, the NPS realized the benefit of having a ranger on horseback as opposed to a vehicle. I was the one selected to try that type of program in the Giant Forest or Lodge pole area. At that point in time I didn’t have the little radio to carry with me. Our radio was in the vehicle. When I was on my horse, and I grew up on a farm riding horseback, it was a pleasure for me. I enjoyed that aspect of it, but I felt somewhat lost without that radio. As a patrol ranger, I felt that radio was an important tool that I needed. It served a good purpose in patrol of the campground and I realized that. I liked the Hillman program at Crater Lake. It was very helpful for interpretation if John Wesley Hillman arrived at the rim on horseback, but it also lended a medium to reach the people and they liked it.

Was the eruption of Mount St. Helens in 1980 a factor in getting the seismograph?

I think we had one in place when Mount St. Helens erupted. I remember seeing the waves on it. It did pique a great interest from out staff, especially our interpretive program. I have to tell you about a little wrinkle on that. Within a couple weeks of the first eruption we got a call from FEMA (52). They understood that we had a street sweeper and were calling because there was a great need for some of these sweepers in cities like Yakima and Portland that had ask fallout. What can you say? We had to declare it available, so they came and got it. We didn’t see it again until something like October or November. When it was brought back, the bearings were just shot. The ash had just chewed them up. We lost that puppy and I don’t know if we ever replaced it or not. That was our contribution to the Mount St. Helens ordeal.

To close out the Crater Lake segment, I wanted to ask you about the successes during the five and a half years were there. Also, what things disappointed you the most?

I see the boundary adjustment and the working relations I had with the Forest Service, connections through my friend Clay Peters, as foremost. He was in a key position working on the drafting of the legislation that helped bring about the park expansion. I feel good about that. I’m thinking of long term benefits to the park. Working with external interests was another accomplishment. Getting resource management programs off the ground that helping our interpretive programs makes really good progress. I really had nothing to do with the historic studies, but was pleased to see them come along. It is a thing that I very much support.

Probably the biggest disappointment has been the old lodge. I didn’t go along with the public who felt the lodge was such a great cathedral and all that. It was nothing but an old barn that developed without any sound planning. It grew up like Topsy. After its torn and tattered history, especially with all the safety and fire concerns, my feeling was that it served its purpose. It probably never should have been built there in the first place. A visitor doesn’t need to turn over in his bed and look out the window to see the lake. Paying $120 per night is a luxury I don’t think we can afford. It’s just out of place. A visitor’s experience should be that of having the sensation of that John Wesley Hillman did when he first saw the lake. It isn’t looking over and seeing this ugly old lodge, nor should it be looking down and seeing boats fluttering around on the lake. To appreciate that pristine jewel that it is, a visitor should be able to come up to the rim and see nothing but crystal blue water, Wizard Island, and that’s all. And, of course have the feeling, WOW. That is my biggest disappointment. I know that there are probably many in the Park Service who feel somewhat like I do, but it’s surprising how many people think it is the Windsor Castle. Another disappointment was that we directed to turn the operation of Mazama Campground over to the concession (53). Is it still concession operated?

Yes.

I hated to see that happen. Maybe I’m an old traditionalist, but I felt that it was just giving them too much. I was very much in favor and did some site planning for the campground store down at Mazama. This was part of an effort to remove that function from the rim. For overnight lodging, I strongly encouraged something down in Munson Valley rather than at the rim. There is room in Munson Valley. In fact there is space where you go down below headquarters about two miles in the vicinity where the old dump used to be (54). That could be a place suitable for lodging. They could put up some interpretive plaques and scale models of the lodge at the rim for people to look at, so they could understand what was once there. But we chose to go another way, I guess. I was down for the dedication and it looks nice (55). When I left Crater Lake I began to think they’d put a scale model of the old lodge around my neck because of all the headaches I had with it. At one point we had to put external fire escapes there.

I remember the one on the east side of the building.

We had to go into an elaborate smoke alarm system and spent tons of money on that darn thing. I made the decision that they could no longer have fires in that mammoth fire place in the Great Hall.

Yes, I remember the sign.

I had to put it up because the chimney had deteriorated so badly that the smoke was billowing into rooms upstairs. That didn’t win any popularity contests. They’ve got the fireplace reconstructed now.

What was the relationship of Oregon Caves when you were superintendent? Did you provide any direct assistance to the monument?

Yes and no. Going back to the cluster office period, the group provided budgetary oversight, administrative personnel, and interpretive assistance to John Miele and Dick Sims (56). Then there was a period after Ernie retired that the group office was still functioning. I was there in a coordinating role and it was maybe a two day a week job. Then Oregon Cave became completely independent, so we backed off (57). I left a standing offer to provide any assistance that they needed and to just to give us a call. It was on that basis, but that type of assistance wasn’t incorporated into the organizational chart.

We still provide direct assistance to them with budget and in a few other ways.

I think there were a couple of times that we sent somebody over there for a while. On a couple of other occasions they wanted some assistance, but most of the time they operated on their own. They liked being independent.

I had a couple questions on the plan that you helped to finish at the Oregon Caves. In the draft there was a holding area about three or four miles up the road, on Highway 46. What led to that?

I’ll have to take the blame or credit. Bruce Black might have been doing the Oregon Caves master plan draft and I can’t remember who else. But they were gone from the scene and John Rutter said, “Here, do it.” At that point in time, the planning process was to the point where we were to have public meetings. I hammered out of final plan, a revised draft, I guess it was. We went down and held a meeting in Cave Junction. Ben Gale and I flew to Medford and drove over to the monument. We had a meeting and not too many people showed. We discussed it, and it was the concessionaire who had some questions. Christianson, I believe his name was.

Out of that came this final, with endorsements from John Rutter and Ben Gale (58). My idea, rather than having a holding area up the road some distance and having visitors wait at a place with nothing to do, was to have some place in Cave Junction. You would come in and register at the parking lot in Cave Junction. They could then say we can accommodate so many cars and it’ll be such and such a wait. Whoever is operating the station at Cave Junction could say, “Okay car such and such you may go.” In the mean time there are things for people to do and see in Cave Junction. This would help the Chamber of Commerce and maybe go hand in hand with the Forest Service by indicating what recreational opportunities there are in the area. But all of this is contingent on communications, so they had to establish a system that would make this thing work (59). The big problem that prompted these plans was the overcrowding in the parking area on real busy days (60). That was the big problem, as stated in the master plan draft. There wasn’t room for an overflow and you had people stacked up on that road, so you had a problem. I’m not surprised that it never happened, did it?

There is an Illinois Valley Visitors Center. The Park Service helps staff it now.

That’s good. It is what I envisioned. Let me add this… about the time of the North Cascades master planning, the director ordered planners to look at other means of transportation beside the automobile. Tramways were proposed for North Cascades, but I knew that a bus system wouldn’t quite work at Oregon Caves. Planners have since focused on the parking problem.

Footnotes:

Located in Giant Forest.
Later called Albright Training Center.
The Field Operations Study Team, in existence from 1966 to 1968.
The park naturalist series (GS-452) was abolished in 1969 and resumed wit ha new classification system that included park management or rangers (GS-025) and technicians (GS-26).
Park divisions called Interpretation and Resource Management were generally headed by Chief Rangers.
This problems led to the rebirth of interpretative divisions in many parks by the late 1970’s.
Office of Resource Planning under Peetz’s direction from 1966 to 1969.
The Pacific Northwest Region started as a “district” of the Western Region in 1968, and achieved full regional status in 1969.
Authorized in 1965, established in 1970. Fritz was superintendent at Craters of the Moon National Monument from 1966 to 1974.
Superintendent at Sequoia and Kings Canyon when Rouse worked there.
Then a national monument.
They published a multi-volume report with recommendations in 1962.
Zoning appeared in master plans of the time, and later (in modified) as part of general management plans.
North Cascade National Park, along with two national recreation areas, was established in October of 1968.
The U.S. Forest Service conducted its Road less Area Review and Evaluation twice, first in the late 1960’s and then in the mid 1970’s.
It would have meant driving on the present route of the Pacific Crest Trail from Highway 62 to the PCT junction with the Pumice Flat Trail.
Hartzog was director from 1964 to 1972. The facility may have been the Red Blanket Patrol Cabin.
All but one of the backcountry patrol cabins built in 1933 and 1934 were demolished.
Animal Unit Months, used in calculating grazing fees.
Rudolph was chief ranger from 1981 to 1983.
Restricting it to the road connecting Diamond Lake with the North Junction, in line with the regional director’s decision in 1974.
The most closely associated with the Crater Lake projects were regional office staff members, T. Allen Comp [Chief of Cultural Resources], Stephanie Toothman [Regional Historian], Laurin Huffman [Historical Architect] and Dan Babbitt [Chief of Design in Maintenance Division].
Peting’s historic preservation class developed a number of design scenarios for preservation and use of the Munson Valley Historic District, and completed their report in 1984.
This was John Davis, who assisted Jim Wiggins and then Dan Sholly until 1978.
Sholly went from being chief of I&RM to chief ranger in 1978, when Pat Smith was hired as the chief of interpretation.
The first position is resource management belonged to Mark Forbes, who was hired in 1978. A resource management training program was authorized by Congress in 1981.
This took place in 1974.
Jack V. Houston.
Borgman was the group superintendent and retired in March 1980.
Rouse’s predecessor, Frank Betts, largely refused to work with the group office.
Jim Rouse concluded his career at North Cascades as assistant superintendent. John Reynolds was superintendent at that time and is presently regional director in San Francisco.
The current superintendent at North Cascades.
Dickenson was regional director in Seattle from 1977 to 1981.
34)
Raymond C. Smith, et al.,Optical Properties and Color of Lake Tahoe and Crater Lake, Limnology and Oceanography 18:2 (March 1973) pp.189-199
This took place in 1982.
Regional Chief Scientist in Seattle.
That took place in 1979.
Susan Seyer’s thesis on the area, reformatted into a CPSU report with assistance from Jerry Franklin.
Park Landscape Achitect from 1934 to 1939.
A number of recognition ceremonies were held in 1983 at Crater Lake and elsewhere because of the 50^th anniversary of the Civilian Conservation Corps.
The park’s first computers were made by Wang.
Crater Lake has been served with outside power since 1929, but with overhead lines until 1983.
Building #227.
The record was set officially on April 1, 1983.
Prior to 1991 all the roofs in Steel Circle were flat with the exception of Building #17.
Where his wife most often resided while their two daughters attended Oregon State University.
The first meetings took place in 1982.
The American Federation of Government Employees, Local 1042.
This took effect in 1984.
The John Day Fossil Beds required extensive National Park Service planning efforts prior to its establishment and during the first few years after authorization. Rouse played a key role from the regional office in facilitating the monument’s planning process.
Federal Emergency Management Agency.
This took place on a “trail basis” In 1983, and was finalized for the life of the concession contract in 1986.
The so-called summer dump. This area excluded from wilderness recommendations until 1993.
This took place in July 1995.
Sims was superintendent of the monument from 1971 to 1973, while Miele served in that capacity from 1974 to 1985.
Oregon Caves was officially independent from 1982 to 1985.
The master plan of 1975.
Until 1984 all the monument had was a radio phone through a toll station.
Annual visitation peaked in the 1970s at roughly 200,000.

Other pages in this section
Crater Lake Centennial Celebration oral histories

Hartzog – Complete Interview (PDF)

Jon Jarvis

Albert Hackert and Otto Heckert

Hazel Frost

James Kezer

F. Owen Hoffman

Douglas Larson

Carroll Howe

Wayne R. Howe

Francis G. Lange

Lawrence Merriam C.

Marvin Nelson

Doug and Sadie Roach

James S. Rouse

John Salinas

Larry Smith

Earl Wall

Donald M. Spalding

Wendell Wood

John Lowry Dobson

O. W. Pete Foiles

Bruce W. Black

Emmett Blanchfield

Ted Arthur

Robert Benton

Howard Arant

Obituary Kirk Horn, 1939-2019

Mabel Hedgpeth

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Crater Lake Institute – Enhancing the Visitors Experience

A free and in-depth library about Crater Lake National Park

John Eliot Allen