When Vint was formulating his development plan for Rim Village in 1926, he foresaw a promenade that was to be bounded by a roadway and the rim. A retaining wall for the promenade was needed, so a Bureau of Public Roads design was adapted by the NPS for use at Rim Village (see CRLA Maintenance Division drawings dated April 1926, June 1927, and 9/30/29; also DSC microfiche 106-812). In 1929, three retaining walls were constructed across small washes at different Points in the Rim Village area. They were joined together over the next three construction seasons to form a wall that runs the entire length of the promenade. Rock for the wall was obtained in various parts of the park, loaded into trucks by hoist, hauled to Rim Village, and then cut to the proper size and shape by masons. Work on the stone curbing for the roads and walks of Rim Village lasted from 1932 to 1936. The stone was obtained from the north slope of the Watchman because it was found to split and trim better than any other in the park, while also being abundant and close to the road.
Construction of the Sinnott Memorial in 1930 is of importance to the evolution of rockwork in the park because this is where experimentation begins with large battered stone that often protrudes beyond a uniform masonry surface. The idea could have come from Herbert Maier, who had previously done museums at Yosemite and Yellowstone. Maier’s Yavapai Station at the Grand Canyon served as the model for the Sinnott (Vint to the Director, 2/6/30). His one-time assistant and later resident landscape architect at Crater Lake, Francis Lange, has said that the rationale behind the decision to begin incorporating large boulders into building exteriors was that larger rock “aged better” (oral history interview 9/12/88).
Refinement of the large boulder idea can be seen in the two cottages (buildings #24 and #28) designed by Lange and constructed in 1931. Large boulders are used near the bottom of the exterior walls and the size of the stone gradually tapers off near the top. Another example of this can be seen in pictures of the small firehall constructed that year. When it was demolished in 1969, some of the boulders were said to be “as big as a small car” (in the Smith Brothers’ Chronology) . Lange has also said that the purpose of the larger stone was to give a curved appearance to the structure, making it a better model of the terrain than construction emphasizing straight lines (oral history interview 8/8/87). An interesting demonstration of this idea might be the drinking fountain along the retaining wall near the Victor Rock Trail to the Sinnott Memorial. In 1931, a stone mason named Mancini produced a scale model of Crater Lake from a single boulder.
By 1932, the use of untrimmed boulders in construction at the park becomes a dominant feature. A “government contact building” was drawn that year for Rim Village (this type of building was later called a “museum” or a “visitor center”) . Designed by NPS architect George Norgard (the man who had done the drawings for the Ranger Dormitory in Munson Valley), this building would have been situated next to the cafeteria on the plaza. It was to be built in two units, one in 1933 and the second in 1934. This two story structure was to replace the 1924 Community House, provide offices and space for public contact activities. It was to “conform with the present type of architecture used in park buildings” and cost almost twice the estimated amount to be expended upon the Superintendent’s Residence (“Justification for Individual Cost Projects, 1933”).
Proper use of the boulders in large buildings was not without problems. A 1934 report to Vint on the construction of the Administration Building in Munson Valley commented: “Some trouble was experienced in getting a good distribution of color in the rockwork, but the hardest thing was to keep out the unnatural shapes . One bad habit of many masons seems to be the desire to trim rocks around windows to resemble a pie with a slice missing. This awkward shape is also resorted to when fitting rocks together. The only way to avoid poor rockwork in many cases is to have an inspector constantly on the job, or else make detailed sheets showing each rock. This would prove very expensive construction when using natural shaped rocks.” Despite these problems, Lange called the Administration Building in his final field report for 1935 “one of the most attractive structures of its kind in any of our national parks.”
