Dunes and Dreams:

A History of White Sands National Monument

Administrative History 

White Sands National Monument

by Michael Welsh

1995

National Park Service

Division of History

Intermountain Cultural Resources Center

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Professional Paper No. 55
Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgements

Foreword

Chapter One: A Monument in Waiting: Environment and Ethnicity in the Tularosa Basin

Chapter Two: The Politics of Monument-Building: White Sands, 1898-1933

Chapter Three: New Deal, New Monument, New Mexico, 1933-1939

Chapter Four: Global War at White Sands, 1940-1945

Chapter Five: Baby Boom, Sunbelt Boom, Sonic Boom: The Dunes in the Cold War Era, 1945-

1970

Chapter Six: A Brave New World: White Sands and the Close of the 20th Century, 1970-1994

Bibliography
List of Illustrations

Figure 1. Dune Pedestal

Figure 2. Selenite crystal formation at Lake Lucero

Figure 3. Cave formation, Lake Lucero

Figure 4. Cactus growth

Figure 5. Desert lizard

Figure 6. Visitors to White Sands Dunes (1904)

Figure 7. Frank and Hazel Ridinger's White Sands Motel (1930s)

Figure 8. Roadside sign for White Sands west of Alamogordo (1930)

Figure 9. Early registration booth (restroom in background) (1930s)

Figure 10. Grinding stone unearthed at Blazer's Mill on Mescalero Apache Reservation (1930s)

Figure 11. Nineteenth-Century Spanish carreta and replica in Visitors Center Courtyard (1930s)

Figure 12. Pouring gypsum for road shoulder construction (1930s)

Figure 13. Blading gypsum road into the heart of the sands (1930s)

Figure 14. Hazards of road grading (1930s)

Figure 15. Adobe style of construction by New Deal Agency Work Crews (1930s)

Figure 16. Hispanic woodcarvers making corbels for Visitor Center (1930s)

Figure 17. Patrolling the dunes (1930s)

Figure 18. Rock Island railroad window display, Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL (1938)

Figure 19. High School girls' softball game (1930s)

Figure 20. Skiers at dunes (1930s)

Figure 21. Woman "Skiing" on Alkali Flats Lake Bed (1930s)

Figure 22. Interior Department vehicle on inspection tour (1930s)

Figure 23. Alamogordo High School Marching Band at "Play Day" Festivities (1930s)

Figure 24. Tom Charles' touring car for The White Sands Service Company (1930s)

Figure 25. Oliver Lee ranch house, Dog Canyon (1930s)

Figure 26. Drilling for water at Garton Lake (1930s)

Figure 27. L.L. Garton Ranch House (1930s)

Figure 28. White Sands, New Mexico. Laura Gilpin (1945)

Figure 29. White Sands, Laura Gilpin (1943)

Figure 30. U.S. Army Engineer Battalion marching across dunes (1943)

Figure 31. World War II—Era troops at picnic in the dunes (1940s)

Figure 32. Bomb crater in dunes (1940s)

Figure 33. Clay-plated road washed out by heavy rains (1940s)

Figure 34. Medical Corps officers and wives on vacation in World War II at White Sands 

(1940s)

Figure 35. Army Officers' wives at United Service Organization (USO) picnic in World War II 

(1940s)

Figure 36. Play day picnic (1946)

Figure 37. McDonald Ranch (1945)

Figure 38. Activity at base of Trinity Site Tower (1945)

Figure 39. Jumbo moving to Trinity Test Site (1945)

Figure 40. Gadget tower prior to detonation at Trinity Site (1945)

Figure 41. General view of McDonald Ranch Headquarters from top of old well derrick (April 

1945)
Figure 42. Special tank out-fitted for soil sample collection (1945)

Figure 43. Jumbo being loaded on freight car near Socorro with trailer frame in background 

(1945)

Figure 44. New Mexico atomic jewelry (1945)

Figure 45. Blueprint for Atomic Bomb National Monument (1946)

Figure 46. Children playing on V-2 German rocket on display in dune (1940s)

Figure 47. Summer picnickers (1930s)

Figure 48. Women golfers (1950s)

Figure 49. Crumbling adobe at Visitors Center in need of repair (1950s)

Figure 50. Ranger checking stream gauge in Dog Canyon (1950s)

Figure 51. Scarcity of water in dunes required use of aging tanker trucks (1950s)

Figure 52. Boy School Jamboree in the dunes (1950s)

Figure 53. Greeting visitors at old portal entrance at Visitors Center (1960)

Figure 54. Desert maneuvers by the U.S. Army (1960s)

Figure 55. Visitors preparing for nature trail hike (1970s)

Figure 56. Expanded museum displays in Visitors Center (1970s)

Figure 57. Science class participant in Environmental Study Area (ESA) Program (1970s)

Figure 58. Opening reception for White Sands Juried Art Exhibit (1970s)

Figure 59. Indian dancers prepare for performance (1970s)

Figure 60. Dunes wedding (1970s)

Figure 61. Horseback patrol (1970s)

Figure 62. Ranger patrol (1980s)

Figure 63. Filming a car commercial (1980s)

Figure 64. Proposed Trinity National Historic Site (1969)
Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank the many individuals and organizations that expedited the 

research and writing of this manuscript. These include Dennis Ditmanson, superintendent of 

White Sands National Monument, and staff members Bill Fuchs, John Mangimeli, Paul Menard, 

and Jerry Yarbrough (now superintendent of Fort Davis National Historic Site). In the Southwest 

Region of the NPS, Santa Fe, the author wishes to thank Neil Mangum, Regional Historian, his 

assistant Art Gomez, his secretary Jo Ann Ortiz, Stella Moya, and Amalin Ferguson, Regional 

Librarian. At the New Mexico State Records Center and Archives, Santa Fe, thanks go to 

Richard Salazar and Alvin Regensberg. Austin Hoover, director of the Rio Grande Collections at 

the New Mexico State University Library, also provided valuable assistance. The National 

Archives and Records Administration staff in Denver is to be thanked, including Joel Barker, 

Eileen Bolger, and Joan Howard of the Archives, and Robert Svenningsen of the Federal 

Records Center. Valuable assistance also came from staffers at the National Archives and 

Records Administration in Washington, DC, especially Robert Kvasnicka. Finally, thanks go to 

my wife, Cynthia, and daughter, Jacquie, whose patience and good cheer made research and 

writing much more enjoyable.

Michael Welsh

Greeley, Colorado

April 1995
Foreword

"Why on earth would you want to go there, it's nothing but sand," my friends said when they 

called in response to the news of my assignment to White Sands National Monument, "you'll be 

bored silly in six months." Well that was six years ago and I'm still waiting for the break in the 

action. The Great White Sands as they were called by Tom Charles, the "father" of the park, can 

be very deceptive. What appears, at first glance at least, to be a virtual wasteland actually 

supports a very diverse ecosystem. Cultural resources abound with both a National Register 

Historic District at park headquarters, and perhaps thousands of archeological sites scattered 

throughout the backcountry. Dispersed visitation allows travelers the opportunity to experience 

the park in a unhurried fashion, but total annual numbers rival the nearby, and better-known, 

Carlsbad Caverns National Park.

By most measures, White Sands should be viewed as a major park operation. It's the largest 

National Park Service unit in New Mexico. The annual visitation averages just under 600,000. 

The array of natural and cultural resources is comparable to that found in many areas that carry 

the "national park" designation. External affairs, due to the required interaction with our military 

neighbors are exceedingly complex. Yet the park has long-suffered from an "identity crisis," 

which is reflected in a lack of both the human and fiscal resources commensurate with the need.

Like many, if not most, units of the National Park System, White Sands National Monument was 

established through the combination of a wide recognition of the unique characteristics of the 

resources, which exist here, along with the unabashed "boosterism" of the local community. That 

local support served the monument well in its early days, as evidenced by fact that virtually all of 

the present infrastructure was in place within six years of the site's establishment. Very soon, 

however, the region experienced a fundamental shift in its economic base, a change, which had a 

profound impact on the fortunes of the fledgling park.

In this scholarly study, Dr. Michael Welsh examines the forces that led to the establishment of 

the monument as well as the extraordinary combination of circumstances, which threatened its 

very existence during the "War Years," severely hampered development for more than half of its 

history, and continue significantly to influence park operations.

Dr. Welsh's work is based on his own familiarity with public history in New Mexico as well as 

his careful review of the documents specific to the White Sands story. Early on in the process it 

became obvious that we at the park were going to enjoy working with Mike because he shared 

our enthusiasm for this project. In our opening interviews, for example, he asked what our goals 

were for this document and I responded that I hoped that he would not only record the history of 

the site, i.e., capture the names and dates and places, but also help us understand how the present 

circumstances came to exist. It was a charge that he took very seriously and frequently he would 

call with a "guess what I found" message. His interest went far beyond that of a typical 

contractor and was very much appreciated.

Overall, I think Dr. Welsh has captured the essence of the White Sands story. It's a tale of a park 

born out of seemingly incompatible interests; preservation of a very special place while also 

securing an important economic boost for the community. It's interesting, and frustrating, to 
speculate on what the park might have become had that local enthusiasm not been diverted by 

the overwhelming military development which began in the early 1940s. In the absence of the 

high energy support provided by Tom Charles and the other early boosters, the park became a 

strange sort of hybrid whose unique resources were recognized nationally, and even 

internationally, but which was used mainly for its recreational values locally. The tension 

between those points of view has shaped, and will continue to influence, the park's management 

process. Perhaps the future will bring a wider recognition of the resource values represented at 

White Sands National Monument.

On behalf of the park staff, I wish to extend our thanks to Dr. Welsh for his dedicated pursuit of 

this story. He truly went above and beyond to insure that the project would be complete.

Dennis L. Ditmanson

Superintendent
Chapter One: A Monument in Waiting: Environment and Ethnicity 

in the Tularosa Basin

In August 1935, Carl P. Russell, chief of the eastern museum division of the National Park 

Service (NPS), published in the National Geographic Magazine a stunning photographic essay 

on the White Sands National Monument. Accompanied to the Tularosa basin of southern New 

Mexico by the park service s chief photographer, George A. Grant, Russell wrote movingly of 

the ecological treasure that Congress only two years earlier had designated for protection from 

development. Whether one's interest ran to science, archeology, or history, said Russell, White 

Sands provided opportunities for research and study. And should one be motivated more by the 

heart, those whom Russell called "discerning travelers" might find "the loveliness of its white 

and green, [and] the cleanliness of its vast expanse" that ranked White Sands among what the 

veteran park service official called "Nature's masterpieces." [1]

The story of White Sands National Monument offers the visitor, student, and public official an 

excellent setting in which to observe the forces of nature upon human beings, and their reaction 

to the challenge posed by the dunes. The historian C. Leland Sonnichsen, longtime faculty 

member at the nearby University of Texas at El Paso, wrote extensively about the daunting 

features of environment and ethnicity confronting all who entered the arid stretches of the 

Tularosa basin (so named for the expanse of "tulare," the Spanish word for "red weed"). 

Sonnichsen once described the high desert between the Rio Grande and Pecos River as "the 

laboratory for the science of doing without." How the National Park Service developed and 

maintained a site as striking and dramatic as Carl Russell's "masterpiece" says much about the 

history of the park service, the state of New Mexico (especially its understudied southern 

reaches), and the American West down through time. [2]

Within the past decade, historians have sought to join with scientists, photographers, artists, and 

tourism promoters to assess the meaning of national parks and monuments. The most 

provocative of these works came from Alfred Runte, who in 1979 published National Parks: The 

American Experience. Taking issue with the conventional wisdom that the NPS was America's 

most-cherished federal agency, and that preservation of natural landscapes marked the high point 

of national altruism, Runte posited three factors motivating Congress and park advocates. 

Starting in the mid-nineteenth century, citizens concerned with destruction by private interests of 

ecological treasures (primarily west of the Mississippi River) had to convince the nation's 

lawmakers that potential park land was "worthless." This idea echoed the privatism of the postCivil War era, known as the "Gilded Age" for its extremes of wealth and poverty, its haste to 

develop natural resources, and its shift from a rural to an urban society. [3]

Once the nation had accepted the legal fiction that Runte called the "worthless-lands thesis," the 

concept of "monumentalism" came into play. American pride in its growth and expansion 

overshadowed doubts and uncertainties about national merit, especially when contrasted with the 

natural and historical wonders of Europe. Runte saw this "search for a distinct national identity" 

stemming from self-identification with "earth monuments" such as Yosemite State Park (1864) 

and Yellowstone National Park (1872). "Scenic impact," said Runte, influenced the rapidly 

growing nation to call for embrace of aesthetics and utilitarianism, leading in the early twentieth 

century to the famed "conservation movement" espoused by President Theodore Roosevelt, 
himself an avid outdoorsman, and John Muir, the champion of California's forests and

mountains. [4]

White Sands National Monument would be touched by each of these criteria, plus Runte's third 

concern, what he called "park follies." In order to sustain funding, NPS staff had to 

accommodate divided logic on the part of visitors, critics, and Congress. Having proven the 

economic "worthlessness" of a site, park officials then devoted much of their time to calculation 

of its benefits to the region and nation. This led to exercises, activities, and planning that often 

contradicted NPS goals, and left the service exposed to the very criticism of Runte and others 

that culminated in 1991 with the "Vail Agenda;" an impassioned plea for new directions and 

financial support for the National Park Service. [5]

Runte's overview of the service did not speak directly to the experience of units like White 

Sands, in part because of his preference for the larger and more popular national parks. National 

monuments fit a separate category of management, as examined by historians Robert Righter and 

Hal Rothman. In a seminal article, "National Monuments to National Parks: The Use of the 

Antiquities Act of 1906," Righter interpreted congressional intent as the signal feature of NPS 

status. The Antiquities Act, drafted at the height of Progressive concern for efficient and 

economic management of the nation's resources, sought to avoid the political influence of 

western landowners and resource developers on Congress, the keeper of what Righter called the 

nation's "crown jewels," the national parks. [6]

What concerned Righter, and also Rothman in Preserving Different Pasts: The American 

National Monuments (1989), was the "second-class" status of monuments, from their creation to 

funding to acceptance by the public. Congress moved too slowly to protect areas of lesser 

"monumentalism" than Yosemite or Yellowstone, while the Interior department, supervisor of 

NPS activities, was deluged with requests both frivolous and meritorious from local boosters of a 

given site. To rationalize the preservation process, the Archeological Institute of America (AIA), 

and one of its foremost officials, Edgar Lee Hewett, campaigned with Congress to give the 

President authority to designate areas for NPS protection by executive fiat. This would halt the 

desecration of Indian ruins in the Southwest, an issue close to the heart of Hewett, whose long 

career in archeology gave rise to several programs of research and teaching, including the School 

of American Research and the Museum of New Mexico, both in Santa Fe, and the anthropology 

departments of the University of Southern California and the University of New Mexico. [7]

Rothman's research highlighted the role of natural scientists in the development of national 

monuments, a factor that White Sands shared with its peers. Committed more to preservation 

than were boosters of national parks, scientists saw the ecological variety of the smaller sites as 

worthy of close scrutiny undisturbed by excessive visitation. White Sands, more than most 

monuments of the West, provided scholars of the natural world with a living laboratory that 

encompassed fields from botany to zoology. By 1940, the NPS itself would list a bibliography of 

more than two dozen scholarly and popular works about the dunes. This contributed as much to 

raising awareness among federal officials as did the advocacy of southern New Mexico officials 

eager for the economic benefits of tourism to the monument. [8]
Figure 1. Dune Pedestal.

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

The geologic history of the dunes began millions of years ago, when natural forces created the 

Tularosa basin. The basin extends for 150 miles in length, and averages fifty miles in width. The 

area of the White Sands dunes (within and outside the monument boundaries) stretches some 275 

square miles, with average dimensions of 27 miles long and ten miles wide. Some forty percent 

of the dunes are within the monument itself, while the remainder lie on the property of the White 

Sands Missile Range (WSMR), the U.S. Army's huge weapons testing center to the north and 

west of the monument. [9]

Natt N. Dodge, chief naturalist for the Southwest Regional Office (SWR) of the park service, 

compiled in 1971 the research of many of the scientists attracted to the basin and dunes since the 

mid-nineteenth century. He noted that the Tularosa basin had once been part of the vast 

"Delaware basin," dating back some 230 million years. High in salt content, the Delaware basin 

collected saline deposits over the millennia that became the basis of the "Yeso formation," with 

the term "yeso" translated from the Spanish word for "gypsum." About 70 million years ago, the 

event called by geologists the "Laramide revolution" lifted the Rocky Mountains and their 

southwestern spine, exposing the gypsum-rich rock. Over the course of many centuries, the 
forces of wind and rain eroded the San Andres Mountains to the west, and the Sacramento 

Mountains to the east, causing the accretion of gypsum on the basin floor. [10]

Often a visitor to the dunes in his long career with the service, Dodge spoke highly of their 

unique ecological character in a region noted for its breathtaking environmental phenomena. 

White Sands was "a striking example of geology in action," said the naturalist, "unnoticed by 

most people yet . . . a fundamental process of nature." Contributing to their singular character 

were the extremes of heat and cold, moisture and aridity, and the surprisingly complex and 

populous flora and fauna of the region. Annual rainfall rarely exceeded ten inches, yet the water 

table lay only three to four feet below the surface of the dunes. Temperatures ranged from zero 

degrees Fahrenheit in January to 110 degrees-plus in the summer. The whiteness of the sands, a 

function of their purity (over 99 percent gypsum), reflected rather than absorbed the heat of the 

desert, creating temperate conditions in the midst of summer or the depths of winter. [11]

The naturalist Dodge also catalogued in the "harsh" dune ecosystem no less than 144 species of 

birds, 23 small mammals, 371 species of insects, and several types of reptiles. Dodge marvelled 

at the adaptability of the insects and rodents, including the fur color of the "Apache pocket 

mouse," which was lighter in tone and shade than its cousins amid the Valley of Fires, a lava 

flow north of the monument. [12]

Figure 2. Selenite crystal formation at Lake Lucero.

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Much like the plant and animal life of the Tularosa basin, human beings faced identical choices 

of adaptation for survival. The earliest people identified in the dunes area belonged to the 

"Folsom" culture; hunters who used spear points like those discovered in far northeastern New 

Mexico in the early 1900s near the town of Folsom. Archeologists speculated that their 

preference for "big-game" hunting, especially the bison of 10,000 years ago, kept them away 

from the dunes proper because of their sparse vegetation. In like manner, later cave dwellers 
called the "Hueco" culture (from the Spanish word for "tank") appeared along the west face of 

the Sacramento Mountains by AD 500. Building upon the centuries of agricultural evolution in 

the region, the Hueco people lived in pit houses and cultivated crops by diverting water from 

nearby streams. Pottery remains found along the margins of the basin have been linked to the 

cliff-dwelling "Mogollon" culture of southwestern New Mexico, indicating the trade networks 

and leisure time available to these advanced peoples amid the harshness of the Tularosa basin. 

[13]

Drought conditions throughout the Southwest after AD 1100 struck the basin, depopulating the 

area in a fashion similar to that of the Chaco culture of northwestern New Mexico. Archeologists 

uncovered amid the dunes fire rings of a more nomadic people whose presence in the Tularosa 

basin is dated from about 1300. The descendants of these hunters named themselves the "Inde," 

translating from the Athabascan language as "the people." The Spanish, the first Europeans into 

the area, described them with the term "Mescalero Apache," the name with which most 

Americans are familiar. The Spanish recognized the Inde use of mescal, the heart of the agave 

plant found throughout the region, as a source of food and medicine. To this they added the term 

"Apache," which came from Zuni Pueblo in far western New Mexico to mean the "enemies" of 

Zuni. The Mescaleros were mountain people who traveled great distances in search of game, 

from the buffalo plains of southern Colorado and western Kansas, to the Mexican states of 

Coahuila and Chihuahua. They adapted well to the rigors of the desert and mountain landscape; a 

condition they attributed to their creation story that the first Inde emerged from the side of Sierra 

Blanca ("White Mountain"), the imposing landmark at 12,000 feet on the eastern border of the 

Tularosa basin. [14]

Because of their commitment to life in the basin, the Inde posed serious challenges to other 

Native societies in the Southwest that might have entered the region. The first European 

explorers considered the basin no more appealing. Romanticists of the 1930s sought linkages of 

the Tularosa area to such "conquistadores" as Alvar Nunez, Cabeza de Vaca, whose travels from 

Florida to Texas to northern Mexico from 1528-1536 marked the entering wedge of Spanish 

conquest in the interior of North America. Subsequent "entradas" into New Mexico by Francisco 

Vasquez de Coronado (1540-1542) and Don Juan de Onate (1598) skirted the Tularosa basin to 

the north (Coronado) and west (Onate). The closest that any Spaniard came to the area was 

Antonio de Espejo, who in 1583 came north along the Rio Pecos. He and other Spanish explorers 

described the entire stretch of southern New Mexico as "Las Salinas," or the "salt lands," for the 

alkaline quality of soil in the basin. Later Spanish period settlement (1598-1821) preferred the 

more temperate climate of northern New Mexico's river valleys, leaving no record of Spanish 

intrusion into the White Sands. [15]

The environmental factors limiting Spanish development of southern New Mexico also 

confronted the third wave of historic change for White Sands: the arrival in the 1840s of 

American soldiers. The United States in 1846 committed troops to the conquest of Mexico's far 

northern frontier, as much to gain access to West Coast ports as to dominate the interior 

Southwest. While Americans shared the ambition of the Spanish and later Mexican empires for 

expansion, the United States brought levels of technology and capital that permitted 

transcendence of environmental limits that had daunted others. One measure of this commitment 

was the deployment of surveying parties of the U.S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers 
(CTE), charged with inventorying the natural and human landscape of the nation's massive 

conquest (one-third of the continental land mass).

William N. Goetzmann has written extensively about the journeys of the highly trained West 

Point engineering graduates throughout western North America. The first party of Army officers 

to study the Southwest came south in 1849 from Santa Fe under the command of Lieutenant 

William Randolph Marcy. The CTE unit did not veer eastward from the Las Cruces-Dona Ana 

area, in part because they found no Hispanic guides willing to engage the desolation and 

Mescalero presence of the Tularosa basin. Marcy did hear stories of large salt deposits, and he 

dispatched Lieutenant William Smith to study the feasibility of a military wagon road to the 

Sierra Blanca. Smith's report contained no references to the sand dunes, even though his route 

went past White Sands near present-day U.S. Highway 70. [16]

As with much of the development of the American West, the Tularosa basin first gained 

economic viability with construction in 1855 of Fort Stanton. The military outpost above the 

present-day mountain community of Ruidoso was a reminder to the Mescalero Apaches of the 

interest that Americans had in the resources of the West, though limited funding prior to the 

Civil War kept settlements from appearing in the basin. The Army did build several service roads 

westward to the Rio Grande corridor, one of which headed south of White Sands through San 

Agustin Pass in the Organ Mountains. Then in 1861 a group of Hispanic families journeyed 

eastward across the basin to establish the farming community of Tularosa, which was joined two 

years later by more Hispanic families at the village of La Luz, northeast of present-day 

Alamogordo. It was these communities that first utilized the gypsum resources of White Sands, 

as villagers applied moistened sand to the walls of their adobe homes to deflect the rays of the 

summer sun, and to give the buildings a distinctive white appearance from a distance. [17]

After the Civil War, two issues merged in southern New Mexico to bring attention to White 

Sands. The nation's concerted efforts to locate Indian tribes on reservations created a temporary 

market for beef for soldiers at Fort Stanton, and for the Mescaleros on their reservation (created 

in 1873). In addition, gold prospectors explored the mountain ranges surrounding the basin, with 

discoveries to the north and east of White Sands as early as 1865 in Nogal Canyon. Stage routes 

ran across the basin floor in the 1870s, with one line stopping at the "Point of Sands," near the 

present-day entrance to the monument. There stage riders found water for themselves and their 

horses, and modest accommodations for food and lodging. [18]

By the 1880s, American technology and military power had solidified the nation's claim to the 

Tularosa basin. The only recorded engagement in the White Sands between Apaches and the U. 

S. Army occurred on July 25, 1881. Lieutenant John F. Guilfoyle and his unit of the Ninth 

Cavalry (the famed black, or "buffalo" soldiers) pursued a mixed band of Mescalero and 

Chiricahua warriors led by chief Nana, son of the legendary Cochise. There were no fatalities 

listed in Guilfoyle's report, and the Apaches escaped into the San Andres beyond the alkali flats. 

[19]

Completion in 1881 of the Southern Pacific Railway route from Albuquerque to El Paso also 

provided the Tularosa basin with its best access to the outside world. Homesteaders followed the 

large cattle operations of such historical figures as John Chisum, who in 1875 had run over 
10,000 head of cattle past the dunes to graze in the northern part of the basin. John Slaughter 

likewise drove stock to market past the White Sands, giving rise to the "John Slaughter Cattle 

Trail." Competition for acreage and water spawned the historic Lincoln County Wars (1878-

1881), luring Billy the Kid and other outlaws to the basin. [20]

Range wars would linger in the memories of novelists and filmmakers, but to residents of the 

Tularosa basin the potential for growth created by better transportation and removal of the 

Mescaleros proved more rewarding. In 1897 two brothers from Dona Ana County, Jose and 

Felipe Lucero, were among several claimants of homesteads near the proposed rail line from Las 

Cruces to the Sierra Blanca mining town of White Oaks. The Luceros, both sheriffs in Las 

Cruces, settled on 160-acre tracts around the saline lake that still bears their name on the 

southwestern side of the monument. Then in June 1898, the El Paso and Northeastern Railroad 

arrived in the basin. The townsite of Alamogordo sprang up, sold by a group of Pittsburgh 

investors incorporated as the "Alamogordo Improvement Company." They purchased the land 

from a local rancher, Oliver Lee, who had gained notoriety for his trial in 1896 on charges of 

murdering a prominent Las Cruces judge, Albert Jennings Fountain, and his nine-year old son 

Henry. Acquitted in the trial, Lee sold his Alamo Ranch to create the town that would press for 

inclusion of the dunes into the National Park Service. [21]

Figure 3. Cave formation, Lake Lucero.

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

The nation's lawmakers may have misunderstood the environmental and ethnic variables of 

southern New Mexico, but Governor Miguel Antonio Otero knew of scientific fascination with 

the ecology and resource potential of the Tularosa basin. The son of New Mexico's territorial 

delegate to Congress in the 1850s, Otero had engaged in his own resource speculation in 

northern New Mexico and southern Colorado. He also championed the application of technology 

to overcome environmental limits, having assisted his father in bringing the railroad, the 

telephone, and the automobile to the territory. Finally, Governor Otero realized that the twentieth 

century would reward those who utilized information, and he pursued aggressively the 
improvement of scientific education at the territory's fledgling institutions of higher learning. Of 

these, the land-grant school at Las Cruces (now New Mexico State University), and the school of 

mines in Socorro (New Mexico Institute of Mining Technology), were nearest to White Sands, 

and produced a large volume of research on the basin and the dunes. The University of New 

Mexico in Albuquerque (the territory's flagship liberal arts school), and even the teachers college 

in Las Vegas (New Mexico Highlands University) would send faculty to the dunes in the early 

twentieth century to gain knowledge about the flora, fauna, and mineral resources of the area. 

[22]

The scholarly output on White Sands and its environs impressed not only Governor Otero, but all 

who conducted literature searches for student term papers and scientific publications alike. O.E. 

Meinzer and R.F. Hare, in their 1915 report on the Tularosa basin for the U.S. Geological Survey 

(USGS), noted no fewer than twenty-five publications of varying length on the dunes and the 

region. The first mention of the sands came in 1870, when George Gibbs, a geology professor in 

New York City, published an article in the American Naturalist on the "Salt Plains of New 

Mexico." The dunes had come to his attention when he received a packet of gypsum sand mailed 

by General August V. Kautz, stationed with the Army at Fort Stanton. Kautz stopped often at the 

Point of Sands stage station while crossing the basin, and he knew from his training at West 

Point of the properties of gypsum. Gibbs quoted the general as saying of the dunes: "The sand is 

so white and the plain so extensive as to give the effect of snow scenery." Kautz had not "seen a 

description of the place in print," and thus mailed "a specimen of the sand" to Gibbs for his 

analysis. [23]

For the next fifteen years, no scholar attempted an assessment of the White Sands until M.W. 

Harrington wrote in the magazine Science (1885) of "Lost Rivers." He speculated that the 

Tularosa area had been part of "a supposed old river bed." Harrington further recorded an Indian 

legend of the basin's formation, "a year of fire, when this valley was filled with flames and 

poisonous gases." He proposed naming the basin the "Gran Quivira Valley," for the fanciful 

stories of Indian wealth in New Mexico pursued by Coronado. The 1890s saw further interest in 

White Sands by academics, as R.T. Hill wrote in the Geological Society of America Bulletin

(1891) about the "Hueco-Organ Basin." In that same year R.S. Tarr published in the American 

Naturalist "A recent lava flow in New Mexico." Tarr took Harrington's "lost river" thesis a step 

further, deducing from the presence of gypsum deposits, salt marshes, and "ancient beaches" that 

the "well-defined valleys . . . extend much farther than the present streams succeed in going." 

[24]

The study of White Sands reached a new level of sophistication in 1898, when Clarence L. 

Herrick traveled from Albuquerque to collect data for the first of three scholarly articles in 

national journals. Herrick had built a distinguished reputation as a geologist and academic with a 

doctorate from the University of Chicago and an offer in 1897 of a research chair at his alma 

mater. Herrick, however, suffered from tuberculosis, and came west for "the cure" that late 

nineteenth century doctors prescribed: the clear air, high altitude, and arid climate of New 

Mexico.

Once in the Southwest, Herrick took a position on the faculty of the newly opened Socorro 

school of mines, where he taught from 1894-1897. He traveled widely in central New Mexico, as 
a mining boom west of Socorro had attracted other geologists. When Governor Otero assumed 

leadership of the territory in 1897, he encouraged the University of New Mexico to replace its 

missionary-schoolteacher president (Hiram Hadley) with the more sophisticated Herrick. Otero 

and Herrick then undertook the arduous task of building a national reputation for territorial 

higher learning, focusing on the use of scientific research to develop New Mexico's resource 

economy, and thus its financial base for better education.

What brought Herrick to the White Sands was passage in Congress in 1898 of the "Fergusson 

Act," named for the territorial delegate (Harvey Fergusson) who secured 200,000 acres of public 

lands for New Mexico's colleges. Otero instructed Herrick to survey these lands personally, and 

to select acreage which in his professional judgment would generate sufficient royalties to 

supplement the meager funding provided by the territorial legislature. Herrick rode horseback 

into the Zuni Mountains of far western New Mexico to claim timberlands for UNM, and then 

came east to the "saline lands" to assess their potential for salt production. [25]

In order to publicize his findings, President Herrick sent an article in 1898 to the American 

Geologist entitled, "The occurrence of copper and lead in the San Andreas [sic] and Caballos 

mountains." He then published simultaneously in his own University of New Mexico Bulletin and 

the prestigious Journal of Geology (1900) "The geology of the white sands of New Mexico." 

This marked the first thorough description of the formation of the San Andres Mountains and the 

alkali flats, with references to many springs of water throughout the area: After leaving UNM for 

reasons of health in 1901, Herrick returned to Socorro to write in 1904 the last of his tracts on the 

region, entitled "Lake Otero, an ancient salt lake basin in southeastern New Mexico," published 

in the American Geologist. He linked the basin to the Rio Grande valley formation, and 

measured the antediluvian lake bed at 1,600 to 1,800 square miles. Not surprisingly, Herrick 

recognized New Mexico's patron of science by naming the lake in the governor's honor. [26]

Evidence of the scientific curiosity about White Sands emerged immediately in scholarly 

journals. H.N. Herrick, Clarence's brother and himself a geologist at the University of Chicago, 

published in 1904 in the U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin "Gypsum deposits of New Mexico." 

Quickly appearing in that same year were two articles by C.R. Keyes, one in the American 

Journal of Science ("Unconformity of Cretaceous on older rocks in central New Mexico"), and 

another in the Engineering and Mining Journal ("Iron deposits of Chupadera Plateau"). The 

following year T.H. McBride published in Science "The Alamogordo desert," offering a survey 

of the botany as well as geology of the dunes. Even Clarence Herrick's successor at UNM, 

William G. Tight, wrote in 1905 in the American Geologist of "The Bolson plains of the 

Southwest." Tight, who had studied under Herrick at Denison University in Ohio and later at 

Chicago, served as editor of the American Geologist, the journal of the Geological Society of 

America, and in 1907 brought the group to Albuquerque to meet amidst the ecological 

distinctiveness of his adopted home. [27]

Later scholarship moved the findings of Clarence Herrick, et al., beyond their general surveys 

into more detailed accounts of the disparate elements of the basin and the dunes. Thus it was no 

surprise to the nation's scientists in the 1920s that local interests in Alamogordo, led by the 

homesteader Tom Charles, petitioned for inclusion of the White Sands into the national park 

system. Factors of politics, economics, and environmental concern had forged a thesis about the 
Tularosa basin that it was a land of extremes, posing challenges and offering rewards to 

whomever sought access to it. The journey of the monument, therefore, would be charted by the 

ecological and historical markers laid down over centuries and millennia, and would shape the 

operations and management of the monument throughout the twentieth century.

Figure 4. Cactus growth.

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Chapter Two: The Politics of Monument-Building: White Sands, 

1898-1933

The ecological complexity of the White Sands region had its human counterpart in the protracted 

efforts of southern New Mexicans to create a unit of the National Park Service at the dunes. 

Analysis of the political economy of Otero County in the early twentieth century reveals patterns 

of ambition and conflict that blessed and cursed the national monument campaign for over three 

decades. These conditions also revealed the challenges awaiting future generations interested in 

the management of the vast gypsum fields of the Tularosa basin.

Promoters of the "Land of Enchantment" (including park service officials) have been less 

enthused about the stories of southern New Mexico than they have the more renowned Rio 

Grande valley and the mountainous north. Yet the historical variables that affected these more 

populous, and perhaps more romanticized sectors of New Mexico also shaped the development 

of counties such as Otero. Then, too, the distinctive environmental circumstances of distance, 

aridity, and isolation gave rise to economic strategies rarely seen elsewhere in New Mexico. The 

natural forces that crafted the White Sands thus washed over the human landscape to the extent 

that the western writer Emerson Hough called the basin "as dangerous a country as ever lay out 

of doors." [1]

Much has been made in popular literature of the area's range wars (especially the Lincoln County 

Wars of 1878-1881), and of their most glamorous villain, William H. Antrim, or William 

Bonney, or Billy the Kid. This emphasis obscured the linkage between a harsh environment and 

extensive efforts to develop southeastern New Mexico's resources. The players in this drama 

exhibited the qualities of entrepreneurialism and risk-taking that scholars have either described 

as virtuous or destructive. The post-Civil War era nationwide (1865-1900) has been 

characterized as the "Gilded Age;" a term first employed by the author Mark Twain to explain 

the dichotomy between America's rising standard of living, and the manipulation of power and 

money by industrialists and financiers. The burgeoning cities of the eastern United States 

required vast amounts of raw materials for industrial production, and the most likely sector for 

exploitation was the interior West.

Out of this period of rapid economic growth came the "Santa Fe Ring," a small group of 

investors, politicians, and publicists that took advantage of the dependent status, modest income 

levels, and lack of access to the outside world that burdened much of territorial New Mexico. 

Because Congress refused to grant statehood to New Mexico until 1912, the political and 

economic power of the territory rested in Washington, DC, and in the hands of federal 

appointees in Santa Fe. In his book, The Far Southwest, 1846-1912: A Territorial History

(1966), Howard R. Lamar wrote of this process of isolation and dependency: "The ring reflected 

the corporative, monopolistic, and multiple enterprise tendencies of all American business after 

the Civil War." First with land, then with its bounty (timber, stock raising, agriculture, and 

mining), individuals like Thomas B. Catron, Stephen B. Elkins, and others created an economic 

pattern of resource use that would reach into the Tularosa basin and surround White Sands. [2]

The proximity of northern New Mexico to the railroad lines building southwestward to 

California drew the early attention of Anglo ranchers, miners, merchants, and political 
appointees. Very little energy was expended by outside interests in southeastern New Mexico, 

except for the large cattle ranches owned by Texans migrating westward. Drawn by federal 

contracts to supply beef to soldiers at the various military posts along the Pecos and Tularosa 

rivers, and to Indians on the Mescalero Apache reservation, the ranchers had little time or money 

to invest in larger development schemes. This would change in the 1880s, when two New York 

brothers, Charles and John Eddy, came by stagecoach to the Pecos River valley to operate a 

cattle ranch. Charles Eddy saw the potential for railroad transportation throughout the region, 

and promoted community building in Carlsbad (which he first named for himself) and in 

Roswell. Among Eddy's signal contributions was establishment of a large irrigation district near 

Carlsbad, which by the early twentieth century provided economic stability throughout the area 

and a model for future water projects. [3]

While agriculture prospered in the Pecos valley, the Eddy brothers wondered if similar 

applications of technology, capital, and expertise could generate prosperity to the west in the 

Tularosa basin. Gold strikes in the Sierra Blanca had created the boomtown of White Oaks, 

while timber harvests had begun in the Sacramento mountains. Charles Eddy approached a group 

of investors in El Paso, Texas, suggesting the merits of a rail line between that border town and 

the mines. By 1897 he had garnered enough support for construction of the El Paso and 

Northeastern Railroad (EPNE), which by 1901 had established its terminus with the Rock Island 

and Pacific Railroad line at Santa Rosa, New Mexico. [4]

The arrival of the EPNE into the Tularosa basin had the same effect as did all railroad intrusions 

into the isolated interior West. Natural obstacles to transportation evaporated, and eager 

promoters provided handsome investments in search of quick returns. Yet the variables of 

aridity, heat, and distance kept the miracle of Carlsbad from spreading throughout Charles 

Eddy's new domain. The railroad created a new townsite some fifteen miles east of the dunes, 

named Alamogordo ("fat cottonwood" in Spanish), where for $5,000 the EPNE had purchased 

Oliver Lee's Alamo ranch and its precious water rights. The Alamogordo Improvement 

Company, a subsidiary of the rail line, then platted a village that grew within twelve months to 

one thousand inhabitants.
Figure 5. Desert lizard.

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Finding the legacy of Billy the Kid less romantic than later generations of novel readers, moviegoers, and tourism promoters, the town organizers petitioned the territorial governor, Miguel A. 

Otero, to provide law and order by carving out a separate county in the basin. The decision to 

name the county after the governor, said Mrs. Tom Charles, wife of the first superintendent at 

White Sands National Monument, came when a lawyer for the railroad, William Ashton 

Hawkins, and a Dona Ana County politician, Albert Bacon Fall, asked Otero to remove 

Alamogordo and the basin from the legal jurisdiction of distant Las Cruces and its authoritarian 

sheriff, Pat Garrett (more famous for his role in the slaying of Billy the Kid). According to Mrs. 

Charles, an accomplished news correspondent, Fall and Hawkins had opposed the power of 

Thomas Catron and the Santa Fe Ring, primarily Catron's efforts to control cattle ranching in 

southern New Mexico. Range wars had persisted in the basin since the death in 1881 of Billy the 

Kid. Hawkins and Fall, who would influence basin politics for the next three decades, appealed 

not only to Governor Otero's vanity but also to his desire to check the power of Catron and his 

Santa Fe contemporaries. Hawkins would work as an attorney for the EPNE and later the 

Southern Pacific Railroad, while Fall would move from Las Cruces in 1905 to the TularosaCarrizozo area, purchasing the 100,000-acre cattle operation of Pat Coghlan and naming it the 

Three Rivers Ranch. [5]

Economic activity in the basin that included such high-profile figures as Hawkins and Fall drew 

the attention of other investors. One such group in El Paso wanted the federal government in 

1898 to establish a twelve-square mile "national park" that included "the extreme northwest 

corner" of the Mescalero Indian reservation, thirty-eight miles northeast of the dunes. The El 

Paso initiative for a "Mescalero National Park" signalled changing public tastes at the close of 

the Gilded Age regarding natural resource development. The rapid exploitation of western lands 

bothered a small but vocal segment of the American public, for whom the aesthetic value of 
unspoiled nature rivalled the marketability of timber, minerals, and water. The historian Samuel 

P. Hays, in his book Conservation and the Gospel of Efficiency (1959), defined this transition 

from "use" to "preservation" as the "conservation movement," part of the larger political and 

economic revolution known as "Progressivism." Unlike their late-twentieth century successors 

(the environmentalists), conservationists believed in concepts like "wise use" of resources, 

"sustained yield" of production, and the "gospel of efficiency" in policy making, which often 

appeared as the cliche: "The greatest good for the greatest number." [6]

The debate over the future of Tularosa basin lands would influence White Sands throughout the 

twentieth century. Howard Lamar noted that by the 1890s, prominent citizens of the territory 

"worried about the burgeoning conservation movement which threatened their free use of New 

Mexico's woodlands." In addition, developers "began to lobby for reducing the size of Indian 

reservations." In 1898 the territory had successfully petitioned Congress for passage of the 

Fergusson Act, which granted two million acres of public land to the public school system for 

sale as revenue-generating property. Angered by these efforts, the EPNE mobilized opposition to 

the Mescalero National Park, not out of recognition of tribal sovereignty but a fear of future 

withdrawals of public lands from the marketplace. Among the voices raised in protest was that of 

William Hawkins, who believed that New Mexico had enough Indian reservations and military 

installations without adding national parks. [7]

Despite the "victory" of Hawkins and the EPNE, other interests kept pursuing the competing 

venues of preservation and development of the Tularosa basin. Miguel Otero sought to improve 

the image of his native land by encouraging both concepts of use and protection of resources. 

Symptomatic of the divided mind of the Progressive reformer, Otero wrote glowingly in 1903 of 

the potential that White Sands offered to the tourist and industrialist alike. Devoting a full page 

of his lengthy report to the Secretary of the Interior to the promotion of White Sands, the 

namesake of Otero County became almost poetic in his description of the dune fields: "On these 

gypsum sands is the playground of the mirage, and here it plays its greatest pranks with distance, 

perspective, and color." Shifting in the next paragraph to a development metaphor, the governor 

praised the use of the 99-percent pure gypsum for agricultural fertilizer, plaster of Paris, and 

even sulphuric acid. Otero closed his report by noting the presence of a cement plant in nearby 

Alamogordo that relied upon White Sands gypsum; proof positive that "the great desert . . . may 

some day be utilized in commerce and be found a great source of wealth." [8]

For the next ten years the White Sands tantalized developer and preservationist alike. By 1907 

J.R. Milner and Bill Fetz, brothers-in-law, had constructed a plaster of Paris batching plant about 

one-half mile southwest of the future headquarters site of the monument. Mrs. Tom Charles 

wrote five decades later that Bill Fetz operated the plant, "cooking the sand by means of an iron 

roller, using mesquite roots for fuel." Fetz carried the processed plaster by ox-cart to 

Alamogordo, where contractors used the blocks for housing construction. One of his wagondrivers was 14-year old Charlie Sutton, later to work for Tom Charles at the monument in road 

construction (1934-1935). Sutton, who also served as mayor of Alamogordo, remembered how 

Fetz and his employees extracted gypsum by drilling a long shaft into the dunes, and removing 

its contents at night to avoid the desert heat. Plant workers then slept inside the hollowed-out 

shafts, as the journey back to town over a rutted road was prohibitive. [9]
In 1907 the dunes also welcomed a Kansas farm family that had moved to Alamogordo for the 

health of its mother, Rachel Charles. Her husband, Tom Charles, would become White Sands' 

most prominent advocate, and replace the Milner-Fetz batching plant in 1933 with the heavily 

visited monument. Charles and his second wife, Bula, would work first as farmers, then 

insurance salespeople, and journalists to boost the fortunes of Alamogordo and the Tularosa 

basin: Tom Charles had graduated in 1897 from Kansas State University, where he had played 

varsity football. He then wrote for several newspapers, becoming president of the Kansas chapter 

of the Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA). When his wife Rachel contracted tuberculosis 

in the winter of 1906-1907, the Charles family moved by wagon to Alamogordo for the "cure." 

The Charleses found a community that by 1910 would boast nearly 3,000 people. The difficulty 

of dry-land farming in the basin brought the family into town by 1915, and three years later they 

purchased the Hughes-Tinklepaugh insurance agency, expanding it into one of the larger 

companies in New Mexico. [10]

Because of his early efforts to secure his family's financial status, Tom Charles at first did not 

engage in the plans of local and territorial officials to create versions of the "Mescalero National 

Park." William H. Andrews, the nonvoting congressional delegate from New Mexico, had sought 

in 1906 to develop some sort of recreational facility in the Tularosa basin. Andrews told Albert 

Fall of his idea in 1912, when the latter became U.S. Senator with the granting of New Mexican 

statehood. Fall had become interested in the concept because of his desire to expand his Three 

Rivers ranch, which adjoined the northwestern boundary of the Mescalero reservation. In 

addition, Fall had witnessed the collapse of the EPNE railroad in 1905 when the line could no 

longer secure fresh water for its steam engines. The large mining company, Phelps-Dodge, had 

purchased the EPNE and sought access to the westward-flowing streams that the Mescaleros 

controlled; a better source than the alkaline waters of the basin that ruined the boilers of the 

EPNE train engines. [11]
Figure 6. Visitors to White Sands dunes (1904).

(Courtesy Museum of New Mexico. Negative No. 53095)

The story of Albert Fall and his land transactions have been the subject of much controversy and 

confusion. As a senator (1912-1920), and then as the ill-fated Secretary of the Interior under 

President Warren G. Harding (1921-1923), Fall managed to expand his holdings at Three Rivers 

by a factor of ten (over one million acres of leased and purchased land). One aspect of his career 

that has drawn the ire of historians was his repeated efforts from 1912-1922 to take Mescalero 

land for a national park, with the dimensions shifting several times (finally including a small 

640-acre section of White Sands). Local folklore in the Tularosa basin holds that Fall, convicted 

in 1927 of bribery and conspiracy for his "sale" of U.S. Navy oil reserves at Teapot Dome, 

Wyoming, to the Sinclair Oil Company (later the Atlantic Richfield Company, or ARCO), paid 

the price for crimes committed by many members of the Harding administration (until the 1970s 

Fall was the only convicted Cabinet officer to serve a prison sentence). Yet by examining his 

involvement in plans for a national park in southern New Mexico, one can see how Fall's 

connections to the Santa Fe Ring overcame his ostensibly "progressive" idea that White Sands 

and other natural attractions in the Tularosa basin merited protection from exploitation.

Within weeks of taking his Senate seat in the spring of 1912, Albert Fall introduced Senate Bill 

(S.) 6659, a companion measure to U.S. Representative George Curry's House Bill (H.) 24123, 

establishing the "Mescalero National Park." Curry, whom Governor Otero had appointed in 1899 

as first sheriff of Otero County, and who would later serve as territorial governor in his own right 

(1907-1910), had transferred his allegiance to Fall (as did many civic and political leaders in the 

area), and thus supported Fall's plans to enhance the value of Three Rivers ranch. The Office of 
Indian Affairs (OIA), which had oversight of the Mescalero people, disliked the precedent of 

creating "recreation parks within reservations," and opposed the plans of Fall and Curry. This 

failed to intimidate the senator, who two years later drafted Senate Bill 4187, expanding the 

Mescalero park concept to include "allotment" of all reservation lands (survey and distribution of 

160-acre plots to tribal members, with sales of the surplus to non-Indians), withdrawal of 

Mescalero title to $3 million of timber lands, opening the reservation to mining prospectors with 

no royalties due to the tribe, and leasing of lots on the west face of the Sierra Blanca for 

"summer cottages" for wealthy tourists. [12]

Undaunted by rejection of these two measures, Senator Fall in 1916 ventured yet again his idea 

for a regional national park. Changing its name to "Rio Grande National Park," Fall hoped to 

take advantage of passage that year of the Federal Highway Act. One route anticipated by federal 

officials was the "Southern National Highway," which could connect Alamogordo to El Paso and 

then San Diego. Ostensibly designed for transportation of military personnel and supplies in time 

of national emergency (like the impending "Great War" in Europe), the highways would later 

stimulate in the 1920s the boom in tourism and commercial traffic known as the "car culture." 

Senator Fall and other prescient leaders knew that New Mexico, which in 1920 ranked 47th of 48 

states in per capita income, could not afford the extensive network of highways needed to open 

southern New Mexico to postwar economic growth. In 1916 Congress had also authorized 

creation of the National Park Service (NPS), charging its director, Stephen T. Mather, with 

preserving natural beauty so that more Americans could have access to it. All three variables (the 

Rio Grande National Park, a southern highway, and the NPS) could bring good fortune to New 

Mexico, and hence Albert Fall's persistence with his dream of a Mescalero playground. [13]

The euphoria of 1916 (excluding the third congressional rejection of Fall's park) met the 

sobering realities of 1917 for New Mexico and the Tularosa basin. American entry into war in 

Europe coincided with turmoil in Mexico, where Senator Fall and other investors lost access to 

their oil properties because of the prolonged Mexican revolution. Economic constraints in 

wartime (among them cessation of railroad shipping) burdened Albert Fall with bad debts. The 

senator tried to sell his water rights to the EPNE railroad, but met opposition from Mescalero 

farmers who charged that this would endanger their irrigation water. Then in 1920 Fall further 

irritated the Mescaleros by fighting plans of the Indian Service to sell $500,000 of tribal timber 

for reinvestment in a 10,000-head tribal herd. Fall held grazing leases on the reservation, and 

believed that expansion of Mescalero cattle would overgraze tribal lands and reduce the value of 

his leases. [14]

Albert Fall gained leverage with the Mescaleros, and with Congress, when in 1921 he became 

Secretary of the Interior. Fall and his successor in the U.S. Senate, Holm O. Bursum of Socorro, 

hoped to revive a variety of economic development schemes that had been blocked by 

Progressives in Washington or delayed by the exigencies of World War l. These would include 

national park proposals, opening of Indian lands to mineral exploration, quieting title to Pueblo 

Indian lands contested by non-Indian owners, and easing of federal restrictions on western 

resource development. This strategy would generate a highly emotional resistance in New 

Mexico and nationwide, culminating in Fall's prosecution and, ironically, in the promotion of a 

separate White Sands monument by the Alamogordo insurance agent, Tom Charles.
Secretary Fall employed some of the marketing ideas of the "See America First" campaign that 

the NPS had supported during the First World War. Designed to stimulate travel to the parks, and 

thus extract more financial support from Congress, the NPS also encouraged formation of private 

lobbying groups, such as Robert Sterling Yard's National Park Association (NPA). During the 

gubernatorial administration of William McDonald (1912-1917), New Mexico business and civic 

leaders formed a statewide version of the NPA, the "National Park Association of New Mexico." 

Before the war its primary concern had been creation north of Santa Fe of the "Cliff Cities 

National Park," later to become Bandelier National Monument. In addition, the NPA petitioned 

Congress for a $500 million "national Park to Park highways" project. Senator Bursum offered to 

"push the matter vigorously," as New Mexico desperately needed outside funding to improve its 

meager transportation network. [15]

Along with building momentum within the state for national parks and their federal expenditures, 

Fall asked William Hawkins and Richard Burgess to campaign for a disconnected national park 

containing Mescalero lands and the Elephant Butte dam and reservoir, a two-million acre-foot 

water project on the Rio Grande north of Las Cruces. El Paso business leaders joined the petition 

drive, trying to link Mescalero National Park with highway construction to the Mexican border. 

Governor Merritt Mechem expressed surprise to Senator Bursum in November 1921, as he had 

learned of strong opposition from his own state game and fish commission. Alva L. Hobbs of 

Raton, chairman of the commission, wrote directly to Stephen Mather about rumors of NPS 

seizure of Elephant Butte, New Mexico's premier fishing site. Mather and his staff wrote several 

letters to Hobbs and other correspondents to placate their fears, concluding that the state would 

manage recreation at the reservoir if the Park Service ever took control. [16]

Local sponsorship of these schemes emboldened Fall in 1921 to seek national support for his 

reversal of Progressive-era land policies. That year he drafted legislation that would permit his 

Interior department to sell ten percent of the public lands in each state at public auction. The 

federal government would retain mineral rights, and no timber lands would be sold. Funds 

derived from these sales would be spent on road construction on the rest of a state's public 

domain. This would allow connection of the Mescalero and Elephant Butte park lands, and not 

incidentally open Three Rivers ranch to automobile and truck traffic from the more populous Rio 

Grande valley. These measures would also make it difficult for western legislators to oppose 

Fall's plans for the Tularosa basin. Given the Republican majorities in the House and Senate, and 

a pliant administration in the White House, Secretary Fall had no reason to doubt the prospects 

for this latest park measure. [17]

Applying lessons learned from his previous forays into park planning, Albert Fall then moved in 

October 1921 with a new proposal: the "All-Year National Park [AYNP]." He called to his ranch 

a delegation from the Alamogordo chamber of commerce, one of whose members was Tom 

Charles. The Secretary took full advantage of his prestige with local citizens, discussing a wide 

range of regional concerns, only one of which was his park. Charles and his peers agreed to form 

a committee to stimulate support for the park throughout southern New Mexico and west Texas. 

He also consented to serve on the executive committee of a new lobbying group, the 

"Southwestern All-Year National Park Association [SAYNPA]," whose members included 

Governor Mechem and William Hawkins, now a resident of El Paso. [18]
In order to convince Congress of the groundswell of support for the AYNP, the Secretary worked 

with Charles and the Alamogordo chamber to host a "statewide" convention of chamber 

delegates interested in national parks for their sectors of New Mexico. To assuage the doubts of 

promoters of a site at Bandelier ruins, Fall asked Ralph Emerson Twitchell to bring a delegation 

from Santa Fe to the meeting. Twitchell, a respected attorney and amateur historian (the author 

of the multivolume series, Leading Facts of New Mexico History), joined with the Southern 

Pacific's William Hawkins to shepherd Fall's vastly expanded park through the chamber meeting.

Upon arrival at the SAYNPA gathering, the northern New Mexicans discovered Fall's larger 

agenda. The city of El Paso had sent one hundred delegates, and placed on the executive 

committee two of its nine members (the remaining seven all came from southern New Mexico). 

Robert Sterling Yard would later claim that "the advocates of all other [park] sites were shouted 

down," and that "several were voted out of the meeting." Yard further contended that the El Paso 

contingent pushed for a "circle system" of federal highways linking Elephant Butte and the 

Tularosa basin with "a popular El Paso resort south of the [Mescalero] Reservation," the 

mountain village of Cloudcroft. In addition, park boosters drafted plans to "involve the 

Government encircling the [Elephant Butte] reservoir with a superb [one] hundred miles 

highway." In closing, said Yard, the delegates deliberately employed the term "Southwestern" in 

their title to leave "the impression that this was not a local scheme but demanded by a large 

section of the country." [19]

The All-Year park moved along two tracks in 1921-1922: unashamed promotion by Fall and his 

allies, and unstinting opposition by the NPA and other groups. The NPA still smarted from the 

bold power play executed in Yosemite National Park a decade earlier known as the "Hetch 

Hetchy controversy." The city of San Francisco , in rebuilding after the disastrous earthquake 

and fire of 1906, had petitioned Congress for permission to construct a massive municipal water 

supply project in a pristine valley of Yosemite. Even the staunch Progressive/conservationist 

president, Theodore Roosevelt, approved of the Hetch Hetchy dam and reservoir. Alfred Runte 

wrote of Hetch Hetchy that "if ever the cloud over the valley did have a silver lining, it was in 

teaching preservationists to rely as much on economic rationales [as] on the standard emotional 

ones." Believing that "the national parks were still the stepchildren of federal conservation 

policy," defenders of Yosemite vowed "to create a separate government agency committed solely 

to park management and protection." [20]

Albert Fall thus tested the Park Service's resolve a mere five years after its inception, doing so in 

the cavalier manner that echoed the laxity (if not the corruption) of the Harding years. Senator 

Bursum and the SAYNPA wrote the draft of the All-Year park bill, calling for inclusion of 2,000 

acres of the Mescalero reservation, 640 acres of the Malpais lava beds east of Carrizozo, 640 

acres of the "Gypsum Hills" (White Sands), and the shoreline of the Elephant Butte reservoir. In 

April 1922, Holm Bursum introduced the measure in the Senate, while the SAYNPA released a 

flurry of press notices in favor of the fragmented park. One such document quoted Enos Mills, 

the "father of the Rocky Mountain National Park," as saying: "No scenery in all Colorado [the 

site of the park] surpasses that of the Mescalero Indian Reservation." The release described the 

tribal lands as having "exceptional climatic advantages over any other public playground on the 

continent," with "beauties [that] may be enjoyed the year 'round." As an afterthought, the 

SAYNPA added: "Nearby are the famous White Sands , rightly designated 'one of the wonders 
of the world,' and the Mal Pals, the latest lava flow on this continent." Should Congress approve 

Fall's plan, said the release, it would provide "a means of attracting tourists and sightseers and 

prospective homebuilders to a part of the country, which for variety of unconventional scenery 

has no equal elsewhere in America." [21]

This press release revealed both the boldness of Fall's plan and his sophisticated understanding 

of the "car culture" to NPS strategies for expansion. By linking the park units to highway 

construction, then connecting both to the new "leisure economy" developing in southern 

California and Florida, Fall hoped to outmaneuver the NPA or any other obstructionists. Perhaps 

the ease with which he had dismissed early Park Service objections fooled him, as in May 1922 

he ordered Stephen Mather to come to Three Rivers to study the AYNP concept. Among the 

officials meeting with Mather were Tom Charles and the Alamogordo chamber. Dietmar

Schneider-Hector wrote that Mather spoke to the Alamogordo Commercial Club banquet on May 

3, 1922, revealing "that the sites he had visited lacked scenery generally associated with national 

parks." Mather mollified the Alamogordo audience by "adding that there remained sufficient 

areas to compensate for the apparent deficiencies." Upon his return to Washington, Mather wrote 

Fall that the AYNP's "disjointed boundaries, lack of spectacular scenery, and questionable 

usage" made the measure "unrealistic" and "preposterous." [22]

Perhaps Albert Fall would have succeeded with his All-Year park had he not coupled the 

measure with another initiative close to the hearts of many New Mexico land speculators and 

developers: the Bursum bill" to quiet title to Pueblo Indian land claims. In the early 1920s, some 

Progressive reformers had tired of their exercises on behalf of urban social change, and looked 

about for new, less-taxing causes. One area of their interest was the American West, appealing 

for its beauty, tranquility, and exotic Native cultures. In this regard they joined forces with the 

artistic communities forming in California and New Mexico (especially the Santa Fe and Taos 

art colonies), where members of the postwar "Lost Generation" of disaffected urbanites gathered 

to paint, write, sculpt, and photograph the otherworldliness of the Southwest's lands and people. 

[23]

Ironically, the defenders of Native land rights had jousted with Albert Fall in 1916, only to see 

his proposal return with a vengeance. In so doing, Fall and Bursum carefully crafted language 

that made it difficult for the Mescaleros to resist, and for non-Indian support groups like the 

"Indian Rights Association [IRA]" to mount an effective campaign of criticism. Fall knew that 

the Mescalero reservation had been created not by treaty negotiation (and hence Senate 

ratification), but by the more expeditious process of "executive order." As such, the reservation 

could be altered or abolished by subsequent presidential decrees. Mindful of the 1920s 

sentiments in favor of Indian rights, Fall sent Interior officials to meet with the Mescalero tribal 

council, even though the federal government (in the person of the Interior secretary) had final 

authority in Indian affairs. Fall's agents offered to protect the remaining acreage of the 

reservation by statute if the council released the 2,000-acre section coveted by Fall as "land 

conspicuous for beauty of scenery or adapted for summer camps." The tribe would then be given 

inducements such as sawmills to harvest timber, control of non-Indian grazing leases, and 

employment preference in any Park Service venues on the reservation. Preliminary tribal 

resistance did not deter Fall, who edited the council minutes to delete unfavorable commentary 

and reported to Congress a "90 percent approval" from all Mescalero adults. [24]
The historian Lawrence Kelly contended that non-Indian support groups had shown less 

enthusiasm for the Mescalero cause than they did for the more ominous "Bursum bill." Robert 

Sterling Yard, however, wrote in November 1922 that the AYNP bill was a combination of two 

outrages: abuse of Indian sovereignty and disdain for the integrity of the Park Service. Yet Kelly 

did note that Yard met with the most vocal critic of the Bursum bill, John Collier, and advised 

the erstwhile New York Progressive reformer to link the Pueblo lands bill with Fall's park plans. 

If Fall could become the target of national opprobrium, thought Yard, enough support would 

ensue for the Mescaleros and the NPS to override the Secretary's considerable power and 

ambition. [25]

This strategy of linkage began in July 1922, when Bursum and Fall rushed the AYNP bill 

through the Senate in seven days. S. 3519, said the NPA, would establish a dangerous precedent 

for the Park Service by permitting irrigation, hydroelectric power generation, hunting, mining, 

grazing, and timber cutting on park lands. In addition, the Secretary of the Interior could 

authorize such intrusions without congressional approval or oversight. The NPA scoffed at the 

absurd distances park visitors would travel to the All-Year park's units. Using the Mescalero land 

as a base, the Malpais lava beds were forty miles northeast; the "White Sands or Gypsum Hills of 

Otero County" were thirty-eight miles southwest; and Elephant Butte was ninety miles due west 

of the reservation. There were no paved roads connecting these units; the bill contained no 

surveys or studies of their feasibility; and it made no provisions for funding the establishment or 

maintenance of such a park. [26]

Secretary Fall and Senator Bursum, on the other hand, believed that the NPA was of no 

consequence, a theory seemingly vindicated by the speed with which S. 3519 moved through the 

Senate. On July 7, Bursum asked the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs to consider the 

measure, with neither reading nor discussion of the bill's contents. Distracted by a lengthy debate 

on tariff rates, the senators approved the measure unanimously, accepting Bursum's logic that the 

bill was now "purely local in character and affected only New Mexico," as well as extending a 

courtesy to a former Senate member (Fall). By sending the bill to Indian Affairs, Fall had 

bypassed the Public Lands Committee, the normal deliberative body for national parks. He also 

promised the Indian Affairs senators that the AYNP bill "will be more for the interests of the 

Mescaleros than any other legislation of recent years concerning other reservation Indians and 

their properties." [27]

Logic and procedure such as this gave Robert Sterling Yard and John Collier the leverage they 

needed to defeat Fall's park bill and Pueblo lands legislation. For the remainder of 1922 the NPA 

and Collier's Indian Rights Association (IRA) campaigned in Washington for rejection of Fall's 

agenda, with contributions pouring in from wealthy benefactors. As the pressure mounted, Fall 

slowly retreated from his measures, though not without vehement denials of charges of conflict 

of interest. On January 3, 1923, while Congress still debated the AYNP, Fall tendered his 

resignation as Secretary of the Interior. By year's end he would be implicated in the Teapot 

Dome scandal, Warren Harding would die of mysterious causes just as the scale of the "Harding 

scandals" became public knowledge, Vice-President Calvin Coolidge would promise vigorous 

prosecution of officials like Fail, and John Collier would become the premier advocate of Indian 

policy reform. [28]
Local sponsors of White Sands knew of the bitterness engendered in Congress by Albert Fall's 

scheme, and plotted their strategy accordingly. In the mid-1920s the U. S. Forest Service 

discussed a program of increased usage of the Lincoln National Forest, including recreation and 

logging. This would also bring more federal spending to the Tularosa basin, as would talk of new 

reclamation projects for southern New Mexico. The Republican State Central Committee wrote 

to party members in the area to enlist support for Senator Bursum, who promised as part of his 

re-election campaign to increase federal spending in the state. Louis W. Galles, state director of 

the party's "Coolidge and Dawes Clubs," named for the Republican presidential and vicepresidential candidates for 1924, wrote to L.O. Piersol of Alamogordo stating that Bursum's 

access to the federal treasury meant everything to New Mexico. "Don't forget," said Galles, 

member of a prominent Albuquerque family that operated a large Chevrolet dealership, "that for 

every thousand dollars that New Mexico receives, she pays back to the [U. S.] Treasury through 

the Internal Revenue Service only about $1.00." Galles took pride in New Mexico's cleverness, 

claiming that "we profit by federal aid," with "the burden of taxes . . . laid upon the wealth of 

New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois and California." [29]

This apparent inconsistency (conservative officials seeking federal investment when the free 

market failed) followed a pattern evident in New Mexico and the West throughout the twentieth 

century. Once private investors entered a region like the Tularosa basin, they quickly ascertained 

the prospects for future gains. Indicators such as population growth and income levels dictated 

investment decisions; hence the preference for capitalization of projects in the Rio Grande valley 

from El Paso to Santa Fe. By 1910 Alamogordo's population had stabilized at some 3,000 

residents, a number that would change only imperceptibly over the next twenty years (3,224 by 

1930). This modest advance (seven percent) stood in contrast to New Mexico's overall increase 

of twenty four percent for the years 1910-1930. The state's economy also did not perform well in 

these years, with forty percent of all chartered banks failing between 1920-1924. Personal 

income stagnated in the bottom ten percent of states (even before the Depression), and by 1933 

New Mexicans earned on average only fifty-four percent of their fellow citizens nationwide. [30]

An educated, articulate midwesterner like Tom Charles knew that economic survival in the 

Tularosa basin required flexibility in matters of economics. Rather than hewing to the public 

version of Calvin Coolidge's conservatism (tax cuts, budget reductions, and veneration of the 

free market), the insurance agent and his chamber of commerce realized that federal funds 

remained New Mexico's best guarantor of financial health. Dietmar Schneider-Hector 

characterized Charles' efforts in the 1920s to create White Sands National Monument as 

"Arcadian Boosterism," a reference to local novelist Eugene Manlove Rhodes' Bransford of 

Rainbow Range (1920). In this work Rhodes called Alamogordo "Arcadia," and claimed that 

among its major assets were "the railroad, two large modern sawmills, the climate and printer's 

ink." While witty and colorful, such descriptors disguise the sense of urgency felt by promoters 

of growth everywhere in the West, especially when the nation's fiscal health declined as 

precipitously as it did in the late 1920s and early 1930s. [31]

Tom Charles devoted a good portion of his time in the decade of the Twenties to alerting state 

and national leaders of the impending collapse of the Otero County economy. In 1923 he wrote 

to John Morrow, congressman from New Mexico , complaining of the unfairness of public land 

ownership in the county. Only five percent of the land (269,337 acres) belonged to private 
taxpayers, and only six percent of that (16,000 acres) was not classified as "arid" or "semi-arid." 

Local farmers had but 4,509 acres under irrigation. In contrast, the Lincoln National Forest and 

the Mescalero reservation received federal payments, which met some of Otero County's 

obligations for provision of public services. Unfortunately, said Charles, local residents could no 

longer finance basic services and road construction "because we are broke." Far from describing 

the county in the glowing terms of a Miguel Otero or an Albert Fall, Tom Charles begged the 

congressman for help because "we have a denuded range, eroded watersheds, silted reservoirs, 

flooded farms and busted stockmen." [32]

Charles' correspondence is filled with similar letters to prominent officials like U.S. Senator Sam 

Bratton, H.L. Kent, president of the New Mexico State College of Agriculture and Mechanical 

Arts (later New Mexico State University), and regional directors of the U.S. Forest Service and 

U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. His message at all times was the same: the need for less federal 

control of public lands (so as to increase local tax revenues), while expanding federal investment 

in the transportation and communications infrastructure. Charles and his wife, Bula, also began 

writing a series of travel articles for publications like the New Mexico Highway Journal (later the 

New Mexico Magazine), extolling not the hardships of Otero County but its blessings, most 

prominently the Lincoln National Forest, the Mescalero reservation, and the White Sands. [33]

These activities indicate that Tom Charles had more on his mind than merely shepherding a Park 

Service unit through Congress. Yet his energy, commitment, and acquired political network 

would be essential to the success of the monument, a condition recognized by local and national 

leaders alike. Charles also learned from the mistakes of Albert Fall, as he avoided the appearance 

of self-promotion or benefit in his pursuit of NPS status for the dunes. Dietmar Schneider-Hector 

contended that Charles merely mimicked the efforts of his mentor (Fall), and that Charles' 

"admiration" for the discredited Interior secretary somehow tainted his success. SchneiderHector also took pains to separate Charles from the moniker "The Father of White Sands," 

crediting instead one Numa Frenger of Las Cruces, who wrote Charles in 1926 suggesting that "a 

large part of [the dunes] should be saved as a Government monument." Charles graciously 

acknowledged the concept, but reminded Frenger: "It has been a pretty hard fight to put the idea 

over. We are making progress however and such letters as yours will help us materially." [34]

For Charles and his contemporaries, a better transportation network would ensue only if they 

collaborated closely with state highway officials. Thus by the late 1920s (when forty percent of 

the New Mexico state budget came from federal highway construction), Charles and the local 

chamber of commerce had convinced state planners to build the future U.S. Highway 70 from 

Las Cruces to Alamogordo, and past the dunes. Charles by 1928 would call this the "White 

Sands road," which upon completion was only gravel. At that point he felt ready to promote 

Numa Frenger's suggestion more forcefully. As a courtesy to Albert Fall, Charles wrote asking 

the former Cabinet secretary's advice. "We drove out over the new road to the White Sands last 

night," said Charles, "and are certainly delighted with it." The future monument custodian called 

the road "one of the prettiest that I have ever seen in New Mexico, or any place else for that 

matter." Charles then asked Fall for his "judgment of the possibilities along the line of having a 

section of the sands set aside," and confessed "my total ignorance of the first steps in the matter." 

[35]
Whether this latter remark was sincere or disingenuous, Charles knew of the problems facing 

Alamogordo as the Great Depression rolled over New Mexico, and may have requested the 

advice of Fall to determine the best technique for maneuvering the monument through the federal 

government. President Herbert Hoover in 1932 had granted Fall an early release from prison for 

reasons of health, and Charles also knew of Hoover's desire to expand the holdings of the NPS. 

This shift of emphasis heartened Charles, who also pressed the case for White Sands because 

homesteaders had been attracted to the dunes with the grading of the federal highway. The 

Alamogordo area needed another economic boost, as private enterprise had failed to provide the 

Las Cruces road with amenities for travelers (no gasoline stations the length of the highway from 

downtown Las Cruces to Alamogordo, a distance of eighty miles) . Visitors thus had few 

incentives to return, and Tom Charles would have fewer customers for his insurance agency. [36]

One other factor influencing the campaign for creation of White Sands National Monument was 

passage in 1929 by the New Mexico legislature of "Joint Memorial No. 4." This measure asked 

Congress to lift the twenty-acre restriction on mining claims in the dunes, as this amount was not 

cost-effective for investors. The aging William Hawkins had read a feature story in the 

Alamogordo News late in 1929 where Senator Bratton had informed Tom Charles of his support 

for the monument. Hawkins complained to Bratton that such a facility would deprive the area of 

the resource potential at the dunes. The former railroad attorney also mentioned the possibility of 

transferring ownership of White Sands to the state, which could then lease or sell the lands and 

deposit the proceeds in the public school fund (at that time a major source of educational 

monies). "We have enough things locked up in New Mexico now," claimed Hawkins. If Bratton 

felt compelled to accede to Tom Charles' wishes, he said, "for God's sake cut it [the monument] 

down to a thousand or two thousand acres" from the total of 270 square miles of gypsum. [37]

Hawkins' opposition to creation of the NPS unit developed momentum in February 1930, when 

Park Service director Horace Albright asked President Hoover to withdraw nine townships (a 

total of 354 square miles) in the White Sands area for study. Both New Mexico senators, Sam 

Bratton and Bronson M. Cutting, supported Hoover's action, as did the El Paso and Alamogordo 

"boards of trade." Hawkins, a veteran of Albert Fall's AYNP deliberations, suddenly found the 

process of withdrawal highly offensive, and begged Governor Richard C. Dillon to intercede. 

Hawkins considered especially outrageous the idea that the Interior secretary (Ray Lyman 

Wilbur) need not "depend upon what is agreed upon in New Mexico, but very largely upon the 

experts to whom [Wilbur] may commit the [White Sands] question for examination." Dillon 

complied with Hawkins' request, and prevailed upon Secretary Wilbur not to act as capriciously 

as Albert Fall had planned a decade earlier when he coveted access to Mescalero lands. [38]

Two problems arose for Tom Charles and the park service after William Hawkins' intervention. 

The NPS did not have a qualified staff member available to visit White Sands and write a report 

before the close of the summer tourist season. Director Albright had asked Thomas Boles, 

superintendent of the nearby Carlsbad Caverns National Park, to examine the dunes as the 

official observer for the park service. Boles could not make the journey to White Sands, but 

wrote to Albright stating his belief that the dunes, in the words of Dietmar Schneider-Hector, 

"did not constitute an interest for the National Park Service." Local businesses also worried, as 

had William Hawkins, about the precedent of removing the entire dune field from economic 
development. But Tom Charles wrote to all public officials concerned of the volume of tourist 

traffic that would stop at White Sands should the monument be created. [39]

Correspondence in 1931 between Charles and parties interested in White Sands revealed the 

power of Hawkins, Fall, and other business leaders to shape the destiny of White Sands. Arno 

Cammerer, acting director of the NPS , came to the nearby town of Roswell in July of that year 

to gauge regional support for the monument. He informed the Roswell chamber of commerce 

president, J.S.B. Woolford, that the Park Service "had some one hundred twenty projects to 

inspect, but they were going to give the White Sands some priority." Tom Charles then informed 

Claude Simpson of Roswell that he would accept a monument reduced greatly in size; some 43 

sections, or 27,000 acres. "It would give us some of the best of the sand," said Charles, "and still 

leave the main body intact for commercial use should the state [of New Mexico] ever get it and 

use it." Charles would be satisfied also with two miles of the dunes facing U.S. Highway 70. All 

that remained, he thought, was favorable treatment from Thomas Boles and from Roger Toll, 

superintendent of Yellowstone National Park, whom the NPS considered its premier authority on 

park feasibility. [40]

As the summer tourist season neared its end, Charles became concerned when neither Boles nor 

Toll had paid a visit to Alamogordo or the dunes. He then contacted George L. Boundey, 

custodian at Tumacacori National Monument in southern Arizona. A former resident of 

Alamogordo who had lived one summer in a cabin at the dunes , Boundey worked for Frank 

Pinkley, superintendent of the NPS's division of southwestern monuments. Pinkley, who would 

be instrumental in guiding Charles once White Sands joined the park system, could offer critical 

support if he favored the dunes' application. Charles had learned by late September 1931 that 

Carlsbad's Boles had recommended a unit two miles wide and "seventeen or eighteen miles 

long," covering a "cross-section of the Sands and the old lake bed to the west [Lake Lucero]." 

Pinkley demurred, preferring that Charles proceed through channels with the Boles and Toll 

reports. By November the latter review had been completed, but Charles still worried about the 

obstructionism in Alamogordo. He thus informed Roger Toll: "There is a prevailing notion here 

that there is a great commercial value out there in the Sands." The local chamber had promised 

monument detractors not to seek the entire dune ecosystem. "We will appreciate your 

cooperation to that end," Charles wrote to the Yellowstone superintendent, concluding that "that 

promise not only has been made to Mr. Hawkins and his friends but to Governor [Arthur] 

Seligman and the Chambers of Commerce at our adjoining towns." [41]

Late twentieth century historians of the park service, like Alfred Runte, would note that incidents 

like the reduction of White Sands' acreage typified the failure of the NPS to ensure protection of 

natural ecosystems within park boundaries. The park service itself declared in 1933 that "the 

enduring obstacle to sound ecological management in the national parks was the prior emphasis 

on setting aside purely scenic wonders." Roger Toll's report did expand Tom Charles' idea of a 

more modest park from 27,000 acres to nearly 150,000 acres; yet this constituted less than half of 

the dune field. Given the variables at work in the Tularosa basin, however, Tom Charles had 

managed no small feat when in the fall of 1932 Senator Cutting promised in a private meeting in 

Alamogordo: "I will do everything I can for you but suggest that you be satisfied with a National 

Monument instead of an National Park, it will be much easier to get." [42]
The promise of Senator Cutting convinced Tom Charles that establishment of the monument lay 

close at hand. Cutting's biographer, Richard Lowitt, wrote that Cutting had great influence with 

President Hoover, sharing with him the Progressive faith in "wise use" of western lands. As 1932 

was an election year, with Hoover facing a strong challenge from the charismatic Democrat 

Franklin D. Roosevelt, the president accelerated the pace of park review and selection. White 

Sands would benefit from Hoover's decision to expand the NPS with nine new units that year,

and from the forty percent increase in park holdings by the time Hoover left the White House the 

following March. [43]

Hoover's ignominious defeat at the polls in November 1932 has been described as the nadir of 

his administration. Yet the president exercised his executive authority in the waning days of his 

term to accept the judgments of the NPS staff, and of Bronson Cutting, to establish White Sands 

National Monument. Acting under the auspices of the Antiquities Act of 1906, Hoover issued on 

January 18, 1933, a proclamation designating 142,987 acres of the White Sands dune fields as 

the nation s newest National Park Service facility. In recognition of the sands' distinctiveness and 

multifaceted appeal, Hoover wrote that the NPS should manage the unit not only for the generic 

purpose of preservation, but also for its "additional features of scenic, scientific, and educational 

interest." Bronson Cutting then congratulated Tom Charles by telegraph, and the thirty-five-year 

journey of dune preservation had reached a satisfactory conclusion. O. Fred Arthur, supervisor of 

the Lincoln National Forest from 1918-1934, spoke for many when he wrote upon retirement: 

"Tom Charles always worked best when confronted with opposition." Arthur, the veteran of 

many collaborative efforts with the Kansas insurance agent, concluded of Charles: "As everyone 

knows it was mainly through his persistence and efforts that the Monument became an actuality." 

[44]
Chapter Three: New Deal, New Monument, New Mexico, 1933-1939

Advocates of White Sands National Monument secured President Hoover's proclamation not a 

moment too soon. Unlike other units of the park service, White Sands did not face imminent 

danger from resource developers. Instead, the presence of a federal agency in the Tularosa basin 

dedicated to the preservation of natural wonders offered access to public spending at the lowest 

ebb of the Great Depression. This sense of urgency would persist throughout the years of the 

Roosevelt "New Deal," affecting all aspects of park service planning, policy, and program 

development. In this manner, White Sands offered a window not only on the complexity of NPS 

operations, but also shed much-needed light on the little-known dimensions of 1930s southern 

New Mexico.

The historian Gerald D. Nash, author of the path breaking The American West in the Twentieth 

Century (1977), described the impact of the Depression and New Deal on the region as if he 

were speaking of White Sands itself. Whether one analyzed variables of economics, politics, 

environmentalism, or cultural change, the afflictions facing the West surrounded the dunes in 

equal measure. "Everywhere western dreams for sustained economic growth lay shattered," said 

Nash, "victims of the national economic collapse." Farm and ranch income, dependent upon 

eastern and international markets, fell by more than 50 percent. So did resource extraction, 

especially petroleum, a blow to the oil fields of southeastern New Mexico and west Texas where 

prices dropped from $2.50 per barrel in 1929 to ten cents per barrel four years later. More 

ominous for the new park service unit, however, was the regional decline of tourism (by more 

than one-half), the source of visitations that could generate future federal spending at the dunes. 

The New Mexican per capita income stood in 1933 at $209, or 52 percent of the national 

average. There would be little discretionary income for local residents, making White Sands' free 

admission small consolation. [1]

In essence, the monument evolved in the same style of experimentation and uncertainty that 

marked the policies of the Roosevelt administration. Richard Lowitt, author of The New Deal 

and the West (1984), wrote that "depression, drought, and dust undermined dependence on the 

marketplace as an arbiter of activities." In its place were a myriad of federal rules, regulations, 

and employment agencies that removed control of economic life from county courthouses and 

state capitols to Washington, DC. For New Mexico and its Tularosa basin, however, public 

funding offered the only source of investment for private enterprise. Thus it was that local and 

state officials would devote considerable attention to the growth of the monument, both helping 

and hindering park service personnel charged with preserving the dunes and catering to a 

multiplicity of public tastes. [2]

At the close of the New Deal decade, NPS officials would have high praise for the consequences 

of planning and implementation of service policy. Hugh Miller, superintendent of the 

"Southwestern National Monuments [SWNM]," reported in September 1940: "White Sands has 

demonstrated its unquestioned standing as the most important southwestern monument from the 

standpoint of visitor interest." Within two years of its opening, the monument eclipsed all 

attendance records for the 23-unit SWNM system that encompassed the "Four Corners" states of 

Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, and southern Colorado. Yet no one connected to the park service 

could have prophesied the organizational debate that ensued in 1933 over the proper functions of 
the vast gypsum dunes. Some of this could be ascribed to the still-evolving corporate culture of 

the NPS, which along with other federal agencies had to learn hard lessons about western 

ecology, economics, and politics. It would not help, as Gerald Nash noted, that federal officials 

"often openly expressed contempt or hostility for western ways." Monument custodian Tom 

Charles, his contemporaries in Alamogordo, and the regional and national hierarchy in the park 

service thus spent seven years defining the standards that would guide White Sands for the 

remainder of the twentieth century. [3]

Within days of President Hoover's announcement, Tom Charles wrote to Horace Albright about 

the park service's strategy for assuming control of White Sands. Local civic boosters wished to 

celebrate their good fortune with a dedication ceremony that summer. Albright encouraged this 

as "a means of getting wide-spread publicity." The monument would come under the purview of 

NPS' s famed superintendent of southwestern monuments, Frank "Boss" Pinkley. Because 

Pinkley worked at the Casa Grande ruins south of Phoenix, Arizona, he doubted that he could 

travel to southern New Mexico before the spring of 1933. Albright further warned Charles that 

no congressional action on funding for White Sands could occur until that July. This did not stop 

Charles from seeking Pinkley's permission to take a highway grader out to the dunes to create an 

access road into the monument. Pinkley thus had to issue the first of many warnings to the 

exuberant Charles, asking him to wait until NPS personnel arrived to survey the new monument. 

[4]

Pinkley's word of caution bothered Charles not a bit, as he believed that the real power in the 

federal government resided in Congress, not in the park service. He soon wrote to White Sands' 

benefactor, Bronson Cutting, asking his help in bringing highway construction to the monument. 

He told New Mexico's senior senator of the "desperate straits" facing Otero County, and 

wondered if President Roosevelt's "reforestation program" could be stretched to include roads 

out of the Lincoln National Forest to the dunes. Because the matter involved a powerful senator 

(to whom FDR had offered the position of Interior secretary that winter), acting NPS director 

A.E. Demaray had to reply to Charles gently that "there has been some little misunderstanding" 

on the part of local interests, and that "without doubt Senator Cutting will take this matter up 

with the proper authorities." [5]

The Cutting-Charles correspondence signalled a wave of politically tinged negotiations between 

White Sands' boosters and the NPS. Job-seekers like C.C. Merchant of Alamogordo wrote to 

Senator Sam Bratton asking for information on applying for the position of "caretaker." 

Merchant knew Bratton only slightly, had never met Cutting and knew little of Congressman 

Dennis Chavez. More telling was the direct appeal of Emma Fall, wife of the former Interior 

secretary, to Horace Albright. Her family had come upon hard times during Albert Fall's lengthy 

legal proceedings and five-year prison term for the Teapot Dome scandal. The depression had 

wiped out the family investments in real estate, but Emma had opened in El Paso a "Spanish 

cafe," with a Mexican woman in charge. Local residents and tourists alike praised her cuisine 

and the cafe received good notices in travel literature. Mrs. Fall wanted the NPS to grant her a 

concession at White Sands for a branch of her "Amigo Cafe," with perhaps another license at 

Carlsbad Caverns. Horace Albright had to decline her offer, since plans had yet to be drafted for 

White Sands, and the caverns had a concessionaire that "up to the present time has not yet earned 

an adequate income." [6]
Once the new federal budget year began in July 1933, the park service decided upon a 

"temporary custodian" in charge of White Sands. Despite the appeals of Merchant and several 

other candidates, the NPS realized that Charles had the best credentials among local residents, to 

whom the service owed the creation of the monument. Unfortunately, the lack of funding for 

White Sands allowed Frank Pinkley to pay Charles only one dollar per month for his first year of 

service. Charles would also have to provide his own transportation over the fifteen miles of 

rutted dirt road to the dunes, and would have no office or supplies. Thus Charles' correspondence 

went out on stationery from his insurance company, or the Alamogordo chamber of commerce. 

[7]

Researchers working on the history of southwestern monuments have had the good fortune to 

read the "monthly reports" that Pinkley required of all his custodians. Hal Rothman and other 

students of the park service offer varying comments on the merits of these brief, sometimes 

colloquial statements that included visitation totals, lists of prominent visitors, commentary on 

the weather, and reports of construction. In Charles' case, his years as a journalist in Kansas, and 

later his free-lance articles promoting the Tularosa basin and the dunes, fitted him well to present 

his case to Pinkley for more staff and facilities. Visitation began with Charles' estimate of 16,540 

for the month of August, a figure that stunned other SWNM custodians reading the monthly 

report. Charles could only count vehicles on Sundays (his day off from insurance work), and 

calculate the number of visitors daily by guesswork. He also spoke of the need for highway 

work, both in the monument and out from town, as he believed that his park service unit would 

host 500,000 people in its first twelve months. [8]

By Labor Day the SWNM superintendent had yet to arrive at White Sands, prompting Charles 

and his colleagues at the local chamber to plot their own strategy for construction work. The 

chamber had learned that Governor Arthur Seligman had appointed Jesse L. Nusbaum, former 

custodian at Mesa Verde National Park and by 1933 director of the Santa Fe-based Laboratory of 

Anthropology, to select twenty sites in New Mexico to receive work crews from the Civilian 

Conservation Corps (CCC). This was the most popular of FDR's work-relief programs, as it 

removed young single males from urban areas and placed them at work in the countryside. The 

CCC also required no state matching funds; a factor critical in New Mexico, where the entire 

state budget that year stood at only $8 million.

By September the Alamogordo chamber had asked Nusbaum for a 200-member CCC camp to 

begin road work at White Sands. Pinkley agreed, noting that the moderate winter climate could 

expedite construction. Nusbaum had to deny the request, however, as CCC regulations at that 

time prohibited work on federal lands. Alamogordo then immediately petitioned another relief 

agency, the Emergency Conservation Work program (ECW), for one of its winter crews. The 

NPS learned in November that the newly created Civil Works Administration (CWA) would take 

over ECW projects, and that a crew could begin soon on access roads, a parking area, boundary 

surveys, and restrooms built in a style that the NPS described as "Navajo hogan character." [9]

At the end of 1933, Tom Charles could reflect upon a satisfactory year at White Sands. He had 

shepherded the monument through the labrynth of state and regional politics, and had begun the 

arduous task of linking NPS strategies with local desires for usage. The state land commissioner 

had asked for revocation of President Hoover's withdrawal order of 1930, which had limited the 
state's ability to lease acreage surrounding the dunes, or to transfer school lands within the 

monument for acreage outside its boundaries. President Roosevelt lifted the withdrawal by 

executive order on December 6, 1933, allowing NPS officials to initiate correspondence with 

state and private landowners and claimants that would give the service unified control of the park 

unit.

Frank Pinkley finally managed to visit White Sands that October, praising the beauty of the 

dunes and promising help for road construction. Tom Charles' only regret was that Pinkley 

warned against excessive use of the dunes by local visitors, who drove over them, burned fire 

rings in the gypsum for their cook-outs, left trash middens behind, and carried away buckets of 

gypsum for personal use. Charles wrote in his October report to Pinkley that nature restored itself 

at the monument. "Tonight's mountain breeze will heal today's most tragic scar," he said, and 

described NPS rules as "the cold policy of 'undisturbed.'" [10]

For the remainder of the winter of 1933-1934, Tom Charles shared his monument with the work 

crew from the Civil Works Administration. No sooner had the laborers begun to cut an eightmile clay-based road into the dunes than did Charles receive word from Santa Fe that all CWA 

projects would be halted. CWA chief Harry Hopkins disliked the national pattern of project 

directors exceeding his limits on the category of expenditures called "other than labor" costs 

(overhead). FDR's relief programs had been intended to place as many unemployed workers in 

jobs as quickly as possible, with a minimum of cost overruns or budget shortages; the easier to 

blunt intense conservative criticism that characterized the New Deal as "make-work" artificial 

solutions better left to the free market. [11]

The Hopkins edict would be the first of many such "stop" orders to plague New Deal work crews 

at White Sands and elsewhere. This echoed the experimental nature of the president's relief 

efforts, and contributed to the peripatetic nature of NPS policy planning. For Tom Charles, 

however, the solution was simple: contact political officials responsible and ask for guidance. 

Again he wired Senator Cuttting, who suggested that he correspond with Margaret Reeves, state 

director of the CWA. Charles told Reeves that his road project, then 25 percent complete, 

required heavy non-labor costs because crews had to be transported daily to and from the 

monument a distance of thirty-plus miles. In addition, the road crews utilized 24 horses drawing 

repair wagons, with resultant costs for feed, stables, and transportation for the animals. Margaret 

Reeves then told Charles to contact the congressional delegation for further advice on restoring 

supplies and materials to the 104-member CWA unit. [12]

Chaos within the national CWA office prompted custodian Charles to draft more letters to state 

officials. Hopkins' order that laborers be reduced to fifteen-hour work weeks led Charles to write 

to Senator Carl Hatch, who called the CWA to register a direct complaint. Then the CWA 

ordered all NPS custodians to terminate existing employees by April 26. This would allow a new 

set of CWA projects to begin elsewhere, and also fulfill "the President's intention of dispersing 

the C.W.A. forces into private jobs." Superintendent Pinkley could offer little hope to Charles or 

his CWA workers, who had no alternative sources of employment in the Tularosa basin. All he 

could advise was that Charles write a new proposal for road work, as "I have the feeling that 

about the time our forces are cut down to the point of inefficiency they [FDR's staff] are going to 

turn loose a bunch of money for us." [13]
Such promises neither built roads nor fed workers at White Sands. Tom Charles' February 1934 

report noted that the CWA crew had to live in tents at the dunes, supplied with food and water 

until the resolution of the funding crisis. Senator Cutting then telegraphed Charles on March 7 

with word that the CWA's Hopkins had released nearly $12,000 for White Sands work, primarily 

the overhead charges. Charles had solved his problem at the monument, but the directness of his 

appeals to Congress irritated NPS officials. A.E. Demaray, associate NPS director, wrote Pinkley 

that, while Charles had managed to gain the release of all statewide CWA monies for New 

Mexico ($200,000), "the correct procedure. . . would have been for you to take the matter up 

with [regional NPS authorities] and then report to this Office in case you were unable to secure 

action." Charles admitted "the mistake of wiring to Senator Cutting direct," saying "it was purely 

unintentional, of course." His only excuse was that "the local Chamber of Commerce was after 

me and threatened this and that." "I see now," he confessed, "that I should have let them handle 

the matter themselves." [14]

The strain of CWA funding took its toll on Charles and other NPS officials. The stipulation 

requiring 90 percent of workers to be unemployed limited the availability of skilled craftsmen. 

Then the CWA started shifting crews to other sites as warmer weather ensued. Crew members 

also had difficulty with the $6 per week wages, given the amount of time they spent away from 

their homes and families. Even the landscape architect employed at White Sands by the CWA, 

Laurence Cone, came in for criticism. He had devoted more time to discoveries of Indian 

artifacts and campsites than to advising the road crew on the proper route to cut through the 

dunes. Cone pleaded with Charles and Pinkley to spare his job, but the crew foreman, H.B. 

("Hub") Chase, a son-in-law of Albert Fall, fired Cone on April 18, a week before completion of 

the project. Frank Kittredge, chief engineer for the NPS western office in San Francisco, visited 

the dunes in mid-April to examine the road situation. He attributed many of its problems to the 

haste with which it was planned. "It will be recalled that a special case was made of this project," 

said Kittredge, with "approval and authority to commence . . . granted . . ., based only upon a 

sketch map." The road was not in keeping with NPS standards of construction, through no fault 

of the CWA crew. Kittredge then learned of Charles' plans for a massive attendance on April 29 

at the monument's dedication, and he urged the NPS to provide picnic shelters, restrooms, and 

parking facilities, and more staff (especially a full-time maintenance worker to clear the gypsum 

from the road). [15]

The CWA project ended just days prior to Tom Charles' planned gala dedication ceremonies. 

Several committees with prominent residents as members devised a host of welcoming activities. 

J.L. Lawson, a prominent lawyer and landowner who would later try to sell to the NPS his water 

rights to Dog Canyon ranch (the Oliver Lee property east of the dunes), served as chair of the 

"Old Settlers Day," where prizes would be awarded to the oldest and longest-resident Hispanic, 

Anglo, and Indian attendee. On the "reception" committee sat W.H. Mauldin, who had settled in 

1882 in the nearby town of La Luz, and who was the father of the future Pulitzer prize-winning 

wartime cartoonist, Bill Mauldin. [16]

All who attended the day-long celebration realized the special nature of the event, and of the 

monument itself. Tom Charles estimated that 4,650 visitors arrived in 776 vehicles on the newly 

opened dunes road. During the afternoon the crowd cheered a baseball game played by two allblack teams, the Alamogordo Black Sox and the El Paso Monarchs. The Black Sox thrilled the 
"home-team" fans sitting on the dunes high above the playing field by winning 12-7, despite 

rumors that the Texas squad had utilized players from the Mesilla Valley. Then speakers 

addressed the throng on such topics as A.N. Blazer's "The Sands in the Seventies," George Coe's 

"Recollections of Billy the Kid," Harry L. Kent's "Origins of the White Sands," and Oliver Lee's 

"Early Days in New Mexico." [17]

The most touching moment at the opening ceremonies, all agreed, came when Albert Fall spoke 

on "Reminiscences of Early Days." Making his first public appearance since completion in 1932 

of his five-year prison sentence, Fall brought tears to the eyes of his loyal partisans from west 

Texas and southern New Mexico. A reporter from the Alamogordo News noted Fall's infirmities 

(the reason for his early release from prison by President Hoover), and wrote that "it was indeed 

a pathetic sight to see that he had to be assisted from his car and supported during his talk." After 

a few remarks, Fall had to be seated, and the crowd strained to hear his voice. He thanked all

who had come to hear him, and prophesied: "I suppose this is the last time I will meet the oldtimers." Then, in a stunning reversal of form that few listeners could detect, Fall closed by 

praising the park service and local interests who had fought for White Sands. Said the reporter 

for the Alamogordo Advertiser: "He [Fail] told of various attempts to exploit the Sands 

commercially, all ending in futility, and stated his opinion that very appropriately they are now 

put to the best use possible, reserved for their scenic beauty and attractiveness." [18]

Although NPS records do not show it, attendance at White Sands' opening-day festivities had to 

catch the eye of public and private officials alike. Most units in the Southwest did not record 

4,650 visitors in a whole year, and White Sands' distance from major population centers made 

the day all the more remarkable. In 1934 El Paso, one hundred thirty miles away by dirt roads, 

had 105,000 residents, and provided the bulk of out-of-town visitation. No other community 

within 200 miles had more than Albuquerque's 27,200, and Alamogordo's 3,100 people came 

often that summer. Indicative of the variety of visitors was the party from the New Mexico 

School for the Blind. Some 100 youths and staff members, including school board member Bula 

Charles, spent June 1 cavorting in the dunes. The school superintendent told Tom Charles that 

"no place else can the blind children turn themselves loose with such freedom." [19]

Both the park service and local boosters agreed that White Sands should be promoted 

advantageously, so that attendance would generate financial support from the FDR 

administration. The New York Times on May 15 carried an NPS press release on the dunes that 

caught the attention of Frederick A. Blossom, librarian at the Huntington Free Library in New 

York City. The park service's own film maker, Paul Wilkerson, came to White Sands in October 

to prepare a newsreel for distribution in the nation's movie houses. Then in November the 

National Geographic Magazine accepted Tom Charles' invitation to visit the dunes and craft a 

photographic essay. The chief NPS photographer, George Grant, spent several days in the 

Tularosa basin and surrounding mountains seeking unusual stories. He found most appealing the 

proximity of the dunes to the Lincoln County War. "Every school boy wishes to know about 

Billy the Kid," said Grant. As there was "no place where this information is available, all in one 

spot," and that this was "the first time perhaps that the Billy the Kid story has entered the 

National Park Service picture," Grant urged Charles to develop such a connection for the 

"transcontinental travel" about to come to the monument. [20]
Increased visitation and publicity for White Sands also attracted Governor Andrew Hockenhull,

who had been approached by organizers of the 1934 Chicago "Century of Progress" exposition. 

Hockenhull wanted New Mexico to fill its building at this "world's fair" with outstanding 

examples of the state's charm and exotica. He asked Tom Charles in May to chair the Otero 

County fund-raising campaign, seeking $300 for the building. Charles energized his diverse 

community by planning a series of dinners and dances for the Anglo, Hispanic, and "colored" 

population of Alamogordo. The black "colony" in town had never been asked to join in a 

community-wide program, and thus could not accommodate Charles' request on such short 

notice. The Anglo and Hispanic venues, however, raised $324, allowing Charles to make White 

Sands the centerpiece of the New Mexico building. The floor of the building was covered with 

gypsum, and NPS officials received many compliments from the thousands who visited the 

Chicago exhibit. [21]

All this notoriety would be in vain, however, if Tom Charles could not improve transportation to 

the dunes. In March word filtered out of Washington that New Mexico would receive $6 million 

in new federal highway construction funds. State engineer G. D. "Buck" Macy informed Charles 

that he would authorize grading and oiling of the fifteen miles of State Highway 3 to the dunes, 

at a cost of $300,000-400,000. "Boy, how the crowds will pour in," said Charles, as the Tularosa 

basin would now be linked to the national highway network from North Carolina to Los Angeles, 

which Charles described as "over 90% completed." [22]

Unfortunately for White Sands, plans for the road had also interested others, including Mr. and 

Mrs. Frank Ridinger, who built a gasoline station and small motel at the "Point of Sands," one 

mile southwest of the White Sands turnoff, and also the "Southern Dusting Company" of 

Tallulah, Louisiana. The latter was merely the latest in a series of speculative mining ventures in 

the dunes. The company had leases around Lake Lucero, and wanted to drill for sodium 

compounds. They also wished to cut a road to the lake bed along the western boundary of the 

monument. Tom Charles feared that he could not police the area, especially if auto racing took 

place on the long stretches of alkali east of Lake Lucero (later to be known as the "Alkali Flats"). 

[23]

Less easy to dismiss was the presence of the Ridinger family. Frank Ridinger, a veteran of World 

War I, his wife Hazel, and their three daughters had obtained a lease from the state land office 

prior to 1930 to build their small way station on the Alamogordo-Las Cruces highway. In the 

spring of 1934 they became irritated at the presence of Tom Charles in the monument area, 

whom they believed sought the termination of their lease. Then in April the Ridingers asked the 

park service for permission to manage a concession at the opening ceremonies, only to be 

rebuffed. Hazel Ridinger wrote a strong letter of protest to Frank Pinkley, accusing Charles of 

distorting the truth. "We have ignored his [Charles"] petty prissy tooting" that he was a 

"government man," said Ridinger, and claimed that "T[.] Charles['] one interest in the Sand is 

and has been personal publicity." She claimed that her family had "ten local friends to [Charles'] 

one," and asked the SWNM superintendent to visit the dunes to verify their claims. [24]

For the rest of the summer, Tom Charles and the park service pressed for closure of the Ridinger 

affair. The custodian denied infringing upon the Ridingers' business, nor that he wanted them 

removed before completion of the U.S. Highway 70 project. Pinkley did not see this incident at 
first as serious, in that he had several similar "young feuds on our hands at other points in the 

[SWNM] system." He informed Mrs. Ridinger that she had "ascribed to personal animosity on 

Mr. Charles' part what was in fact only enthusiasm for the monument." But the Ridingers 

remained unmollified, and in September Pinkley asked his assistant superintendent, Robert H. 

Rose, to contact the New Mexico state land office to terminate the Ridinger lease when it 

became eligible for renewal in October. Rose volunteered to spend a night at the motel to verify 

charges that the Ridingers were rude to monument visitors, and also because Tom Charles had 

learned that Frank Vesely, state land commissioner, would accede to the NPS's wishes if they 

wanted the Ridingers gone. Vesely made good on his promise, and the Ridingers turned to the 

politically connected Judge J.L. Lawson for help. Lawson, most recently a participant in the 

White Sands opening ceremonies, asked Vesely to let the Ridingers at least sell the lease to earn 

some income for their troubles. [25]

The Ridinger case remained a disappointment for Charles, but the NPS had to address other landuse issues generated in the Tularosa basin. The Alamogordo chamber of commerce had asked 

Senator Hatch to petition the park service to purchase timber lands near Cloudcroft for inclusion 

in a national park. The impetus came from passage in Congress that year of legislation that 

permitted purchase of "submarginal lands" to remove them from cultivation or harvest. Conrad 

Wirth, assistant NPS director, informed Hatch that the service "could not consider this area . . . 

unless it was an outstanding example of a major type of American scenery." The park service 

did, however, advise President Roosevelt to release on November 28 Proclamation No. 2108, 

expanding White Sands by 158.91 acres. The New Mexico state highway department had 

redesigned U.S. 70, and the NPS needed this acreage just south of the monument boundary to 

guard against future commercial development. Tom Charles had learned that "one of the leading 

boot-leggers [vendors of illegal liquor] of the community has an idea of homesteading it for 

business purposes." Then late in 1934, local civic officials mounted a campaign to have the NPS 

purchase as a "wildlife refuge" the lake and well of L.L. Garton. Frank Pinkley doubted whether 

the "lake" could be of significant value to White Sands, but promised to explore these petitions 

in the near future. [26]
Figure 7. Frank and Hazel Ridinger's White Sands Motel (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

The Garton well issue would mature the following year (1935), as would plans drafted in 

November 1934 by Robert Rose for a museum at White Sands. For the next six years the park 

service would design, construct, and outfit a museum and visitors center at the dunes that park 

officials would consider one of the best in the system. Pinkley's assistant superintendent 

predicted that the facility, which Rose wanted built in the shape of a cross (with a lobby in the 

center and exhibit space on the wings), would address three themes: high visitation; the need to 

explain simply the dunes' complex ecosystem; and the real probability of expansion in the future. 

"Here in the White Sands," said Rose, "we have one of the finest places in the National Park 

Service system to teach that principle of 'Adaptation to Environment."' Just one year earlier, the 

NPS had released a study by George M. Wright, et al., Fauna of the National Parks of the United 

States (1933). The authors called upon the park service and Congress, in the words of Alfred 

Runte, to "round out the parks as effective biological units." The monument may have been 

reduced in size because of commercial and political pressures, but Rose believed that enough 

remained of the dunes "to satisfy that intellectual curiosity by bringing people in contact with the 

natural wonder or scientific feature itself." [27]

Rose's recommendations became the baseline data for the next six years of museum planning and 

construction. The facility itself would not open to the public until 1938. Yet his idea to 

emphasize natural history over that of humans was in keeping with NPS logic to present the story 

that the park itself revealed. Rose did, however, cite the need to embrace more fully the life of 

the nearby Mescalero Apaches. A young anthropologist at the University of Pennsylvania, Moms 

Opler, had researched the Mescaleros and other bands of Apaches in the 1930s Southwest, and 

spoke in September 1933 at the dunes to a group of Alamogordo Rotarians about "the habits of 

the Mescalero." Rose knew of local interest in these native people, and reported to the NPS: 

"Unless some archeological national monument reasonably close to the Mescalero Reservation 
can lay stronger claim to a full and complete treatment of the Mescalero Apache, these modern 

Indians should be made the subject of exhibits" at White Sands. [28]

The theories of Robert Rose had a basis in fact, as White Sands would count 34,000 visitors in 

both 1934 and 1935. Tom Charles constructed a registration box at the park entrance, asking 

patrons to indicate their hometowns and size of party. He did so only after Superintendent 

Pinkley requested "a detailed report of the contact which I [Charles] make about the White 

Sands;" a condition he considered "too big an order at the present salary [$1 per month]." 

Charles would make an average of three trips per week to the dunes, stopping cars of picnickers 

to inquire about their well-being. Charles also met a steady stream of visitors in his Alamogordo 

insurance office, and handled all correspondence, publicity, and report-writing there. Among the 

less pleasant aspects of Charles' custodial work were the appeals of the unemployed for work. 

One such individual was W.A. Warford, a 48-year old San Franciscan who had not worked for 

four years. Needing to support his wife and five young children, Warford wrote to Charles 

seeking a position as a foreman in a White Sands CCC camp (which unfortunately did not exist). 

[29]

For every W.A. Warford, however, there were other information-seekers more interested in the 

growing publicity around the dunes. The newly elected governor of New Mexico, Clyde A. 

Tingley, would make tourism promotion a critical feature of his economic program. The first 

liberal Democrat to sit in the governor's office in the 1930s, Tingley assiduously cultivated 

President Roosevelt and his New Deal officers, often joining FDR when the polio-stricken 

president spent time in the nearby Hot Springs/Elephant Butte area. Tingley would also apply for 

every conceivable federal grant, and work with the state's congressional delegation to receive 

dispensations from matching-funds regulations (by 1938 New Mexico ranked last nationally in 

its share of state matching funds; three-quarters of one percent). This would benefit the Tularosa 

basin and White Sands financially, but would also intensify the political influence of the 

Democratic party, which had not been able to overcome the power of the Republican/Bronson 

Cutting network (to which Tom Charles belonged). [30]

The state's initiative in tourism promotion found an eager participant in Charles. As the 

"temporary" custodian learned more about the growing national fascination with the dunes, he 

developed new plans for maximizing publicity. The photographs and text of the July 1935 

National Geographic Magazine story pleased Charles when he saw an advance copy. "We will 

make any sacrifice to get a good spread in the National Geographic," Charles told NPS 

photographer George Grant. Friends wrote Charles when they read the story, such as W.D. 

Bryars, one of the early promoters of the monument. "It is a master stroke and means a very 

great deal," said the Santa Fe judge, who concluded: "The people of [southern New Mexico] and 

of the entire state are eternally in your debt." [31]

The National Geographic article triggered a substantial increase in visitation and out-of-state 

inquiries to the New Mexico state tourism office. Charles furthered this effort with inauguration 

in early May of "Play Day," a gathering of Otero County school children, their teachers and 

parents. Building upon the success the previous year with the dedication ceremonies, Charles 

saw Play Day as an excellent opportunity to reward the citizens of the Tularosa basin for their 

support. More than 3,500 people gathered for a picnic, concert, and games at the dunes. Among 
the attendees were 35 children from the Mescalero Apache reservation school; a sign of Tom 

Charles' continuing commitment to incorporate them into the monument. Play Day thus became 

the centerpiece of White Sands' activities, expanding within a few years to include 

schoolchildren and college students from west Texas and southern New Mexico. [32]

Its success, and that of the park service at the dunes, also impressed Thomas Boles, 

superintendent at the nearby Carlsbad Caverns. Boles, whose lukewarm endorsement of the 

creation of White Sands had required the second opinion of Roger Toll, had reason within four 

years to change his mind. "I have always felt," said Boles, "that the Caverns' biggest competitor 

in the Southwest was the Grand Canyon." After the summer travel season of 1935, however, "the 

showing made by the White Sands" led Boles to realize that "perhaps my real competitor is much 

closer," a situation that would become even more apparent when "you [Charles] get a paved 

highway between Alamogordo and Las Cruces." [33]

Figure 8. Roadside Sign for White Sands West of Alamogordo (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 9. Early registration booth (restroom in background) (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 10. Grinding stone unearthed at Blazer's Mill on Mescalero Apache Reservation (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 11. Nineteenth-Century Spanish carreta and replica in Visitors Center Courtyard (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 12. Pouring gypsum for road shoulder construction (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 13. Blading gypsum road into the heart of the sands (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 14. Hazards of road grading (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 15. Adobe style of construction by New Deal Agency Work Crews (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 16. Hispanic woodcarvers making corbels for Visitor Center (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 17. Patrolling the dunes (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 18. Rock Island railroad window display, Michigan Avenue, Chicago, IL (1938).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 19. High School girls' softball game (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 20. Skiers at dunes (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 21. Woman "Skiing" on Alkali Flats Lake Bed (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 22. Interior Department vehicle on inspection tour (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 23. Alamogordo High School Marching Band at "Play Day" Festivities (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 24. Tom Charles' touring car for The White Sands Service Company (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 25. Oliver Lee ranch house, Dog Canyon (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 26. Drilling for water at Garton Lake (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 27. L.L. Garton Ranch House (1930s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
CHAPTER FOUR: GLOBAL WAR AT WHITE SANDS,

1940-1945

With the passing of two generations since the end of the Second World War, scholars of the 

National Park Service are now fashioning the context of life at units like White Sands National 

Monument. What emerges is both the continuity of issues (economic, political, and ecological) 

that shaped the park, as well as the patterns of change that rendered the monument distinctive 

within the national park system. During the war, Johnwill Faris and his small staff would 

endeavor to provide the visiting public with the aesthetic and recreational experiences that they 

had come to expect from the dunes. Yet the vagaries of war surrounded White Sands in ways that 

few other NPS units could imagine. From this emerged a conflict between preservation and 

development that would persist for the next five decades, only shifting course as the nation in the 

1990s faced the duality of declining economic activity and the demise of the Cold War.

White Sands owed its creation to policies crafted in the Great Depression and subsequent New 

Deal. By 1940 the monument possessed the boundaries and structures that would entertain 

millions of guests throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Yet the changes brought 

to the American West by the entry of U.S. forces into war guaranteed that White Sands would 

remain one of the most-visited parks in the NPS network. Gerald Nash has written that by 1945 

"the West had become a barometer of American life." Ten million men and women passed 

through the region as members of the armed services, while millions more civilians flocked to 

the West's myriad of defense installations and industrial centers. The Tularosa basin, while not 

growing on the scale of Albuquerque or El Paso, nonetheless witnessed a large in-migration of 

service personnel and their families to the Alamogordo Army Air Base (AAAB). The same 

conditions of environment that had made White Sands so exotic and forbidding in the 1930s 

(isolation, distance, aridity, and hot temperatures) suddenly became attractive to the Roosevelt 

administration's military strategists. The War Department would thus transform southern New 

Mexico in the space of three short years, and alter the course of White Sands' history. [1]

Perusal of the historiography of the park service for the years 1940-1945 reveals a pattern 

contrary to that of White Sands. Neither Alfred Runte nor Hal Roth man found the Second 

World War of significant import to chronicle its meaning for the NPS. Rothman's Preserving 

Different Pasts (1989) devoted a chapter to the New Deal, and only a sentence to the war in the 

national parks. Yet the passage of people throughout the West made its parks well-known even if 

visitation nationwide declined. In like manner the encroachment into park ecosystems that Runte 

and others bemoaned occurred in large measure because of postwar urban growth, coupled with 

the desire of visitors to escape the very cities they had come West to inhabit. Tourism and 

"Mission 66" (the NPS strategy to bring park infrastructure up to standards after the lean war 

years) can be linked to the churning process of World War II. Thus the experiences of Johnwill 

Faris and his co-workers speak not only to life in the dunes, but also to the redefinition of the 

park service in the boom years after 1945. [2]

A quick glimpse of the uniqueness of White Sands at war can be grasped from perusal of 

visitation data for the years 1940-1945. Despite institution in the late 1930s of an entrance fee 

(adjusted in 1941 from 25 cents per person to 50 cents per vehicle), the numbers remained far 

greater than those for comparable NPS units elsewhere. Using 1939 as a base for measurement 
(59,000 visitors), White Sands saw visitation peak in 1941 at 73,000, then decline by 1944 some 

54 percent (to 35,000). Yet the number of visitors soon rebounded the following year to 56,000, 

and then reached a trajectory in the early postwar era (over 100,000) that continued for the rest of 

the century. Given the fiscal constraints of wartime, the workload facing NPS personnel at the 

dunes never eased for any length of time, placing pressure on resources, facilities, and staff that 

few other parks could match. [3]

Visitation for the years 1940-1941 (up to the bombing of Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941) 

showed little change from the preceding decade. Scholars, film crews, and government officials 

drove through the park entrance on inspections for research, entertainment, or supervision. In 

December 1940, Paramount Pictures sent a camera crew to film Tom Charles, now the proprietor 

of the burgeoning concession, as he drove tourists over the dunes. Charles and his "White Sands 

Service Company" vehicle thus advertised the park to millions of movie goers who saw the 

Paramount series, "Unusual Occupations," on their neighborhood screens. [4]

Visitors also poured into White Sands on the "Play Days" of 1940 and 1941, lured in the latter 

year by the landing at the dunes of a commercial airplane owned by American Airlines. The 

Alamogordo chamber of commerce saw this as excellent publicity for its efforts to connect the 

basin with the outside world, and park service officials acquiesced, though they warned eager 

tourism boosters not to expect permission for a permanent landing field. Perhaps ignoring Frank 

Pinkley's earlier rebukes of Tom Charles' drives over the dunes, Hugh Miller, superintendent of 

southwestern monuments, identified the "landing strip" as "a satisfactory location, now almost as 

level as a floor and devoid of vegetation so that no permanent disfigurement of the area would 

result." Then using words that once brought the wrath of NPS officials down on Custodian 

Charles, Miller concluded: "Evidence of any special smoothing would be obliterated by the first 

windy day." [5]
Figure 28. White Sands, New Mexico. Laura Gilpin (1945).

(Courtesy Laura Gilpin Collection. Copyright 1981. Negative No. 26231.1. Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth TX.)

The American Airlines stunt typified the aggressive promotional activities of the Alamogordo 

business community, from which had come Tom Charles and the monument itself. In 1940 the 

chamber initiated another campaign to upgrade the status of White Sands from a monument to a 

more-prestigious (and better-funded) national park. Nationwide publicity had resulted from a 

visit to the dunes in December 1939 by Ernie Pyle, the Pulitzer prize-winning journalist and 

Albuquerque resident whose praise for White Sands, and for Johnwill Faris' hospitality, reached 

millions of readers. In March 1940, the chamber petitioned U.S. Representative John J. Dempsey 

to upgrade the facilities at White Sands, especially its need for more drinking water. Joseph 

Bursey, state tourism director, and local columnists echoed these sentiments, and circulated a 

rumor that the New Mexico congressional delegation would introduce a bill to change the status 

of White Sands. Faris himself became excited at this prospect, as he hoped that the move would 

elevate his position (and salary). The SWNM superintendent believed that this rumor was 

nothing more than standard fare from zealous local boosters, but Hugh Miller did praise Faris 

and his monument staff by saying: "You have a most promising area both from the standpoint of 

its merit as a national attraction and from the standpoint of revenue which is becoming an 

increasing factor of influence with the Bureau of the Budget." [6]

Johnwill Faris realized soon thereafter that the "park status" stories had ensnared him, as Tom 

Charles had warned during the 1938 WPA scandals. At the close of the New Deal, a conservative 
Congress had reduced spending on the many public works projects that had assisted White Sands 

with its infrastructure. This also reduced political involvement in the inner workings of the NPS, 

although conditions in southern New Mexico bucked national trends. The state WPA office 

inventoried the labor force at White Sands in 1940, finding that two-thirds of the contract 

workers were Hispanic. These employees stayed on the payroll longer than the federal limit of 

eighteen months, prompting Hillory Tolson, director of the NPS' Santa Fe regional office, to 

warn J.J. Connelly, state WPA administrator, that the park service would run out of money for its 

White Sands construction well before the close of the 1940 fiscal year. [7]

Political interference of a more direct nature involved the persistence of fired WPA carpenter 

Michael Reardon to regain his job and his reputation. Reardon employed an Albuquerque 

lawyer, Robert H. LaFollette, who pressed the park service to reinvestigate the WPA "scandal." 

LaFollette (not identified as a relative of the progressive Wisconsin senator of the same name) 

believed that White Sands officials had reduced WPA wages arbitrarily, and that Reardon had 

been punished for testifying to that effect before a federal grand jury. The park service, mindful 

of Reardon's connections to New Mexican politicians Dennis Chavez and John Dempsey, sent 

Reardon's case file to Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes, who concurred in the judgment of 

regional NPS officials. [8]

Because of the uniqueness of the New Mexico New Deal, Johnwill Faris had to move cautiously 

in the election year of 1940. The following June he wrote in his monthly report of the 

appointment of John Dempsey as undersecretary of the Interior. Dempsey had run against 

Chavez in the 1940 Democratic primary race for U.S. Senator, only to be defeated. President 

Roosevelt then named Dempsey to the Interior post, prompting Faris to say: "The Honorable 

John Dempsey knows well the problems of the west and we can be assured of an understanding 

representative in Mr. Dempsey." This was unfortunately not the story that Faris conveyed 

privately to regional director Miller. J.L. Lawson, former owner of the controversial Dog Canyon 

property, had defied the Otero County Democratic party by supporting Dempsey, and Faris

feared a reprisal against White Sands. "Tom Charles is bitterly opposed to Dempsey," said Faris, 

"and not one but many rumors have it that Dempsey will get Tom out of the picture at White 

Sands[,] etc." Lawson himself greeted Faris on an Alamogordo street by asking "how I liked my 

new boss [Dempsey]." The custodian told Miller that he should "look behind the scene" if 

problems arose at the monument, as people said: "You never can tell about Lawson." [9]

Doubts concerning the sentiments of Interior officials towards White Sands could not deter 

Johnwill Faris or the regional office in the months preceding U.S. entry into World War II. The 

lack of staff bothered NPS supervisors, who devoted considerable time to writing an 

interpretative manual for use in ranger talks. Natt Dodge came to White Sands to observe the 

operations and maintenance of the museum, which had opened in June 1940. "Undependable 

electric current," plus a lack of heat in winter, limited the museum's appeal to visitors in its first 

year, as did the incomplete design of the museum exhibit cases. Then the heavy summer travel 

brought dozens of visitors at one time through the museum, with no staff available to explain the 

monument's features. By August 1941, the NPS could send additional employees to the dunes, 

but had no funds to address the structural problems of electricity and heat. [10]
The strain upon the monument's facilities also reflected problems old and new: the 

environmental conditions in the arid Tularosa basin, and the experimental nature of New Deal 

policy. The ecology of the dunes affected the water supply, whose high salt content corroded 

pipes and clogged drains several years after construction. High winds damaged lines from 

Alamogordo built to deliver telephone service, requiring park staff to check the transmission 

network each time they traveled into town. Newton Drury, director of the park service, noted in 

his inspection tour in May 1941 that the blowing gypsum not only covered the roads (causing 

high maintenance costs), but also abraded the engines and chassis of NPS vehicles used in 

clearing the highway. Most interesting, however, was the deterioration of the adobe walls and 

buildings. Their style reflected the New Deal's sense of place and historical distinctiveness. Yet 

the mud construction cracked and chipped during heavy rains, and required annual maintenance 

for plastering that the NPS had not included in its designs. Then late in 1941 the monument 

received ten inches of rain within a ten-day span, inundating roads, damaging the adobe 

structures yet again, and restricting visitor travel to the dunes. [11]

To meet these needs, NPS officials at first turned to their benefactors, the New Deal agencies 

that had constructed facilities at White Sands. Despite nationwide curtailment of such programs 

as the WPA, CCC, and other organizations, New Mexico' s political leaders had managed to 

retain WPA personnel at the dunes. Johnwill Faris had continued to use the federal work crews 

to keep his park open, with Jesus Armijo devoting all his time to collecting admission fees at the 

monument entrance. As late as April 29, 1940, President Roosevelt had authorized expenditure 

of $57,500 for non-construction maintenance at White Sands. These crews built Spanish-colonial 

furniture for the headquarters, cleared the roads, painted signs, and planted cacti and other native 

vegetation around the visitors center. [12]

Dependence upon funds other than the NPS appropriation caught White Sands off-guard less 

than two months after FDR's proclamation, as word reached Custodian Faris of the termination 

of all Recreation Demonstration Projects at the close of the 1940 fiscal year (June 30). SWNM 

superintendent Miller came to the dunes in early September, and noted the pressing need for 

improvement of facilities and services. Predicting that White Sands "may readily receive 

100,000 bona fide visitors next year," Miller feared that the decline in federal support would 

"create an unfavorable impression of the Park Service as a whole." Upon consultation with 

Custodian Faris, the superintendent agreed that White Sands' only hope was establishment of a 

CCC camp (one of the few remaining New Deal labor programs) to fulfill duties that the NPS 

had never been able to accomplish. [13]

While the superintendent saw logistical and procedural obstacles, Hugh Miller also recognized 

White Sands' predicament: high visitation, elaborate facility construction, and limited financial 

resources. The U.S. Forest Service had a CCC camp outside of El Paso (the Ascarate County 

Park), which needed more work to remain viable. The cost of shipping workers and materials the 

one hundred miles to White Sands made creation of a new camp at Alamogordo more feasible, 

as the lack of potable water at the dunes restricted the housing of two-hundred plus workers. 

Regardless of the problems, said Miller to the regional office, "we have an urgent situation on 

our hands at White Sands." He further encouraged Johnwill Faris to submit a twelve-month work 

plan to the CCC at once. [14]
The custodian's response indicated the extent to which White Sands depended upon New Deal 

largesse for its operations. Johnwill Faris devised a program to employ 200 workers for one year, 

housing them on ten acres of land outside of Alamogordo that city leaders would donate to the 

CCC. These crews could engage over a dozen projects, none of which included original 

construction. The menu ranged from housing to roads to landscaping to museum lighting. One 

interesting feature was Faris' wish to devote 12,500 "man-days" (the number of days times 

workers) to remove five miles of the old clay-plated entrance road. Built in 1933 by the CWA, 

the road had been replaced by an asphalt route, but visitors sometimes followed the old path by 

mistake. Faris also wanted 12,500 man-days to convert Garton Lake to the wildlife refuge first 

intended in its purchase. These activities, concluded Faris, "will enable us to become an area 

well balanced and prepared to handle the number of visitors that is apparently destined to come 

our way." The custodian then acknowledged the consequences of failure to meet these needs by 

not gaining a CCC camp: "Without the work we may be years rounding out a similar outlined 

program without embarrassment and virtual disgrace to our Service." [15]

Figure 29. White Sands, New Mexico. Laura Gilpin (1943).

(Courtesy Laura Gilpin Collection. Copyright 1981. Negative No. 2600.2. Amon Carter Museum, Fort Worth TX.)

The merits of the White Sands proposal notwithstanding, the CCC in 1941 did not fund the 

Alamogordo camp. Then in June of that year the other source of New Deal labor, the WPA, 

announced elimination of most of its park service contracts. Johnwill Faris and his small staff 

(Ranger George Sholley and maintenance man Joe Shepperd) thus faced the summer travel 

season without the personnel of the preceding eight years. Equally affected was Tom Charles. 

Like his successor as custodian, Charles' business had been overrun by the growth of visitation 

and demand for his souvenirs, refreshments, and his guided tours of the dunes. By January 1940, 

Charles once again drew the ire of his former supervisor, Frank Pinkley, when he requested 
waivers of the NPS restrictions on his operations. The park service had allowed Charles to outfit 

a small trailer with concession items, but ordered him to bring the trailer back to headquarters 

each evening. Charles' proprietary attitude towards the park led him to take the wheels off the 

trailer and leave it overnight in the picnic area. He then asked Pinkley if he could build a 

watchman's house out in the dunes to guard against theft. The SWNM superintendent wrote to 

Charles in language as stern as any he had used while Charles had been a park service employee. 

"All this is not what we talked about nor what we issued a permit for," said Pinkley. Should the 

NPS let Charles continue to increase his operation, "we are caught in a never ending line of 

expansion based on the plea that you must be allowed to do this and that and the other in order to 

protect your investment." [16]

Charles' request had come less than two months after his retirement as custodian of the 

monument. Yet within that short span of time, the "Father of White Sands" had realized what he 

had suspected all along: that visitors to the dunes would patronize a concession heavily. His 

White Sands Service Company had turned a small profit for the two months of operations in 

1939, and in 1940 would generate revenues of nearly $400 per month. To meet that consumer 

demand, Charles continued to petition NPS officials for expansion of his facility. In March 1940, 

he received permits from the Southern Pacific and the Rock Island railroads to transport 

passengers from Alamogordo to the dunes. He also asked Hillory Tolson for permission to move 

his operations from the trailer to vacant work space in the visitors center. This triggered yet 

another debate within the NPS regional bureaucracy, reminiscent of the early days at White 

Sands when Charles' plea for recreational usage clashed with the ecological aesthetic of park 

service professionals. Charles L. Gable, chief of the "park operators division" in Washington, 

conceded that the White Sands visitors center would not be fully utilized for some time, and that 

Charles could generate additional revenue for himself and the NPS by using the headquarters' 

supply room. In addition, Gable encouraged his superiors to allow Charles to continue his "dune 

drives" (except to Lake Lucero), and to open a "gasoline service station" for visitors (the only 

such facility for miles in any direction). [17]

The park service compromised with Charles for the 1940 summer season by providing "storage 

space" for the White Sands concession in the visitors center. Charles would continue to use his 

trailer in the picnic area, with service offered daily from 2:00PM until 11:00PM daily. The NPS 

would try to build more pit toilets near his concession, but had no money for shade. 

Superintendent Miller encouraged Charles instead to "experiment . . . with the feasibility of 

renting beach umbrellas at a reasonable price." Colonel John White, Region III director, visited 

White Sands in July to confirm these arrangements. He believed that visitor demand required 

two sites for concessions: the dunes proper and the headquarters complex. White then 

acknowledged what normally would have been park service heresy: "[The dune drive] gives 

visitors not only a fine opportunity to see the dunes, but to have them explained in inimitable 

fashion by Tom Charles." [18]

By the fall of 1940, the combination of high volume and Tom Charles' persistence led the park 

service to negotiate a solution favorable to Charles' company. From June to September, the 

dunes had 31,000 paying customers, many of whom patronized Charles' trailer. Hugh Miller 

reported that "the service the operator [Charles] is expected to give is required in the sands and 

cannot be expected to satisfy legitimate public demand at any other point." Miller declared 
Charles' trailer to be "ridiculously inadequate," and called for construction of a facility of some 

600 square feet "at a point approximately 200 yards beyond the present construction site." If the 

NPS could not provide Charles with such a facility by the spring of 1941 (including 20 picnic 

tables and six pit toilets), Miller suggested that the park service accept Charles' offer of private 

funding in exchange for a "20-year permit" for his company. [19]

In a fashion typical of its relationship with Tom Charles, the NPS spent the next twelve months 

alternately challenging his plans and recognizing the inevitable. Hugh Miller wanted Charles to 

accept a location adjacent to the visitors center, sign a lease for a maximum of five years, and 

limit his annual salary to $1,800. Miller even criticized Charles' plan to charge fifteen cents for 

hamburger sandwiches (the local rate in Alamogordo), as Charles did not as yet prepare hot 

meals at the park. The superintendent also suggested termination of the dune drives, given the 

distance from the visitors center. Charles agreed to address all of Miller's concerns, but grew 

weary of the delays. By November 1941, he had consented to lease a $3,500 government 

structure, to be built in adobe style next to headquarters. Yet Charles also gently chided Miller 

(as he had his predecessor, Pinkley), noting that he earned $500 in August 1940. "Whatever you 

think best Hugh," said Charles, "for after all White Sands comes first with me, but I wouldn't 

have to work for anyone else for $1,800 a year." [20]

Tom Charles' strategies for concession work at White Sands reflected his deep understanding of 

local demand and state politics. Both factors influenced land-use issues in 1940-1941, as the state 

land office sought control of unclaimed grazing acreage within the monument. The New Mexico 

state game warden, Elliott Barker, pursued his own proprietary policies on the thirteen sections 

of state land at White Sands. In January 1940, Barker brought to the monument a herd of nine 

antelope, hoping to restore game animals to the Tularosa basin. Within days, however, coyotes 

attacked the weaker animals, reducing the herd size and endangering the game experiment. To 

Barker's surprise, the NPS denied his request for state game officers to pursue coyotes onto 

monument property and kill them. He found especially mystifying the logic of Milton McColm 

of the Santa Fe NPS office, who claimed that "coyotes are just as interesting to many of our 

monument visitors as are antelope and we hope Mother Nature will allow us to have both." [21]

More aggressive than the state game warden was the New Mexico state land office, which sought 

in 1940 to exchange its "in-holdings" in White Sands for federal lands outside monument 

boundaries. So long as the park service held these 13 sections (8,320 acres), the state could not 

generate revenue from leaseholders because of the lack of contiguous acreage demanded by 

ranchers and mineral companies. In early 1940, state officials resumed negotiations with the 

NPS, hoping to arrange satisfactory transfers. In April of that year, state and federal officials met 

at White Sands to discuss trading land just north of the monument. Included was the separate 

lease held by Frank Ridinger, owner of the motel and gas station that had bothered Tom Charles 

in the 1930s. By September the park service had surveyed the claims, and also restudied the Dog 

Canyon water-rights issue, as the state's five-year limit on "beneficial use" neared. Finally, the 

family of the late Gene Baird sought to reinstate his longtime use of 40 sections of monument 

land for grazing. The park service faced a dilemma, in that the well-connected Baird family 

could not easily be ignored. Yet to fence the acreage would cost money that White Sands did not 

have, while the staff lacked the time to observe the remote sections for violations of park service 

grazing rules. [22]
While engaging this mixture of land uses, the park service received a shock when the state land 

office moved to claim the acreage around Garton Lake. The Interior department had included the 

Garton property as part of the White Sands Recreation Demonstration Area, in order to expedite 

funding for facility construction early in the New Deal. The state contended that the land had not 

been deeded over to the park service, and the failure to complete the Garton project restored the 

land to the U.S. General Land Office (GLO). Under the Taylor Grazing Act, several New 

Mexican ranchers, the most prominent being E.F. Harrison, filed claims in 1938 and 1939 to the 

Garton acreage and other non-park service tracts within the monument. To everyone's surprise, 

on March 7, 1941, A.J. Wirtz, undersecretary of Interior, ruled that the NPS had fenced more of 

the Garton property than allowable. "The remainder of the vacant lands," said Wirtz, "are 

unreserved except as a part of the [fourth] grazing district, and should be administered as in the 

case of any other Federal range." Wirtz did not grant Harrington his claim, but encouraged the 

U.S. Grazing Service to generate revenue by allotting the land to another claimant. [23]

The Harrington case brought together officials from the NPS and Grazing Service to limit the 

potential damage of the Wirtz decision. Johnwill Faris told Superintendent Miller: "The loss of 

this property would greatly reduce the value of the Garton tract as a wildlife area and cause our 

Bureau to lose a very important strip of the cross section of the Tularosa Basin." Robert Upton, 

Faris' chief ranger, wrote an assessment of the impact of renewed grazing at Garton Lake. 

Waterfowl would be driven off, the state's antelope herd would lose access to forage, not to 

mention the resultant damage to the ground cover. Upton and Faris then called not only for 

retention of the Garton grazing lands, but "enlargement of the present lake and surrounding 

marsh, by the addition of another well and further dike development." [24]

As the two federal agencies examined the Garton property, what became clear was the faulty 

bookkeeping of the park service and state land office. Overwhelmed in the 1930s by the pace of 

park expansion, and also by the intricate "checkerboard" pattern of private and public land 

ownership in the Tularosa basin, the NPS had recorded only the actual Garton patent of 160 

acres that constituted the lake bed and its shoreline. W. B. McDougall, Region III biologist, 

could find no documentation supporting Wirtz's belief that the lands had reverted to the GLO. In 

addition, the U.S. House of Representatives voted on May 5, 1941, to give the NPS all RDA 

projects at White Sands and three other units. The SWNM superintendent pleaded for reason, 

reminding his colleagues that "the clear intent" of the Garton Lake project "was to establish a 

wildfowl refuge." Hugh Miller further warned the NPS that certain portions of the RDA acreage 

abutted U.S. Highway 70. It "would be highly desirable," said Miller, "to insure control of 

commercial development and to make possible the exclusion of objectionable enterprises from 

that portion of the roadway for all time to come." [25]

Concerted study of the Garton dilemma throughout the summer resulted in an amicable solution.

The U.S. Grazing Service offered to fence in the disputed acreage, as well as an area south of the 

monument entrance "which is not [now] included in either the National Monument or the 

Demonstration Area." Soon thereafter Newton B. Drury, director of the park service, reported 

that his staff had detected the error in A.J. Wirtz's ruling on Garton Lake. The entire tract had 

been part of FDR's 1936 executive order granting the White Sands RDA to the monument, and 

Wirtz agreed to revise his earlier opinion. New Mexico's John J. Dempsey, Wirtz's successor as 

undersecretary of the Interior, ruled on August 26, 1941, that "the notations on the tract books 
were erroneous," and that "no attempt should be made to administer the land therein as a part of 

the grazing district." Dempsey's decision paved the way on November 10, 1941, for a sweeping 

cooperative agreement between the NPS and Grazing Service on White Sands' land use. Both 

parties would police the grazing sections within and adjacent to the monument, and would also 

limit grazing to a "carrying capacity" satisfactory to the park service. [26]

The enthusiasm of the park service for solution of land claims at White Sands in December 1941 

later seemed ironic, as no one knew the consequences of events that month in the far-off Pacific 

Ocean. Johnwill Faris noted that "for the first time we will have a uniform and definite 

agreement on all grazing." He further remarked to his superiors at SWNM headquarters: "It was 

very gratifying to find all the ranchers as cooperative in getting these permits straightened out." 

One reason for the cooperation may have been the petition of the U.S. Army in June 1941 to 

secure 1.25 million acres of public and private land in the Tularosa basin for a bombing range. 

Since the United States had yet to enter the Second World War, the Army did not pursue the land 

withdrawal. Instead, Custodian Faris wrote of the increase in visitation of uniformed personnel 

from Fort Bliss and Biggs Field, in and near El Paso. By July 1941, soldiers and their families 

comprised 15 percent of visitors to the dunes, and nearly 2,000 other soldiers stopped at park 

headquarters to see the exhibits in the museum. [27]

All this would change after December 7, 1941, when the Japanese armed forces struck the U.S. 

naval installation at Pearl Harbor, Territory of Hawai'i. The war would replace the economic 

uncertainties of the 1930s with the exhilaration and stress of national security. White Sands 

would stand alone in the park service as part of what John Freemuth later called "islands under 

siege;" park service units surrounded by commercial development. In the case of White Sands, 

the U.S. Army would establish its Alamogordo Army Air Base within weeks of the Pearl Harbor 

attack. Johnwill Faris also noted the economic and psychological impact of the war. "Seemingly 

the tension of Our Country being at war," he reported, "means a higher strung type of visitor and 

stops are noticeably shorter." There had already been a statewide "blackout," where citizens 

turned off outside lighting to reduce potential risk from invading forces. Faris remained 

optimistic, telling his superiors: "One thing now, we have no doubt about the men in the Service 

[;] they are all in uniform." [28]

More doubtful for Faris and his staff was operation of their park unit amidst the changing orders 

and demands of their new neighbors. Issues that had been merely problematic (water use, 

understaffing, budget reductions) escalated under the dual strain of wartime bombing around 

(and sometimes on) the monument, even as the military brought thousands of soldiers to the 

dunes for picnics and maneuvers. White Sands thus differed from its peers in the park service in 

the chaotic nature of park management in wartime.

Three weeks after Pearl Harbor, Interior secretary Harold Ickes initiated the process of change 

that would fundamentally alter the history of White Sands. Ickes, under whose purview fell not 

only the NPS but also much of the public land in the Tularosa basin, recommended to President 

Roosevelt that the Army's request for 1.25 million acres in southern New Mexico be approved. 

Nearly 275,000 acres of the bombing range belonged to the state of New Mexico, and almost 

35,000 more acres had been claimed by private citizens. Ignoring the complex negotiations of 

1941 that had "resolved" the NPS-New Mexico disputes over claimants in the monument, Ickes 
encouraged FDR to sign Executive Order No. 9029, creating the Alamogordo bombing range. 

The order contained a clause calling upon the Army to "consult" with Interior officials about 

bombing targets. In addition, the order promised to restore the lands to Interior "when they are 

no longer needed for the purpose for which they are reserved." [29]

Demand for public land to house the vast bombing facility quickly generated a need for water. 

The scarcity of water in the Tularosa basin had plagued the early years of White Sands' 

development. But the scale of consumption anticipated by the Army staggered the imagination of 

park service officials. In April 1942, the Arizona Constructors, who had the contract to build the 

runways at the air base, approached Johnwill Faris for access to the Garton well. The aridity of 

the basin - one of the assets for year-round testing of aircraft - required large amounts of water to 

compact the desert soil, then mix into concrete for thousands of cubic yards of cement. The NPS 

regional office considered the petition "a critical defense project," and authorized Faris to grant 

the company a permit to withdraw up to 75,000 gallons of water per day (a figure that would 

soon grow to 175,000 gallons daily). Charles Richey of the SWNM office further suggested that 

Faris "discuss informally with the Army engineers in charge of the airport the possibility of our 

purchasing water from the city of Alamogordo at the end of the Army's new pipeline at the 

airport." The regional director concurred, remarking that the 1930s effort to create a wildlife 

refuge at Garton Lake "is of minor importance and should not dominate . . . our plans for the 

development of the area." [30]

By June 1942, the Arizona Constructors had completed runway paving at the air base, and no 

longer needed access to Garton Lake water. White Sands then negotiated access to the air base's 

water line from Alamogordo; something that a lack of funds had prohibited before the war. 

Another benefit generated by the expansion of military spending was the placement of two CCC 

camps at the base. The pleas of the NPS for similar work at White Sands had gone unheeded, but 

the bombing range managed to lure the work force north from El Paso. This increase in work 

prior to completion of the Alamogordo water line drew the Army Engineers to the Dog Canyon 

site, where the Army envisioned a 15.5 mile-long pipeline to another air field planned south of 

monument headquarters. Congress, however, did not authorize these funds in the 1943 fiscal year 

appropriation for the Army, leaving plans for Dog Canyon water development in abeyance. [31]

By the summer of 1942, the NPS had reason to worry about the growth of the military presence 

around White Sands. Regional personnel and Custodian Faris joined with Army officials to plan 

for expanded usage of the monument by soldiers and their families. Visitation for the 1942 travel 

year (October 1941-September 1942) declined 34 percent, but army personnel accounted for 

15,500 of the total of 52,000 patrons. The dunes provided the only recreational alternative to 

Alamogordo, which regional director M.R. Tillotson saw as having "some beer parlors and one 

bowling alley." Soldiers desperate for relief in the heat of summer had gone to a "borrow pit" 

near the lake (a hole dug by road crews to extract building materials), and used it for swimming, 

only to have one man drown due to lack of supervision. The park service suggested to the Army 

that it dredge Garton Lake to accommodate the large number of soldiers, and that the Army be 

responsible for "maintenance and control" of this "swimming pool." Unfortunately, Army tests 

of the water revealed it to be "contaminated," and plans for the pool were dropped. [32]
Despite the problem of water quality, the Army continued to press for usage of Garton Lake. In 

August 1942, Colonel A.S. Albro, air base commander, asked SWNM's Charles Richey for 

permission to train pilots to eject over the water and have crews "rescues" them as part of their 

"tactical training." The Army also admired the adobe style of monument architecture, and asked 

Faris for the "plans, specifications, and bill of materials." SWNM's Richey thought that "it would 

be a fine thing if we could influence the Army . . . along the lines of the architectural precedent 

we have set for the White Sands area." Less attractive to the NPS staff was Faris' granting of 

permission to the Army to conduct full-scale maneuvers in the dunes. The Army wanted its truck 

drivers to gain experience in the difficulties of desert travel, and saw the dunes as a perfect 

location. Faris in addition carried water to the Army in NPS vehicles, which cost the park service 

15 cents per mile to transport from town. Richey warned Faris: "We should also be very careful 

and not let the Army gradually expand its use at White Sands so that they feel they can do as 

they please there." Then in a judgment that would be prophetic in the postwar era, Richey 

concluded: "Should this [use] ever happen, administration at White Sands will be extremely 

difficult." [33]

The issue of most concern to Faris about the military was its insatiable appetite for land. The 

NPS could bargain with the Army about White Sands because of its national stature. The same 

could not be said for state and local land officials, who instead saw the Army as an answer to 

their prayers. Arid desert soil that had thwarted private development schemes for decades 

suddenly held great value, given the Army's need for vast open spaces with sparse vegetation 

where ecological harm would be less odious than on land near populated areas. State officials 

also became enmeshed in political intrigue as a result of wartime demands for land, and by 

August 1942 a grand jury in Santa Fe had indicted the state land commissioner, H.R. Rodgers, 

for mismanagement of his office. The NPS believed that this would delay any suitable exchange 

program at the monument for the duration of the war. Compounding this political pressure was 

creation in October 1942 of a "land acquisition board" that sought three sections of monument 

property for the Alamogordo air base. The park service withstood this appeal, as it would again 

in November 1944, when former New Mexico governor John E. Miles ran for state land 

commissioner on a pledge to restore "all federal lands possible" to the state. Faris suggested 

privately to NPS superiors that White Sands give up 79 sections in the northwest quadrant of the 

monument; an area that "may contain scattered selenite crystals and even some scattered gypsum 

deposits." Referring to Alkali Flat, Faris believed that the political aggravation caused by 

resistance to Miles was not worth the "waste land" on the west side of the dunes. [34]

Strain upon the monument's land and water base further exacerbated conditions caused by 

extensive military visitation and training exercises. As early as October 1942, Custodian Faris 

called a section of his monthly report "War Jitters." Civilians commented on their fears that 

wartime rationing of tires, gasoline, and oil would prohibit future visits to the dunes. They also 

complained of the additional sixteen-mile round trip from headquarters to the picnic area as 

another wartime nuisance. There was a momentary relaxation of visitor concern in January 1943, 

when the original fears gave way to release of pent-up demand for access to White Sands. In 

April of that year, Faris detected what would become America's postwar attitude towards 

outdoor recreation. "Public sentiment seems to be," said the custodian, "work harder and play 

harder, and our area furnishes the play outlet." Yet five months later (September 1943), the 
pattern of scarcity had returned, not to ease until the summer of 1945 (coincident with the Allied 

victory in Europe). [35]

Where civilians could not fill the dunes as they had in years past, military personnel rushed in by 

the thousands. The Army brought its Military Police (MP's) to supervise uniformed troops, and 

the White Sands staff remarked more than once about the good behavior of such large groups. 

The United Services Organization (USO) also planned activities at the dunes, among which were 

Tuesday breakfasts for soldiers' wives, and use of the museum lobby on winter evenings. 

Custodian Faris paid special attention to the "weekly visit of convalescent patients from the Air 

Base hospital as a means of outdoor recreation." The soldiers expressed great appreciation for the 

services provided at White Sands, taking as much park literature as Faris could provide, as well 

as gypsum that they sent home for Christmas gifts. They in turn promised to bring their families 

to the dunes at war's end. Evidence of this regard for White Sands came in November 1942, 

when the National Parks Magazine printed an article in its winter issue entitled, "Soldiers' 

Paradise." Isabelle Story of the NPS information office decided that White Sands exhibited the 

type of service that the NPS wished to provide the military, and made the dunes the cover story 

for this nationwide publication. [36]

Assisting the staff in meeting the needs of servicemen at the monument was Tom Charles' 

concession. Park service officials granted Charles permission in January 1942 to build his facility 

adjacent to park headquarters. Charles would offer the only food, beverage, and dry goods store 

along the eighty-mile route between Alamogordo and Las Cruces, and the closest such outlet for 

soldiers at the air base. Charles' sons enlisted in the Army soon after Pearl Harbor, leaving Tom 

and his wife, Bula, once again to commute to the dunes. By May 1942, Charles reported that his 

primary customers were soldiers, who regarded his concession as a "canteen," purchasing soft 

drinks and cigarettes in large quantities. The former park custodian did worry about the longterm effects of reduced civilian traffic, and corresponded with railroad agents to continue 

publicizing the dunes as in their prewar advertising. [37]

The commitment of Tom Charles and his family to White Sands played a significant role in the 

prosperity of their concession work. From 1941-1945, the White Sands Service Company 

generated over $38,000 in sales, and returned nearly five percent in profits (this despite two 

years of losses: 1942 and 1944). Tom Charles, however, could not keep up the pace of 

commuting to and from the monument. By late 1942 he missed work on several occasions, 

replaced at the concession stand by Mrs. Joe Shepperd, wife of the White Sands maintenance 

worker. In March 1943, Tom Charles succumbed to illness, dying at age 69. At his funeral the 

pallbearers included Johnwill Faris and his monument staff. Former park service director Horace 

Albright, now president of the U.S. Potash Company, wrote to Bula Charles that Tom had 

persuaded him "by the force of his vast knowledge, unanswerable logic and high enthusiasm" to 

create the national monument. The local chamber of commerce asked Johnwill Faris to permit 

them to install a plaque honoring Charles at park headquarters. Charles Richey demurred, noting 

NPS policy that discouraged such actions. In its place, said Richey, the chamber should petition 

the state legislature to rename a section of U.S. Highway 70 as "Tom Charles Parkway," a 

gesture that Richey believed "would be a magnificent memorial in commemoration of his work." 

[38]
Figure 30. U.S. Army Engineering Battalion marching across dunes (1942).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 31. World War II-Era troops at picnic in the dunes (1940s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 32. bomb crater in dunes (1940s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 33. Clay-plated road washed out by heavy rains (1940s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

As the Second World War moved toward resolution, the staff at White Sands could not ignore 

the irony of the military's presence: high visitation and an increasing number of airplane crashes. 

As early as October 1941, Johnwill Faris reported the crash of a plane fifteen miles west of the 

monument boundary. Three fliers were killed, the first of many victims of the haste of training, 

the inexperience of the pilots, the erratic quality of plane construction, and the forbidding terrain 

of the Tularosa basin. The National Parks Magazine may have billed White Sands as a "soldiers' 

paradise," but in March 1943 Johnwill Faris reported: "Many more plane crashes and we will 

need a full time man for [service] as a field guide." The following month Faris traveled to 

regional headquarters in Santa Fe to obtain accurate maps "on which we plan to spot plane 

crashes, etc., within or adjacent to our area." One particular crash in October 1944 struck just 

south of the monument entrance, tearing out telephone lines and requiring extensive repairs. [39]

Of all the military interaction at White Sands, none had the psychological effect of tracking crash 

victims in the dunes. The number of crashes brought heavy equipment across the gypsum at a 

rate that endangered plant and animal life. In addition, staff members were often awakened in the 

middle of the night to guide rescue crews onto the monument grounds. This caused wear and tear 

on park vehicles, and left employees tired before the start of their normal work days. Johnwill 

Faris, in an interview twenty years after the war, still remembered as "some of the most horrible . 

. . duties" the discovery of fiery crashes, including "going in and finding - it's not agreeable to 

mention, but shoes with feet in them or a glove with a hand in them and so on." Faris learned 

from Army personnel that inexperienced pilots in distress would mistake the white dunes as a 
flat surface for emergency landing. The custodian also impressed his military counterparts with 

his ability to drive stock vehicles through the desert. Ironically, this skill led Army officials to 

offer Faris a commission to enlist as a trainer of Army equipment operators preparing for the 

1943 North African campaign. Faris declined the offer, preferring to assist the military by 

serving as a rescue guide at White Sands. [40]

The future of White Sands, and for that matter the nation as a whole, reached a watershed in the 

spring of 1945. The Allied offensive in Europe had closed within striking distance of the German 

capital of Berlin, with victory all but assured by April. That month also the nation lost its fourterm president, Franklin D. Roosevelt, whose social policies had fostered the growth of White 

Sands, even as his wartime strategies engulfed the dunes with military training and visitation. 

But the most distinctive feature of the entire conflict - the detonation of the atomic bomb -

touched White Sands as would no other event in park service history. The sequence of events in 

the Tularosa basin from April to August 1945 created the "atomic age" tensions that bedeviled 

the monument for the next five decades, even as the permanent presence of a major air base to 

the east (Holloman) and the White Sands Proving Ground to the west (later renamed the White 

Sands Missile Range) buffered the dunes from postwar commercial development that became the 

core of John Freemuth's "islands under siege" thesis.

It was ironic, therefore, that on the date of FDR's death (April 12), Johnwill Faris called Santa Fe 

regional headquarters to report that "the [Army] engineers had filed condemnation [papers] on all 

of the private and state land, not only adjacent to but within the boundaries of the monument." 

James Lassiter, acting Region III director, assumed that "after the war we should have a good 

opportunity of having this land [the private in-holdings] transferred to us and added to the 

monument." Such optimism spread to NPS wartime headquarters in Chicago, where former 

Region III director Hillory Tolson (now acting NPS director) called upon White Sands to use its 

water in Dog Canyon so that its permit would be renewed. Soldiers continued to pour into the 

monument (over 7,000 by June 1), and Johnwill Faris expressed hope that White Sands could 

coexist with the military despite the dunes' location "in the very heart of the new [bombing] 

area." [41]
Figure 34. Medical Corps officers and wives on vacation in World War II at White Sands (1940s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 35. Army Officers' wives at United States Organization (USO) picnic in World War II (1940s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 36. Play day picnic (1946).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

The park service could not know the scale of change about to descend upon White Sands, but 

each passing week in the spring and summer of 1945 revealed a brave new world that challenged 

Johnwill Faris and his staff. By May the Army Engineers had informed Faris that the extent of 

test firing might require evacuation of personnel for indefinite periods. Faris learned that the vast 

stretch of the Tularosa basin (from Socorro to Carrizozo, then south to the Texas state line) had 

become part of the "Ordcit" project (which Faris for a time called "Ordcet"). On May 28, Faris 

wrote to Santa Fe NPS officials: "The sands proper are very much in the danger zone. My 

understanding is that we will be denied any and all use of the sands." Army Engineer appraisers 

took the monument's "Physical Plant Index" to El Paso to study the extent of NPS facilities that 

stood in the line of fire. Within days the regional office solicited urgent advice from Chicago, as 

War Department officials spoke as if "the White Sands are actually going to constitute a bomb 

target in themselves." E.T. Scoyen, associate director for Region III, underscored this concern 

with testimony taken from a hearing in Albuquerque of the U.S. Senate Committee on Public 

Lands. "One is led to conclude that the activity must be of great importance in the conduct of the 

war," Scoyen wrote to A.E. Demaray in Chicago, as "there could be no other adequate 

justification for breaking up ranch homes which have been going concerns for well over 50 years 

with severe financial losses in many instances." [42]
The Army felt confident that it could avoid major damage to NPS facilities at White Sands, but 

moved nonetheless to secure the park acreage by gaining permission to close U.S. Highway 70 

from Alamogordo to Las Cruces. The speed of planning for the atomic test resulted in delays in 

communications, and also unintended remarks that sustained the levels of anxiety at the 

monument. On June 4,1945, A.E. Demaray wired Region III with word that the museum need 

not be dismantled. "We are assured," said Demaray, that the monument was "not a bombing 

target but merely within [the] path of [the] projectile." Yet the next day, Johnwill Faris reported 

that a member of his staff, Ray Knabenshue, had spoken with an army captain who said "that 

unless we [the park service] were out by the 15th [of June] the army would put us out." Faris 

took Knabenshue's comments seriously, in that he had been well-connected to national leaders 

prior to coming to White Sands for his health (Knabenshue had been employed by the Wright 

brothers early in their flying experiments, and his wife had served as personal secretary to FDR 

while he was governor of New York). The story proved groundless, however, and by June 10 

Faris had regained his belief that the postwar era could help rather than hurt the monument. An 

example was his correspondence with the regional director to plan for "taking in all of the sands 

area as a postwar movement." Charles Richey had determined that "prevailing winds may move 

our best sands to lands outside our boundary." The park service should initiate a "complete 

investigation," and be ready if the acquisition occurred "not in the immediate future, but over a 

long period of time." [43]

This dream came to an end in July 1945, when the Army Engineers' "Manhattan Project" came 

south from Los Alamos, New Mexico to detonate the first atomic weapon in human history. 

When Johnwill Faris learned that White Sands could no longer draw water from the air base 

because of the project, he realized the scale of the Army's plans. Only two days prior to the July 

16 nuclear blast at "Trinity Site," on the White Sands Proving Grounds, Faris discovered that the 

Army planned not only a twelve-inch waterline from Alamogordo, but also a 115,000-volt power 

line, and massive airplane runways. "It is a project that is being rushed from all angles," Faris 

told his Santa Fe superiors, "and things break fast." Then the NPS correspondence became silent 

on the pace of construction, even though the atomic explosion occurred less than sixty miles 

northwest of monument headquarters. Thus Faris could not realize how ironic was his letter on 

August 3 to the regional office protesting the NPS decision to remove the Billy the Kid exhibit 

from the White Sands museum. Faris, who in 1940 had voiced concern about the park service 

idolizing such a violent figure where children came to visit , now believed that the early history 

of the Southwest without Billy was "like the Civil War without [Abraham] Lincoln." Faris had 

learned in his six years at the dunes that "to a surprisingly large number of people in our 

southwest Billy the Kid was almost a crusader." To ignore him, "good or bad," said Faris, would 

now "show a distortion not in keeping with our policy of [portraying] true facts for our visitors." 

[44]

The need for secrecy lifted on August 6,1945, when press releases heralded the dawn of the 

nuclear age, and White Sands' place therein. Acting Region III director Scoyen wrote to Chicago 

NPS officials with an explanation of the impact of the atomic testing on both White Sands and 

Bandelier national monuments. The Bandelier custodian had once threatened to arrest Los 

Alamos Army officers engaged in "unauthorized operations," while Johnwill Faris had reported 

that the nuclear blast on July 16 "was covered up for a time as the explosion of a [munitions] 

magazine at the air base." Faris' wife Lena, whom Johnwill had sent with their two sons to 
California just before the test date, remembered in 1993 that the bomb was not only, in the words 

of historian Ferenc M. Szasz, "the day the sun rose twice" (a reference to the intense glare that 

pilots saw 600 miles away). The shock waves were also measured 550 miles west of White 

Sands at the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation office in Boulder City, Nevada. Thus it did not surprise 

Mrs. Faris that the vacuum created by the explosion awoke Joe Shepperd and his wife, sleeping 

in their house at the monument, and pulled the covers across their bedroom. [45]

Figure 37. McDonald Ranch (1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)
Figure 38. Activity at base of Trinity Site Tower (1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)

Figure 39. Jumbo moving to Trinity Test Site (1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)
Figure 40. Gadget tower prior to detonation at Trinity Site (1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)

Figure 41. General view of McDonald Ranch Headquarters from top of old well derrick (April 1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)
Figure 42. Special "Sherman" tank out-fitted for soil sampe collection (1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)

Figure 43. Jumbo being loaded on freight car near Socorro with trailer frame in background (1945).

(Courtesy Los Alamos Photographic Laboratory)
For the Alamogordo chamber of commerce, the release of information on Trinity Site provided a 

unique opportunity for tourism promotion. On the morning of the second atomic blast, over 

Nagasaki, Japan (August 9, 1945), chamber officials called Johnwill Faris to suggest that the 

park service create a new national monument to commemorate the atomic test. A.P. Grider and 

Fritz Heilbron of the chamber wrote to the NPS director to promote the idea, comparing its 

historical significance to "the spot where the first Pilgrim set foot on this continent." Johnwill 

Faris saw things somewhat differently, as he dealt more closely with Army officials than did the 

chamber. "Peace will have no effect on the White Sands Proving Ground operations," he told the 

regional office. Yet Faris knew that the atomic site held great potential, and suggested that the 

NPS had "a wonderful opportunity to build and install a museum of super-quality." [46]

The Alamogordo chamber knew what mattered to visitors and locals as the Second World War 

came to an end. Whether the curious came to the Tularosa basin for a glimpse of "instant" 

history, or whether local residents wished to rid themselves of the cares of wartime sacrifice, the 

numbers at White Sands would grow rapidly in the weeks after the war's end. Visitation in 

August and September 1945 (11,000) equalled prewar counts, and the monument that December 

recorded its busiest winter month since 1938. But the numbers also meant a strain upon scarce 

water resources (already threatened by continued military testing and the onset of drought in the 

basin). Then New Mexico's political leaders weighed in first with their calls for an atomic 

monument, and then their fears of the loss of hundreds of thousands of acres of grazing lands. 

One example of this concern was the idea of Charles S. McCollum of the Farm Security 

Administration in Las Cruces. He wished to make the test site "a real peace monument or shrine 

for the entire world." The crater could be fenced and equipped with a visitors center "that would 

be worthy of comparison with many of the fine buildings in Washington." McCollum would 

have deep wells drilled, and visitors drawn from around the world to experience both "the 

surrounding peacefulness of the desert calm," and "the terrible force that can be utilized against 

any nation that might have thoughts of making war on any other country." [47]

Media attention also focused heavily on the Tularosa basin, with reporters scouring the 

countryside for evidence of the atomic test. Johnwill Faris kept a scrapbook of the famous 

visitors who came to the area , as the NPS collected information on the proposed monument. One 

such group included a reporter from the Los Angeles Times, who wrote of the publicity 

campaign waged by the Army to disprove Japanese charges of lingering health hazards at 

Hiroshima. "There was more radioactivity in the atomized New Mexico area visited by the 

newsmen," said the Times on September 12, "than possibly could have existed at Hiroshima 

because of the different altitudes at which the two bombs were exploded." As if to prove that 

Americans had nothing to fear from nuclear radiation, the Times portrayed prominent Manhattan 

Project officials walking through the cinders wearing "no protective clothing except canvas 

'booties' where radioactivity would be 'hottest.'" The Army also allowed the media to take away 

as souvenirs the "atom-fused earth crust" which resembled "gray-green, crackled glass;" a 

compound later to be named "Trinitite." [48]

For local boosters, the Times article proved the appeal of the test site to tourism, and by 

extension economic development. For the park service, however, the actions of the Army at the 

proving grounds soon indicated a bleaker future for a new monument in the Tularosa basin. On 

August 22, the War Department announced that it had transported from Europe two shiploads of 
German-made "V-2" rockets. Because of its vastness, the proving grounds would be the site of 

test firings for scientific research. The Army wanted to conduct these tests for 20 days at a time, 

with NPS personnel evacuated two days out of every three. U.S. Highway 70 would also be 

closed to traffic, thus limiting access for monument visitors. The Interior and War departments 

then negotiated a "Memorandum of Understanding," which included reimbursement to NPS staff 

for expenses incurred while away from White Sands. The superintendent at Carlsbad Caverns, 

Thomas Boles, expressed interest in employing Johnwill Faris and his staff if the White Sands 

closures were lengthy. This offer became moot in October 1945, when the Army decided to fire 

the V-2 rockets on four mornings per week, lodging the White Sands personnel overnight in 

Alamogordo. [49]

The ultimate plan for test firings at the proving grounds did not stop Interior officials, New 

Mexican politicians, and the Alamogordo chamber of commerce from seeking high-level 

sponsorship of the atomic monument. Harold Ickes himself announced on September 8 that his 

General Land Office commissioner would "reserve the lands surrounding the place of the atomic 

bomb experiment for a new monument." Ickes wished to recognize not only the wisdom of using 

the bomb, saying that it "reduced the further loss of life and limb among members of the armed 

forces of this country and our allies." He also saw the monument portraying "the successful 

wedding of the skills and ingenuity of American, British and other scientists, and of American 

industry and labor." Then in a pronouncement that would symbolize the Cold War's fascination 

with nuclear power and energy, the Interior secretary declared: "The atomic bomb ushers in a 

new era in man's understanding of nature's forces and presages the use of atomic power . . . as an 

instrument through use in peace, for the creation of a better standard of living throughout the 

world." [50]

Ickes' directives put in motion a strategy of negotiation between the Interior and War 

departments that revealed the latter's commitment to national security versus the former's quest 

for historic preservation. E.T. Scoyen found it amusing that NPS headquarters had awarded $100 

to a Mr. Joseph Stratton of the Chicago office for suggesting creation of the atomic monument. 

Scoyen noted that the first NPS employee to mention the concept was Johnwill Faris, and that his 

Santa Fe regional office had discussed the idea at length. More important was regional director 

Tolson's "adverse recommendation" of September 5. Publicity such as the Stratton award drew 

many curiosity-seekers to the Tularosa basin, and by October 11 Charles Richey reported that 

"quantities of the 'green glass' which supposedly lined the crater are being carried away." Within 

a month the Army had sealed off access to the Trinity Site, and even former NPS director Horace 

Albright could not gain permission to visit the prospective "monument." [51]

For the remainder of 1945 , Johnwill Faris and his staff struggled with the past and future of 

White Sands. Large-circulation national magazines (Life and Look) sent photographers to prepare 

stories on the monument, and Harold Ickes asked the NPS to supply him with his own personal 

souvenirs of "trinitite." Regional director Tillotson had Faris collect specimens of the "green 

glass," along with a section of cable wire "that was actually used in transmitting the electric 

impulse which detonated the bomb." Tillotson warned that the souvenirs , while "tested for 

radioactivity," "should not be carried for any length of time in close proximity to the human 

skin." Secretary Ickes instead should keep the trinitite in "a glass or lucite container." Other 
applicants for atomic specimens were turned down, however, and NPS officials thus asked Faris 

to keep trinitite at White Sands for future display in the museum. [52]

Johnwill Faris closed the momentous year of 1945 by negotiating a second memorandum of 

understanding with the Army Engineers on the monument's relationship to the "Ordcit" project. 

The Army not only had no plans to permit creation of an atomic park; it also persisted in its 

request for "intermittent use of the lands included in the White Sands National Monument within 

the exterior boundaries of the Ordcit Project." This assumption that Ordcit superseded the 

mandate of the park service became clear in the memorandum, as Faris agreed to remove all 

employees and close White Sands at the request of the War Department. In return, the Army 

would negotiate with all private grazing lease holders within the monument over the loss of 

access to their claims during test firings. The War Department would also reimburse White 

Sands staff for their expenses, house employees and their families at the Alamogordo air base at 

no cost, and pay for any damage to NPS lands and structures caused by Army missile testing. 

[53]

The pattern of park management that unfolded from 1940-1945 would recur throughout the Cold 

War era. The military pressed Johnwill Faris in November to sign the memorandum without 

circulating it through proper NPS channels. The state of New Mexico kept up its demands for an 

atomic monument, and the local chamber of commerce churned out recommendations for 

improving the marketability of the Tularosa basin. One such suggestion came from L.A. 

Hendrix, mayor of Alamogordo, who wired the new Secretary of Agriculture, Clinton P. 

Anderson, requesting that the B-29 bomber that dropped the atomic device over Hiroshima be 

brought to town for display at the junction of U.S. Highways 70 and 54. Alamogordo boosters 

had already begun to describe their town as "the cradle spot of the release of atomic energy." 

Stimulating their interest was the temporary storage at the nearby Roswell air base (later 

renamed Walker AFB) of both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombers. All this activity, plus the 

potential for vast increases in White Sands' visitation, led Johnwill Faris in December to ask NPS 

officials to change his status as a park service "custodian." Faris believed that his work at the 

dunes merited the more-prestigious (and better-paid) title of "superintendent." All that Hillory 

Tolson could advise from Chicago was that the park service distinction between "custodian" and 

"superintendent" was "arbitrary," having been "approved by high administrative field officials 

some years ago." Tolson knew of the awkward status of Faris and his monument within the park 

system, and hoped that "this explanation will enable you to enjoy more thoroughly and with 

some peace of mind the forthcoming holiday season." [54]
CHAPTER FIVE: BABY BOOM, SUNBELT BOOM, SONIC 

BOOM: THE DUNES IN THE COLD WAR ERA, 1945-1970

Figure 44. New Mexico atomic jewelry (1945).

(Courtesy Albuquerque Publishing Company, Albuquerque, NM)

The postwar phenomena of leisure travel and tourism 

led National Geographic magazine in 1957 to revisit 

White Sands National Monument to assess the impact of 

post-World War II visitation. Its editors sent the 

photojournalist William Belknap, Junior, with his family 

of four to the dunes to examine the reasons why over 

one million Americans and foreigners had come to the 

gypsum deposits in the Tularosa basin. "Enchantment, 

disbelief, puzzlement" were what Belknap described as 

"typical questions among startled visitors." His family's 

response upon entering the Heart of the Sands also 

represented that of others whom he saw on his visit. His 

children "shot from the car as if spring-ejected . . . . 

Then the magic hit Fran and me." As they all raced up 

the nearest dune in bare feet, Belknap's wife turned to 

him and said: "I had no idea it could be this beautiful . . . 

. It's like fairyland." [1]

In that passage the National Geographic summed up the 

dimension of White Sands that would bless and curse 

the dunes for a generation after the Second World War. 

Tom Charles had been proven right: families could not 

resist the power of the dunes. But recreational use, 

which had seemed substantial in the hard-pressed 1930s, 

when local families sought inexpensive entertainment , 

gave way in the 1950s and 1960s to staggering waves of 

visitation. Stimulated by forces of economics, politics, 

military and diplomatic affairs, and social dynamics that changed the nation, the demands upon 

White Sands testified to the divided mind that Americans would develop about their national 

park resources. These would also presage the environmental movement of the 1960s and 1970s 

that called for preservation to mitigate the excesses of overuse, no matter how benign the 

intentions of dune visitors.

Three factors after 1945 touched southern New Mexico on a scale and in a form that no one 

could have predicted. Politically, the nation committed itself to a continued militarization 

through its diplomatic policy of "containment," an aggressive if ambivalent resistance to the 

territorial and ideological advancement of the Soviet Union and its Communist form of 

government. Economically, the massive expenditures of World War II, which poured billions of 

taxpayer dollars into New Mexico, west Texas, and the western United States, created a boom in 
science and technology, and also in tourism to release the tensions of a stressful workplace. 

Socially, pent-up demand during the war resulted in the "baby boom," where returning 

servicemen and women married, had children in record numbers, purchased houses and 

household goods, and sparked waves of consumerism that brought highly mobile and large 

families in their automobiles to White Sands and other scenic attractions in the West. [2]

For White Sands, the triangle of Cold War, military spending, and family recreation caused 

visitation to multiply exponentially, starting in the spring of 1946. From its low point of 35,000 

visitors in 1944, the park saw a doubling within two years, then doubling again in three more 

years (1949). By 1957, visitation had doubled once more (to 304,000), or ten times the war-era 

low. From there it did not surprise the staff that visitation exceeded 500,000 in 1965, or that days 

like Easter Sunday of 1964 had nearly 17,000 paying customers. Park employees noted the 

growth in attendance each month in matter-of-fact tones, echoing Johnwill Faris's comments of 

May 1946: "We get little done aside from actual visitor contacts, checking, information, and 

cleanup of headquarters and the sands." When auto traffic backed out of the entrance station for 

two miles on the afternoon of Easter Sunday 1964, the staff's reaction echoed their pragmatism 

in the face of overwhelming demand: they opened the gates and waved in several thousand cars 

with no attempt to collect admission fees. [3]
Figure 45. Blueprint for Atomic Bomb National Monument (1945).

(Courtesy Rocky Mountain Region, National Archives and Records Administration, Denver, CO)
The essential feature of facilities maintenance for White Sands in the postwar era was survival. 

While records do not indicate any formal NPS policy toward the unit, Superintendent Dennis 

Ditmanson would note sixty years after the park's creation that it hosted twenty times its original 

visitation with a physical plant built to New Deal specifications. Forrest M. Benson, Junior, who 

replaced Johnwill Faris in 1961, spoke similar words to his superiors soon after his arrival at the 

dunes. "We are taking care of 378,000 visitors a year," wrote Benson, who had inherited a park 

constructed "when travel was approximately 40,000." [4]

The facilities issues confronting superintendents Faris (1939-1961), Forrest Benson (1961-1964), 

Donald Dayton (1964-1967), and John "Jack" Turney (1967-1973) only worsened as thousands 

of cars drove over the dunes roads, thousands of campfires burned in the gypsum, thousands of 

gallons of water were flushed down toilets or poured into overheated car radiators, and thousands 

of feet crossed the floors of the visitors center and concession. In July 1946, Faris unknowingly 

foretold the challenge of maintenance when he wrote of his success in locating surplus Army 

materiel at the closed Deming Army Airfield. The War Assets Administration (WAA) offered to 

Faris "lumber, pipe, steel plate, warehouse cabinets, filing cabinets, etc." Faris and his rangers 

made several trips that month from the dunes to Deming (a roundtrip of over 200 miles) to 

acquire what he called "our 'loot.'" Unfortunately, this continued a precedent first established in 

the 1930s when White Sands had to rely upon agencies other than the park service for 

equipment, supplies, and labor. [5]

In order to determine the impact of visitation at the dunes in the early postwar years, Region III 

Director M.R. Tillotson sent observers from Santa Fe in January 1947 to report on working 

conditions. Tillotson liked the compact design of the visitors center-headquarters complex, 

although "the crossing of foot and motor traffic at this tight and sometimes congested 

intersection [the entrance station] is a constant hazard." The regional director called for an extra 

"check-in" station, enlargement of office and museum space, more heat for the museum, and 

development of a "botanical garden" at the visitors center to handle the "numerous . . . questions 

regarding the identity of local plants." Tillotson found operations at White Sands satisfactory, 

and could not anticipate the need for substantial changes in the forseeable future. [6]

By the summer of 1947, the growth of travel could no longer serve as an excuse for deteriorating 

conditions. Johnwill Faris noted the increase in security violations, including speeding, 

vandalism, and alcohol abuse. The frequency of citations required Faris to negotiate with the 

justice of the peace in Alamogordo to hear White Sands' misdemeanor cases, and to mete out 

fines and punishment. The monument also went understaffed for several months that year to save 

money, as NPS reduced all SWNM units by $10,000. Most galling was the competition for good 

employees by the neighboring military installations, which did not labor under NPS reductions. 

Mrs. Tom Charles, operator of the White Sands Service Company, expressed dismay at the wage 

inflation caused by military spending. "Housemaids can get 75 cents an hour," said the widow of 

the dunes' first superintendent, "and common labor gets $1 an hour." Thus her efforts to find a 

clerk for the concession stand to accept $30 for a 40-hour week came to naught, as she found 

"that experienced service station attendants draw from $60 to $70 per week." [7]

Continued expansion of the two military installations bordering the dunes, plus increased leisure 

travel, led Johnwill Faris in early 1948 to exclaim: "If January is any indication of what we may 
expect in '48 woe be unto the White Sands." Profits at the Charles' concession had exploded after 

1945, generating from 30 percent to 98 percent return on their investment. The blessings to the 

Charles' were a curse to Faris, however, and he had to accept more military surplus from Fort 

Bliss to construct picnic grills from used truck wheels. Drought conditions in the Southwest, 

which would persist well into the 1950s, further complicated visitor facilities such as picnicking. 

Toilets ran out of water, sand clogged septic tanks, and the threat of polio throughout the 

Southwest required expensive garbage disposal away from the public use area. Thus it was no 

surprise when Faris criticized the regional NPS office in 1952 for refusing to replace White 

Sands' worn-out road grader. Faris, whose visitation now exceeded 200,000 annually, considered 

it highly unfair that smaller parks like Wupatki, Sunset Crater, or Chaco Canyon (which 

averaged less than 40,000 visitors each) should receive new maintenance equipment while White 

Sands was offered used and inadequate road graders. Regional director John Davis tried to 

mollify Faris by asking him to give the equipment "an honest trial," and also advised the 

superintendent "to take this problem in stride without letting it bother you too much." [8]

Water problems, always a concern for the Tularosa basin, entered a new phase with the massive 

visitation of the early 1950s. Constant trips into Alamogordo wore down the park's tanker truck, 

which held only 5,000 gallons. This water would then be stored in a wooden tank, which caused 

problems of algae and bacteria formation. Faris became outraged in January 1953 when the 

SWNM superintendent withdrew $2,000 from funds to repair the water tank, including use of an 

automatic chlorinator. "Chlorination of water is a point I cannot conceive of an agency such as 

ours questioning," said Faris, "particularly here in the Southwest, where contaminated water 

seems to be the rule, rather than the exception." Even the addition of municipal water from 

Alamogordo, by way of Holloman AFB, still required chemical treatment. "The visitors ask now 

why we don't weaken our Clorox with a little water," Faris chided the SWNM, as his staff had to 

pour bottled chlorine into the tank on hot days to purify the supply. [9]

Shortcomings in facilities would have their counterpart in interpretative services at White Sands 

in the years after World War II. Promotion of the natural beauty of the dunes occurred via the 

work of scientists from around the world. Dr. Lora Mangum Shields, professor of biology at 

New Mexico Highlands University in Las Vegas, brought students annually to the dunes for field 

trips. Shields and other scholars wrote at length of the riches to be found at White Sands, but the 

park had no monies to hire a naturalist to explain the dunes to the many visitors who inquired. In 

like manner, famous photographers like Ansel Adams and Josef Muench came to the dunes to 

record their striking beauty. Adams had a contract in 1947 with Standard Oil Company to depict 

White Sands for a promotional calendar which was given free to gas-station customers 

nationwide. Faris asked the regional office in 1954 for funds to hire staff who could "organize 

evening talks," prepare a "self-guided tour leaflet," and "make some progress in the promotion of 

research by other institutions." [10]
Figure 46. Children playing on V-2 German rocket on display in dunes (1940S).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

The strain under which White Sands operated by the mid-1950s echoed that of park service units 

across the country. Demands for improved services and better access to the system's treasures 

prompted NPS officials to inaugurate a ten-year plan called "Mission 66." Planned to coincide 

with the 50th anniversary of the park service, Mission 66 began with a system-wide series of 

"area management studies." The regional team sent to the dunes in 1956 included James 

Carpenter (administrative officer), Philip Wohlbrandt (engineer), Erik Reed (chief of 

interpretation), and David Canfield (chief of operations). They produced a lengthy document in 

January 1957 that explained for the first time the scale and scope of White Sands, and offered 

suggestions for remedies to the problems that Johnwill Faris and his staff knew so well.

The area management study began by noting White Sands' size (seventh in acreage of the 

system's 85 monuments). The team identified boundary status problems with the neighboring 

military bases, and also the heavy volume of local visitation "on special occasions." Among its 

Mission 66 recommendations were permanent and seasonal employee housing to aid staff in the 

volatile real-estate market of Alamogordo, and reduction by means of a "diplomatic effort" in the 

number of "local celebrations." Among these were Play Day and the Fourth of July fireworks; 

the latter a fire hazard in the heat and crowds of mid-summer (both events were terminated by 

1960). The team called for additional full-time staff (a naturalist and museum attendant);

extensive repairs to buildings (painting and sealing); steam-cleaning of garbage cans to improve 

sanitation: and the incorporation of these recommendations within the next three years. [11]

Regional officials in Santa Fe reviewed the White Sands Mission 66 report, but failed to 

recognize the severity of conditions at the monument. Johnwill Faris spoke bluntly in September 

1957 when he learned that the region disagreed with his "justification of our extension of picnic 
facilities and enlargement of our Visitor Center building." Faris found most annoying the 

region's "request for brevity," in that he had linked expansion of the physical plant to the increase 

of visitation. "Whether we like it or not," said Faris, "our area is of the type that is very popular 

with picnickers." Referring to the review team's study, he reminded his superiors that "according 

to estimates made during our early years of development, our present unit is ideal for 

approximately 50,000 visitors per year." Showing little patience with the rhetoric of Mission 66, 

Faris concluded: "Present inadequacies must be corrected and an expansion program 

inaugurated, or we will fall increasingly short of our Service goal with the passing years." [12]

Johnwill Faris' confrontation with his superiors reached a critical stage in 1960, after fifteen 

years of explosive growth at the monument. In his 22nd year at White Sands (21 as 

superintendent), Faris had labored under the strain of visitation, environment, and NPS 

management to make the dunes become a professional and respected unit of the park service. 

The strain showed, however, when George Medlicott of the regional office filed a "Master Plan 

for the Preservation and Use of White Sands National Monument." For Medlicott, the central 

feature of White Sands' planning was alleviation of the crush of vehicles at the entrance station, 

immediately west of the visitors center. Over 100,000 cars passed through the narrow two-lane 

portal, at a rate estimated at one car every 50 seconds during operating hours. Faris had been 

asked by Mission 66 planners four years earlier to predict visitation for the next two decades, and 

believed that the figure of 1.3 million was "not very far off . . . and will be reached and passed by 

1975." Medlicott, while not using that number, nonetheless told NPS officials that access, 

parking, residential housing, and utilities all needed upgrading and expansion to meet whatever 

visitation increases that Mission 66 scenarios would require. [13]

Publicly, Johnwill Faris spoke optimistically that year of the benefits to accrue to White Sands 

from Mission 66 work. In May he wrote for the regional office's monthly report: "Our first taste 

of this marvelous program has been the awarding of contracts for 40 new shades and tables, as 

well as 56 new garbage disposal units, and the same number of fireplaces." The concession 

business would also benefit from these facilities, even though the Tom Charles family had sold 

their interest in 1954 to Robert Koonce of Alamogordo. Koonce tried to maintain the level of 

service demanded by the visitors, but found the task overwhelming. In 1960 he in turn sold the 

concession to local businessman G. Clyde Hammett, who offered to invest $40,000 in a new 

facility separate from monument headquarters. Hammett, who also anticipated strong sales 

volume from the Mission 66 program, led Faris to report: "We can expect much greater service 

with the expansion of facilities that is planned." [14]

What Faris did not say about Mission 66 was that NPS superiors had decided not only not to 

expand along the lines of the master plan. They also revived old arguments from the days of Tom 

Charles first as custodian, then concessionaire, to dispute the findings of Medlicott and Faris. 

Sanford Hill, chief of the division of design and construction for the NPS western office in San 

Francisco, informed the regional director in April 1961 that the problem at White Sands was the 

character, not the volume, of visitation. "It appears that the concession is mainly used by local 

people who come to the Monument as a substitute for a city park," said Hill. "This local use in 

turn," he continued, "has created the traffic problems which now exist." Hill believed that "rather 

than giving further encouragement to such use by expanding concession facilities," the NPS 

should "consider the possibility of eliminating the concession entirely and simply installing soft-
drink machines." Hill further blamed the Charles family for the expansionist mentality in the 

area, saying that the park service had to "accommodate" them with the concession contract. Now 

that the family had left the business, said Hill, "we are apparently relieved of our obligation to 

retain a concession for their benefit." This would negate any need for a state highway 

interchange at the entrance (which would be charged to the NPS), and would also inhibit the 

ambitions of Clyde Hammett, whom Hill suspected of being "interested primarily in developing 

a saleable [concession] facility." [15]

One could hear in Sanford Hill's memorandum the voice of Frank Pinkley and other NPS 

officials who had despaired of the intense localism surrounding White Sands at its creation. 

Ironically, Hill gave no credit to Johnwill Faris for laboring for 22 years to professionalize the 

monument in the face of great odds. That same year as the master plan appeared, Faris suffered a 

severe kidney infection that required major surgery in El Paso, and a lengthy recovery period in 

late 1960. NPS officials then discussed with Faris (now a 34-year veteran of the service) the need 

to provide White Sands with new management. Faris and his wife, Lena, would leave in January 

1961 for Platt National Park, a small unit in southeastern Oklahoma, where he would remain two 

years as superintendent before retirement. [16]

Faris' departure marked the end of an era at White Sands; the period of creation and development 

of one of the most visible monuments in the park service system. Sanford Hill notwithstanding, 

this process owed much to the attention paid by Charles and Faris to local interests. These in turn 

rewarded Faris with a good life as a prominent community member. Donald Dayton, White 

Sands superintendent in the mid-1960s, recalled that static conditions within NPS management 

in the 1950s had kept Faris from advancing his career by moving to a larger park. Yet Lena 

Faris, remembering their life at the dunes from a mother's perspective, noted that the stability 

permitted their sons James and Kenneth to graduate from the local public schools, and to have 

many lifelong friends in Alamogordo. Johnwill served in 1950 as president of the local chamber 

of commerce, which in January 1961 held a luncheon attended by over 100 guests in honor of 

himself and his wife. There the grateful citizenry recognized Johnwill's and Lena's work in 

"Rainbow, DeMolay, Chamber of Commerce, PTA and other civic functions," and gave Johnwill 

a life membership in the chamber. He would also return in 1963 to serve two years as its 

executive director upon retirement from Platt. The best testimonial to Faris' local prominence, 

however, came in March 1961 when his successor at White Sands, Forrest Benson, wrote to 

regional officials: "[Faris] apparently knew everyone personally in the surrounding counties, and 

this presents quite a challenge to continue this fine community relationship." [17]
Figure 47. Summer picnickers (1950s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Forrest Benson took over White Sands as a new generation of Americans came to the park 

service's units. Known to sociologists as the "baby boomers," these families of postwar 

prosperity had children of teenaged years who would bring new pressures to bear on the dunes. 

Among the visitation issues facing Benson, Don Dayton, and Jack Turney in the 1960s were 

increasing vandalism, police patrols, arrests, the use of alcohol, and potential gang violence; all 

consequences of the rebelliousness of youth multiplied by the millions of children born since 

1945 and coming to maturity in the 1960s.

The first feature of Sixties life to touch White Sands was the demand by visitors for campground 

facilities, preferably in the heart of the dunes. Local officials had complained to Forrest Benson 

as early as April 1961 of the "lack of Mission 66 development in this area." Picnics were not 

enough for many families visiting the area, as tourists often came west to sleep outdoors in the 

scenic beauty of the region. This also reduced the costs of travel, and prompted U.S. Senator 

Edwin L. Mechem, an Alamogordo native who as a boy had camped overnight at the dunes, to 

write NPS director Hillory Tolson: "This Monument is beautiful and restful at night. I would 

suggest that you spend a night there sometime." Tolson responded to Mechem by noting the 

reasons for prior refusal of camping at White Sands ("adverse environmental conditions, lack of 

sufficient potable water, and because good camping facilities are available nearby"), but did 

solicit an opinion from White Sands personnel. Leslie Arnberger, acting regional director, 

informed NPS officials in Washington that camping at the dunes emanated from "a growing 

desire to be privileged to experience a moonlight night in this vast white wilderness." 

Unfortunately, initial construction costs for a 50-unit campground in the dunes would exceed 

$300,000, while facilities maintenance would add $25,000 annually, and night patrols another 

$30,000. [18]
These costs notwithstanding, the calls for camping at White Sands persisted. Visitors seeking 

overnight accommodations were allowed to park outside the monument entrance, and to use its 

restrooms in the morning. By 1964, the park had begun a new master plan under the aegis of the 

NPS' "Road to the Future" program. Sanford Hill returned to the dunes in August of that year to 

examine the utility of Garton Lake as a campsite. Since the early 1960s, officials from the state 

of New Mexico, the city of Alamogordo, and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) had 

inquired about the recreational potential of the lake. Hill, who in 1960 had blamed local interests 

for despoiling the White Sands experience, now recommended campgrounds at the lake or near 

the visitors center (for easier crowd control) . He disliked the dunes as a camping location 

because of the cost of services and patrols. Acknowledging this was a change of heart for Hill, 

who considered White Sands a "Class IV, Outstanding Natural Areas" site. Development of such 

locations, said Hill, should be "limited to the minimum required for public enjoyment, health, 

safety, and protection of the features." Hill preferred that White Sands "should hold the line 

strongly against expansion of present facilities or introduction of new adverse activities." [19]

The second aspect of visitation in need of improvement in the 1960s was interpretative services. 

Whereas the 1930s focused upon museum construction, the 1950s on nature trails and hikes, the 

1960s brought an international audience to the dunes among the hundreds of thousands of annual 

visitors. Acting superintendent Hugh Beattie noted in September 1964 that "at least 500 visitors 

received information about White Sands by listening to tape recorded talks in German, Spanish, 

French, Japanese, and Italian." The multilingual staffs at Holloman AFB and WSMR produced 

these tapes, as they hosted such groups as "the foreign student battalions from Fort Bliss 

[German and Japanese]." Spanish-language materials were necessary because "family groups 

from Chihuahua have requested such help frequently." Stimulating the improvement of this 

program were complaints by native speakers of these languages, like the German linguist from 

"the Foreign Service Institute of the [U.S.] Department of State." She had informed monument 

staff in July 1964 of the "poor voice quality, articulation, and content" of the German tapes at the 

visitors center. "We believe that the appeal of our foreign language program," said Beattie, 

"justifies further development and upgrading of the presentation." The desire to meet the needs 

of well-educated foreign visitors thus led Beattie to request funds for the translations into over 

one-half dozen languages. [20]
Figure 48. Women golfers (1950s). Note dark-colored golf balls.

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Most troubling of the "baby boom" changes at White Sands was the need to improve law 

enforcement at the park. This phenomenon had touched all NPS units, as it had the nation as a 

whole, in the 1960s because of the rate of youthful violence in America's urban centers. 

Rebellion was a feature of Sixties life, fed by such movements as civil rights, antiwar protest, 

campus unrest, and the drug culture. Superintendents' reports for White Sands show the 

progression of law enforcement issues from the early 1960s, when speeding, littering, and an 

occasional fist fight took place, to the decade's end when drunkenness, burning of picnic tables, 

firing of bullets into monument signs, theft of property, and gang fights prevailed. Don Dayton 

revealed the severity of such incidents in 1966 when he informed the Southwest regional 

director: "The subject state law was never enforced here previously . . . . Over the years this has 

tended to make White Sands the logical place to hold beer parties that were prohibited 

elsewhere." This led Dayton to stop the use of alcohol at the dunes, with both the usual 

complaints and the decline of vandalism and violence. Dayton also had to close the park at 

10:00PM in the summer, and to implement higher fees to meet increased costs of service to the 

public. Among those services was an experiment for a few years with a mounted horse patrol for 

visibility and speed of response. [21]
Figure 49. Crumbling adobe at Visitors Center in need of repair (1950s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Lost amid the press of daily business at the dunes was the effort of White Sands' staff to improve 

access to scientists and researchers. This included assisting NPS naturalist Natt Dodge with 

research on his pathbreaking Natural History of White Sands (1971) and the international studies 

of Edwin McKee, a USGS official from Denver, on dunes and their movement. McKee's work 

required cutting across dunes with large earthmovers borrowed from the military, along with 

constant measurement of dune drifting and reformation across the monument. McKee's and 

Dodge's research coincided with the ecological emphasis of the 1960s environmental movement, 

and the call by Interior secretary Stewart Udall for more analysis of the natural resources in the 

nation's park system (the "Leopold Report"). Unfortunately, the monument staff could not 

accommodate all requests for access to the dunes' resources. In August 1965, a group of 

Mescalero Apaches came to the park in search of "mint bush" for use in ancient tribal 

ceremonies. The staff told the former inhabitants of the Tularosa basin that "all flora is protected 

in the monument," and the shrubbery they had collected was confiscated. [22]

Intrusions by Mescalero medicine people, while in violation of NPS rules, would prove to be 

mere trifles compared to the generation of military encroachment onto the dunes. If the baby 

boom and postwar economic expansion triggered the exponential growth of White Sands 

visitation, so too did the quest for national security press upon the monument's borders like no 

other park service unit. By studying the relationship between the Department of Defense, 

represented by Fort Bliss, White Sands Missile Range (WSMR), and Holloman Air Force Base 

(HAFB), one learns several lessons about the park service and Cold War America. The massive 

expenditures of federal defense dollars ($150 billion in the West from 1945-1960), in the words 

of Gerald Nash, "opened up a vast new resource for jobs." Ironically, said Nash, "technology 

made great stretches of the once vaunted Great American Desert habitable and pleasant." But the 
wealth and prosperity generated by "vast new scientific and technological centers . . . with 

special emphasis on the aerospace and electronics industries," which caused western income to 

more than double after 1945, also placed great strains upon the ecology and natural resources of 

the Tularosa basin. While Alamogordo never became the city of 90,000 that Johnwill Faris 

predicted in 1956, the dunes could serve as a case study of Nash's charge in 1977: "By the 

middle of the twentieth century the West had already become an almost classic example of 

environmental imbalance brought about by wanton and unplanned applications of science and 

technology." [23]

Figure 50. Ranger checking stream gauge in Dog Canyon (1950s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Johnwill Faris' predictions about the relationship between the armed forces and his monument 

were more accurate than his guesses about local population growth. As early as January 30, 

1946, he wrote to the regional director that "the [Alamogordo Army Air Base] will be manned by 

a skeleton crew merely as a plane refueling station, emergency landings, etc." As for the proving 

grounds to the west and south, "[it] seems to be going stronger so we are yet in the middle of 

excitement." What had prompted the WSPG activity was the capture in Europe by Allied forces 

of German V-2 rockets; the same weapons that had proven so effective in Adolf Hitler's bombing
of London during the Battle of Britain. The Army wished to examine these V-2's for their 

accuracy and firepower, but needed more open space than the Aberdeen, Maryland proving 

grounds would permit. Without knowing it, Faris identified the most telling feature of the next 

25 years at the dunes when he reported to regional headquarters of a visit from a WSPG 

executive officer, "Major Holmes." He had come to the park in late May 1946 because an early 

V-2 test had gone off course and crashed into the dunes. While Holmes denied any problem with 

the test, said Faris, "a general visiting here, who has been in charge of similar tests in Florida, 

informed me, unofficially of course . . . that . . . [the Army] themselves have little or no idea 

where the projectile might land." [24]

The rationale for testing of missiles in the Tularosa basin sprang from diplomatic and economic 

forces far beyond White Sands. Successful development of the atomic bomb in southern New 

Mexico had shown the military the advantages of the region's open space, sparse population, and 

pliant civic leadership. Victory in Europe and the Pacific theatres resulted from massive 

applications of air power, which the armed forces sought to maximize in the first years after the 

war. Then the burgeoning confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union 

provided more incentive for escalation of advanced-technology weapons research and testing. 

When one added the financial windfall of postwar defense spending, it was little surprise when 

Johnwill Faris learned in January 1947 of Army plans to consolidate air bases in Kansas and 

Utah at Holloman. [25]

Construction of test facilities throughout the basin began soon after the visit to the monument by 

President Truman's "Strategic Bombing Survey" team. Its members included Paul Nitze, who 

would become famous as an arms negotiator for the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, and 

Franklin D'Olier of the Prudential Insurance Company, identified by Faris as "a long time 

personal friend of former [NPS] Director Horace M. Albright." The survey team negotiated the 

first of several "joint-use" memoranda of understanding (MOU's) between the Army and the park 

service over access to the western sector of the monument. The NPS believed that "this permit 

will not remain in effect over six months," and that "upon completion of the tests all materials 

shall be removed by the War Department." The Army erected a series of ten to fifteen towers, 30 

feet in height and ten feet wide, to carry electric transmission lines from the U.S. Bureau of 

Reclamation's hydroelectric power plant at Elephant Butte Dam. The Army offered to sell White 

Sands some of its electricity for the "very nominal" sum of .015 cents per kilowatt hour; a 

bargain compared to the monument's oil-fired electric plant. The military also explored the 

option of outright purchase of the Dog Canyon stream flow, which Faris described in 1947 as 

producing "65,000 gallons daily, an amount far in excess of monument needs now or for years to 

come." [26]

Hindsight reveals either the naivete of park service officials, or their sense of inadequacy in the 

face of national security imperatives in the years prior to the war in Korea (1950-1953). In 

March 1947, Superintendent Faris reported a meeting with the WSPG commander, who was 

"very liberal with his information regarding appropriations, proposed construction, rocket firings 

and type of missiles, probable effects on our area, etc." What shocked Faris was the commander's 

assertion "that negotiations were in progress at the present time whereby . . . Naval activities 

would virtually close down our area." The rationale he gave for this sweeping and secretive land 

transaction was that "seemingly no known controls exist for the rockets to be fired." Then, in a 
statement remarkable for its candor, Faris observed: "The bulk of the information we have 

gathered would indicate that we [White Sands] are just an existing evil, and not necessarily to be 

considered by such high priority agencies as the War and Navy Departments." [27]

Such arrogance would manifest itself in a thousand ways to Johnwill Faris and his successors. 

Two incidents in the summer of 1947 typified this mindset of military haste and 

shortsightedness. That July, in the early stages of a ten-year drought, the Army expropriated 

several water wells near the monument to supply its missile range. "The nature of this water," 

said Faris, "was such that lately we are forced to haul almost entirely from Alamogordo." More 

disturbing to the superintendent was the behavior of a "Sergeant Ross," who came to the dunes 

on June 29 with his wife and another couple. Ross did not wear his military uniform, and thus 

had to pay the 50-cent entrance fee like any other visitor. The sergeant declared his immunity 

from any park service charge, and drove toward the dunes, where Faris jumped on the running 

board of Ross' car to stop him. When Faris reached into his shirt pocket for a notebook, Ross 

ripped the pocket open, seized the notebook, tore it to shreds, and warned Faris that he "and our 

whole area would be 'blown to Hell' if I reported the case." Upon complaint filed with Ross' 

superiors, the Army asked Faris not to press charges if Ross were prohibited from returning to 

the dunes. The superintendent relented, not wishing to expose Ross to a court-martial, and 

concluded: "I believe the action taken certainly made it clear that such incidents would not be 

tolerated and I dare say the entire camp [WSMR] knows by now that bluffs and threats do not 

scare us one bit." [28]

Sergeant Ross' comment about "blowing" the monument "to Hell" had a faint ring of truth to it. 

As tensions escalated worldwide between the client states of the Soviets and Americans, 

weapons testing grew more frantic. By August 1947, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, through 

their district office in Albuquerque, had drawn a map of the Tularosa basin in which White 

Sands National Monument would be surrounded by the missile range. The Engineers' property 

division had "acquired the fee simple title to all private owned lands within the Fort Bliss AntiAircraft Range, has the exclusive use of all private lands and interests within the Alamogordo 

Bombing Range until 1967, and co-use of all other private lands and interests within the area for 

the duration of the National Emergency and six months thereafter." Secretary of War Kenneth C. 

Royall thus wrote to Julius Krug, Secretary of the Interior, to explain the need for all public 

domain acreage in the basin not already covered by permit. Royall also wanted a twenty-year 

(not six-month) extension of his department's co-use MOU with White Sands. The secretary 

believed that no public hearing was needed on this massive land transfer, since "the area in 

question, except for the proposed extension to the north, has been used by the War Department 

for several years." Royall would, however, send representatives to such a hearing if Krug 

considered this "necessary." [29]

Johnwill Faris and his staff thus faced a turning point in park service relations with the military. 

The 1946 MOU was ignored with impunity, as shells dropped on the monument with increasing 

frequency (one in December 1948 left fragments "the size of a desk top" one-quarter mile from 

the residential compound). Then for the first time in September 1947, Faris learned why the 

dunes had to be included in the test firings. Colonel Pitcher of the WSPG came to the park to 

inform Faris of the status of the land acquisitions, and to explain why the Army had built another 

utility line across White Sands without NPS permission. "They mentioned the fact that it would 
mess up certain calculations" if missiles could not travel north to south in the basin; "all of 

which," said Faris, "may or may not be true." The superintendent, as he would do so often for the 

next decade, "clearly stated . . . that the same Congress . . . that charged them with protection of 

our country, charged us with keeping that portion of the country within our boundaries in as near 

the natural state as possible and that we were as intent in duty as I appreciated they were in 

theirs." [30]

Matters involving monument trespass reached a peak on August 2, 1948, when the Army held a 

public hearing in Las Cruces to declare their intentions for the Ordcit Project. Other affected 

federal agencies joined the NPS to hear what the Army had in mind. Hillory Tolson, now acting 

NPS director, wrote to his counterpart at the BLM to inform that agency of the park service's 

position on Ordcit. "A 'permanent' permit is out of the question," said Tolson, "since it would 

amount to virtual disestablishment of the monument." John K. Davis, acting regional director, 

also wanted NPS officials to protest the newest technique in missile recovery work at the 

monument: "a close gridiron pattern traversed with many jeeps." Davis called this an "apparent 

disregard or noncompliance" with the MOU, and he wanted other federal agencies to hear in 

public the extent of military intrusion into the fragile ecology of the basin. [31]

At the Las Cruces meeting, the unified opposition of local stock raisers and federal land agencies 

forced the Army to soften its demands for the Tularosa basin. So many ranchers spoke that the 

Army held a separate hearing for federal officials on August 4, where Johnwill Faris and other 

regional staff detailed their grievances. One complaint in particular was the arbitrary firing 

schedule, which Faris noted could come at 4:00 in the morning. "You can't call your time your 

own," Faris told his superiors, "[and] consequently, we have to be on the alert for the Army 

practically all the time." Milton McColm, chief of lands for the Southwest region, came away 

relieved at the Army's willingness to listen, and concluded: "No doubt there will result less 

restrictive operation of other than Army use and interest." [32]

Over the next twelve months the dialogue continued about military usage of basin lands. Rumors 

flew among stock raisers, such as the permanent closing of U.S. Highway 70 once the Ordcit 

land transfers became official. Fueling speculation about the Army's intentions was an article 

appearing in the February 25, 1950 issue of the Chicago Tribune, entitled "Strange Rocket 

Security Modes Govern Range." The author, Hal Foust, reported that all Tularosa basin military 

installations had an "apparent jumpiness" which he related to disclosure of the sale of atomic 

weapons plans by Klaus Fuchs of the Los Alamos scientific laboratory. Fuchs in 1945 had 

transferred secret documents to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg in a house near downtown 

Albuquerque. The public only became aware of this breach of national security four years later, 

when Soviet scientists and engineers successfully tested their own atomic device. Eager to learn 

about security conditions at the "site of continuing secret preparations for warfare of long range 

missiles," Foust came to Alamogordo to visit the two military bases. He marveled at the furtive 

behavior of supervisory personnel, the diffidence of low-level sentries at the gates to WSPG, and 

the candor of local business people to inform a reporter what they had been told about rocket 

firings. Convincing Foust of the bizarre nature of the Cold War in the New Mexican desert was 

the reaction of Johnwill Faris: "If we vacated every time the army tells us we are supposed to . . 

., we wouldn't be performing our duty to the national park service as guardian of these properties, 

including our museum, and as host to tourists." [33]
Military imperatives prevailed over local concerns when on April 1, 1949, the Army and park 

service drafted a new permit for joint use of White Sands. The MOU declared that "physical use 

of the monument is not desired by the Armed Services," and that 24 hours' notice of evacuation 

would be given prior to test firings. NPS staff would be compensated for overnight removal, and 

the park would be reimbursed for restoration of any lands and facilities damaged either by 

missile impacts or recovery crews. Similar considerations would be extended to private grazing 

leaseholders within the monument. A third category of reimbursement would be for the 

concessionaire at the dunes, "to compensate him for any losses or damage sustained that are 

attributable to [the Defense] Department's activities." [34]

This new agreement, coupled with the escalation of the "arms race" with the Soviets, propelled 

White Sands into its second phase of postwar relations with the military: that of dependency 

upon military largesse. In November 1949, Faris reported to the regional office: "I hope our 

Service can see the handwriting on the wall as indicated by all this Army expansion on both 

sides of us." The superintendent had learned that there were "over 500 homes under contract 

within 35 miles of White Sands," which he also interpreted to "mean that we will have to furnish 

recreational facilities to a large number of these families." A year later (October 1950), the 

superintendent recorded more growth: "Some 2,500 new housing units are proposed by the Army 

alone within a radius of 125 miles of the White Sands." The Army in addition came onto the 

monument to conduct a thorough survey of the NPS boundaries, and also to research the legal 

titles of the private in-holdings of local ranchers. [35]

Factors of military expansion and economic growth in the early 1950s encountered a third reality 

in the Tularosa basin: the availability of water. Temporary status for Holloman AFB and WSPG 

had limited the military's use of the area's scarce resources, while White Sands had learned 

through experience the value of water conservation. The new generation of weapons, facilities, 

and personnel coming to the basin, however, required large volumes of water for industrial, 

commercial, and residential use. This pattern echoed the boom growth in other Southwestern 

communities from Los Angeles to Dallas, and resulted in calls for expensive water resource 

development to mimic the humid-climate conditions preferred by military bases elsewhere.

Compounding this dilemma of water for White Sands was the lengthening of the drought cycle. 

In January 1951, Johnwill Faris reported ominously: "Already our Sands well is drained at a 

single pumping . . . This has not occurred before in our history, especially this time of year." Dog 

Canyon's streamflow was of little help, and Faris described it "as low as has ever been recorded." 

NPS officials came to the dunes to negotiate with the Air Force for access to its water line from 

Alamogordo, acquiring 300,000 gallons per month (10,000 gallons per day) for the monument. 

They had found deplorable the fact that "there are practically no water-using facilities for the 

public . . . and that only three of the proposed eight employees' quarters have been provided" 

with running water. A. van Dunn, chief of the NPS water resources branch, noted that White 

Sands had few options other than to accept the Air Force's offer, and that national emergencies 

could permit Holloman AFB to terminate all water deliveries with only a 30-day notice. [36]

This latter issue bothered NPS officials enough to conduct one last survey of a pipeline to the 

White Sands' water source in Dog Canyon. In March 1951, acting NPS director A.E. Demaray 

warned regional officials of the tenuous nature of the Air Force offer. "We realize how badly an 
adequate supply of water is needed," said Demaray, but worried about the cost of the Holloman 

pipeline should the agreement be terminated. "The assurance of permanence and adequacy of 

water supply are dominant factors," Demaray concluded, and he promised to support a Dog 

Canyon system despite its "great first cost and delay." Demaray's enthusiasm for Dog Canyon 

faded, however, when regional director Tillotson informed him two months later: "We estimate 

that a water system with supply direct from Dog Canyon would cost $150,000, or $90,000 more 

than from the Air Base." Sealing the "bargain" for the NPS was news that the 1952 defense 

appropriation bill contained $8 million for utilities work at Holloman, including a ten-inch 

pipeline from the city of Alamogordo's two-million gallon storage reservoir. Merritt Barton, 

regional NPS counsel, noted that water sales to Holloman provided the city with substantial 

income, and more importantly: "There is a civic pride in White Sands, and the resulting desire to 

facilitate its public use." Barton believed that this would expedite the sale of water to the 

monument at favorable rates, even in the unlikely event that Holloman AFB would be 

abandoned. [37]

Figure 51. Scarcity of water in dunes required use of aging tanker trucks (1950s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

The permanence of military intrusions into the dunes led Luis Gastellum , assistant SWNM 

superintendent, to visit White Sands in March 1953 to discuss relations with the Air Force. 

Gastellum reported finding "no evidence of lack of cooperation on the part of officials in 

authority." He blamed the incidents instead on "military personnel who have failed to follow 

instructions of their own superiors." The SWNM official conceded that Johnwill Faris might be 

"annoyed by these problems, but they are problems which are apt to develop in any area where 

this type of experimentation is taking place." Gastellum failed to identify other park service units 

undergoing similar "experimentation," and instead told Faris to consider giving "a series of talks 

at [HAFB and WSPG] as a part of the orientation program for new personnel." Faris, more 
knowledgeable of local conditions, informed his superior that "the personnel turnover is so great 

that little good would be accomplished for the effort he [Faris] would have to put out." Gastellum 

did suggest billing the military bases for time and energy spent on missile recovery, but he 

concluded rather naively: "Until we have better reasons and some specific facts to present, I see 

no reason for representatives of this office to attempt to obtain a better understanding of our 

problem." [38]

Gastellum's ignorance of life at White Sands fit the pattern first detected in the 1930s by Tom 

Charles in his discussions with regional and national NPS officials. The year 1954 provided 

several incidents of military thoughtlessness that Gastellum unfortunately did not witness. A 

"Mr. Michelman" had come to the dunes in January, entered the picnic area, and lay down atop a 

dune to rest. A "scouting plane" from one of the military bases came in low in search of missile 

fragments and struck Michelman. The hapless victim lost his elbow joint, and contracted a case 

of yellow jaundice, which required several weeks' hospitalization in El Paso. Equally terrifying 

was the accident in May 1954, when an errant (Faris called it "misguided") missile crashed into 

the picnic grounds. The collision destroyed a picnic table, benches, and shelter. Faris noted dryly 

in his monthly report: "There was no adverse publicity given to the incident for which we are 

very thankful." Finally, a park service official from San Francisco came to the dunes in 1956 and 

noted the chaos attendant to military intrusion. Charles E. Krueger, NPS landscape architect, 

reported on the inadequacy of the physical plant for the volume of visitation, then spoke of a 

"graphic illustration of some of the operational problems confronting the superintendent." A 

warhead had separated from a missile, and crashed near the visitors center. "A helicopter landed 

and took off in front of the headquarters building," said Krueger, "light planes were landing and 

taking off on the highway and heavy trucks, automobiles, jeeps, etc. , were scurrying all around 

the area." In a laconic understatement, the landscape architect admitted: "While it was an 

exciting piece of business to watch, it was hardly the atmosphere we normally associate with a 

National Monument." [39]

As the decade of the 1950s closed, the military's role in basin affairs became more entrenched. 

By 1957, Johnwill Faris would report that the armed services sought "designation of over 100 

square miles [40 percent] of the Monument as a '20-30 mile impact area." The Army had also 

carved across park service land the route to the infamous "instrumentation station NE-30," again 

"without consent of the [NPS] and in most instances without its knowledge." The Holloman 

commander then sought access to "sections 6, 7, and 18 [Township 17 South], [Range 8 East]," 

for use as a "ground launch area." Fred Seaton, secretary of the Interior, wrote to Defense 

secretary Charles E. Wilson that month that the military's desire for "unlimited physical use of 

the Monument" negated NPS plans for Mission 66 expansion. The issue of unrestricted access 

caught the attention of Bruce M. Kilgore, editor of the privately published National Parks 

Magazine. Kilgore and his National Parks Association conceded that "when a matter of national 

security is involved, even our wonderful system of national parks and monuments may have to 

give way." But the editor, who considered himself one of many "sincere Americans," also held 

that "the convenience of the Army is not sufficient excuse for allowing our already diminishing 

heritage of national parks and monuments to be used for military target and testing purposes." 

Kilgore asked Secretary Seaton to apprise his "100,000 members and others over the country 

who read our magazine" about the status of military intrusion at White Sands, and admonished 
further: "Be very hesitant in allowing any unproven claims by military agencies to serve as 

justification for loss of part or all of the White Sands National Monument." [40]

Seaton's response to Kilgore reflected the temper of the times: the continuation of the Cold War, 

the shadow of the anticommunist mentality known as "McCarthyism," and the presence in the 

White House of the former Supreme Allied Commander in World War II (Dwight D. 

Eisenhower). The Interior secretary outlined the "modest" beginnings of missile impacts in the 

1940s and early 1950s, only to be superseded by "great technological advancements." 

Negotiations between Defense and Interior always resulted in the latter giving way, and in the 

recent case, said Seaton: ""It appears that, in the interest of national defense, it would not be 

practicable . . . to impede or prevent reasonable continued activity of the guided missile 

program." The secretary promised Kilgore's readers: "You are assured that this unusual 

development will not act as a precedent in other cases and we are aware of none like it." Seaton 

had not known of Luis Gastellum's admonition in 1953 to Johnwill Faris about the the frequency 

of military incursions onto park lands, and hence his conclusion: "It is hoped that the above 

explanation will satisfy you that we have agreed to the least possible intrusion . . . in admittedly 

adverse circumstances." [41]

Johnwill Faris' last two years at White Sands (1959-1960) were not a crowning achievement in 

his three-plus decades of service to the nation's parks. While his kidney failure may have forced 

his transfer to the quieter Platt National Park, the rush of military activity at decade's end 

disheartened him greatly. In June 1959, a Nike rocket, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead 

over 1,000 miles, landed off course near the heart of the dunes. Recovery crews from the missile 

range informed Faris "that the Nike contained classified material, which would necessitate its 

immediate destruction." The nose of the missile rested in several feet of water, making recovery 

costly if pumps were brought in. The recovery team decided to explode the missile with 500 

pounds of TNT, driving it 18 feet deep into the gypsum. "Investigation after the blast," reported 

an anguished Faris, "almost gave me heart failure." The explosion created "a gaping crater full of 

black water, and an area with a radius of about 300 yards was as black as coal." Faris declared 

that he was "sick at the sight of it, and vowed never again would we allow any such disposal of 

fallen missiles." [42]

Late in 1959, Faris noted the dependency of the Tularosa basin on the military activities that 

disrupted life at White Sands. He could not recruit a teller to handle the monument's cash 

receipts because "we are too close to big defense installations to make our GS-3 [job 

classification] very attractive." Yet the declining American economy had also touched southern 

New Mexico, resulting in reduced visitation. "Rumors of a cutback in contracts" at Holloman, 

said Faris, "are not inducive to free spending." Then in January 1960, Faris went on patrol near 

Lake Lucero, only to discover "considerable construction by the Army along the right-of-way we 

granted them on our western boundary." Faris was "somewhat amazed at the intensity of the 

repairs." He also reported: "An infraction of our agreement occurred again in the vicinity of the 

lake, but we have been assured of its being corrected." [43]
Figure 52. Boy Scout Jamboree in the dunes (1960s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Johnwill Faris' departure from White Sands coincided with the escalation of another series of 

military programs under the aegis of President John F. Kennedy's "New Frontier." The young 

Democratic senator from Massachusetts had campaigned in 1960 against the perceived drift of 

the nation under the leadership of the grandfatherly Eisenhower. Kennedy vowed to "get the 

country moving again" through an economic stimulus package that, in the words of historian 

Walter McDougall, "galvanized science, industry, and government." The 43-year old president 

proposed a two-track economic and security strategy of peaceful space research and advanced 

weapons testing. "The Apollo moon program was at the time the greatest open-ended peacetime 

commitment by Congress in history," said McDougall, while "the Kennedy missile program was 

the greatest peacetime military buildup." White Sands, unlike its peers in the park service , 

would thus witness yet another wave of change, given its location in the desert Southwest that 

offered the Defense Department and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration 

(NASA) an environment that McDougall termed "limitless space, limitless opportunity, limitless 

challenge." [44]

The first White Sands official to encounter JFK's promise to put a man on the moon within a 

decade was Forrest M. Benson, Junior, most recently the superintendent at Chiricahua National 

Monument in southern Arizona. Benson's prior postings had made him familiar with the arid 

ecology of White Sands, but nothing could have prepared him for the dunes' role as a staging

area for New Frontier science and engineering. In March 1961, Benson went on his first 

boundary patrol, only to be "amazed at the amount of [defense] installation." One example of 

such "encroachment," as the park service now called it, came the next month when Benson 

discovered that "a 58-wire telephone line and road traverse the Monument for approximately 1 

1/2 miles." Then Benson read in the Albuquerque Journal on September 17: "Army engineers 

said Saturday they had found a potential spaceport on a huge dry lake bed within the confines of 
the White Sands Missile Range." Michael L. Womack, chief of engineering for the Albuquerque 

District of the Army Corps of Engineers, reported that the area (Alkali Flats) would cover 70 

square miles, and would be "capable of supporting space craft landings, such as the Soviets claim 

they have accomplished." [45]

Kennedy's highly touted "space race" had thus come to White Sands, touching not only the dunes 

but Benson's future career in the park service. The superintendent visited with the WSMR 

commander, General John Shinkle, to gauge the pace of testing and encroachment. Then on 

October 30, John E. Kell, Southwest regional chief of lands, joined Benson and officers from the 

missile range and air base to examine the "load bearing" tests being conducted along White 

Sands' northern boundary. Kell and Benson learned that the armed forces were working on the 

"Dyna-Soar" project, a high-speed, high-altitude aircraft that needed long runways for reentry 

from space. Military officials gave three reasons for use of Alkali Flats, and extension of 

runways into the dunes for five to six miles. The WSMR had already installed "numerous very 

accurate 'tracking' and instrumentation stations interconnected with a central control system." In 

addition, the Dyna-Soar plane needed to land on skids on the salt flats because "no tires are 

currently available that will stand the heavy pressures and heat of landings." Finally, said Kell, 

Dyna-Soar pilots would find "the visibility of the white sands as a target area easily discernible 

from outer space while . . . in orbit." The military officials told an impressed Kell: "If a person 

was on the moon the White Sands area would be clearly visible from that distance [250,000 

miles from earth]." [46]

The Dyna-Soar project as planned did not come to fruition (it would become the "Space 

Transportation System," or "space shuttle," of the 1980s), but this did not spare White Sands. 

Conventional weapons testing continued at the WSMR and Holloman in the early 1960s, along 

with the enthusiasm generated by the first manned spacecraft to orbit the earth (the "Gemini" 

program), and Kennedy's vaunted "Apollo" program to land on the moon. Forrest Benson noted 

as early as October 1961 the excitement that the space program had created within the Tularosa 

basin. Local and national news media, including Time Magazine, came to the dunes to cover the 

story, while Defense officials surveyed the Alkali Flats area and its extensions into the 

monument. Regional director Thomas Allen wrote to the NPS director before Christmas 1961 to 

express his fears of the "widespread campaign of publicity . . . underway to explain and sell the 

project to all and sundry." More disturbing to Allen was the fact that "the men under the 

[WSMR] General's command are engaged in this and omit any reference to the Monument." The 

regional director echoed the thoughts often expressed by Johnwill Faris when he concluded: "By 

the time the [spaceport] proposal is final, the National Park Service will be overwhelmed." [47]

No sooner had the NPS begun its investigation of the effect of the space program on White 

Sands than did the astronaut John Glenn announce upon his return from orbit in February 1962 

that the gypsum dunes were "my most fabulous sight." The park service had entered into 

negotiations with the Defense Department to revise the 20-year special-use permit, in light of the 

vastly expanded needs of the spaceport. Superintendent Benson realized new constraints on his 

own staff within their own monument as interest accelerated in military usage. When his rangers 

were challenged upon entry into the latest impact zone, the WSMR commander ordered that they 

be escorted by military police. "Although I asked if this project could not be accomplished 

elsewhere on the [missile] range," said Benson, "[General Shinkle] made no commitment to 
cancel the mission. " The superintendent then registered the complaint that "this matter of having 

to call on the General appears to be a continuing harassing procedure." Nonetheless, constant 

pressure on military encroachment made them aware of the NPS presence. "We cannot 

physically stop their activity," Benson admitted, "but with repeated contacts they may soon 

realize that the entire basin is not theirs to do with as they wish." [48]

Whatever the mission of the park service, the political and civic leadership of New Mexico saw 

in the space program the economic stimulus they needed to lift the state from its fiscal doldrums. 

Ignoring former President Eisenhower's admonition in January 1961 to avoid dependence upon 

the "military-industrial complex," Tularosa basin boosters invested in the space port the same 

energy that they had shown in the 1930s when New Deal spending came with the formation of 

White Sands National Monument. Senator Clinton Anderson, long a champion of federal 

spending for science and technology in New Mexico, called upon Defense and Interior officials 

to explain their "conflicting stories" about the "space port affair." Colonel Lambert, Holloman 

AFB commander, had told the powerful senator that the Air Force had "no plans" to seek access 

to monument lands. Forrest Benson reported to his superiors: "There may be no plans, but the 

attached news clipping indicates somebody is thinking in terms of a spaceport." He then 

discovered in July 1962 that "more and more items are appearing in the local papers concerning 

increased military activities in the area adjacent to the monument." These local media had also 

detected rising hostility toward the park service, said Benson, because they feared that the NPS 

"may curtail some of this activity involving monument lands, to the detriment of the local 

economy." [49]

Research into the extension and expansion of the special-use permit ranged far and wide in 1962 

and early 1963. In an effort to accommodate the Air Force's position, Washington officials of the 

park service raised the rhetorical question: Why did the NPS want access to Lake Lucero and the 

Alkali Flats? The regional office in Santa Fe combed their records, only to find no 

"determinations for locating the original boundary to include the Flats." An additional discovery 

was that no evidence existed "to determine geologically which lands within the boundary need to 

be retained to perpetuate the formation of the gypsum sands." The regional office did learn that a 

similar study scheduled in 1944 had been cancelled, and they also uncovered Johnwill Faris' 

comment that year that the NPS could delete 79 sections of land without harming the ecological 

and aesthetic integrity of the monument. Faris by 1950 had reduced that prediction to 64 sections 

of land. By 1962, the park service realized that it would have to defend retention of all 149,000 

acres of the monument in the face of national security and political economy imperatives. Thus 

Thomas Allen agreed on March 6 that, "should it be asked for, consideration can be given to 

issuing the military authorities a permit for use of . . . Alkali Flat." The regional director hoped 

that this would not include "installation of large structures," and that the park service "could 

resume use of that land when and if military programs no longer needed it." Allen conceded the 

weakness of the NPS vis-a-vis the military, however, stating his confusion over the Air Force's 

denial to Clinton Anderson about use of White Sands. Not only had the local media detailed this, 

but Allen also had "confirmation . . . as printed and widely distributed in the Rocket Association 

magazine and newspapers." [50]

Superintendent Benson confronted this lack of NPS support squarely in August 1962 when he 

paid a courtesy call at WSMR on the new commander, Major General J. F. Thorlin. Since the 
Interior department had no leverage with the Pentagon, Thorlin's chief of plans, B.H. Ferdig, told 

Benson bluntly: "It is time we quit dealing under the table and legalize our premeditated 

encroachments." Ferdig conceded that "[the Army's] attitude toward lands not owned by their 

agency was in need of considerable improvement," and he feared that the NPS would "give a 

poor recommendation as to their [WSMR's] compliance with permit restrictions." The chief of 

plans revealed, however, the inevitability of Kennedy's space and weapons programs. "With the 

proposed firing from Blanding, Utah, into the White Sands Missile Range," said Benson , "there 

is no assurance that such missiles will not fall on the monument." Then Ferdig confided in 

Benson about the massive scale of land use planned for the Apollo moon project. Said the chief 

of plans: "If you think we are taking over your monument, wait until NASA gets into operation." 

Benson returned to White Sands outraged at how "the Defense agencies continue to plan and 

program their projects, then apologize when they are caught." He knew that "apologies wear a 

little thin after repeated occurrences," and asked his superiors to "help prevent this gradual 

attrition of our area." [51]

The year 1963 marked the nadir of White Sands' relationship with the space program. For the 

military, NASA, and New Mexican political and civic leaders, however, that year was one of 

giddy expectations for economic development. Interior secretary Stewart Udall remembered 

three decades later that the military, flush with appropriations from Congress and just entering 

the protracted conflict in Southeast Asia, was "powerful and popular." The Pentagon could 

usually "get what they wanted," said Udall, and his park service "had to fight back and stop the 

military." A critical example for Udall came in the spring of 1963, when JFK's Defense and 

Interior staffs sought closure on the White Sands special-use permit. The draft from the 

Pentagon, said Thomas Allen, "would give carte blanche use of the eleven western sections of 

[the monument] . . . , an area of about 150 square miles." This would leave the NPS with 72 

square miles, less than one-third the original size of the park. Allen commiserated with Udall's 

unenviable position "to strike a balance between the importance of certain national defense 

activities and the preservation of a natural area having scientific value that exists only when 

unchanged." [52]

Any hope that the park service could forestall the space juggernaut was dashed in the spring of 

1963 when the White House announced a planned visit by President Kennedy that June to 

WSMR. This came on the heels of a story published in March in a Washington journal called 

Insider's Newsletter. The prestigious trade publication quoted NASA officials as studying the 

transferral of the manned space flight center from Cape Canaveral, Florida, to the Tularosa basin. 

Evidence of this was a plan to launch and retrieve a Gemini spacecraft in 1964 from Alkali Flats. 

In the euphoria generated by this news, Clinton Anderson told the Alamogordo Daily News that 

Kennedy "wanted to see for himself what New Mexico senators and representatives have insisted 

is the best area for landing space vehicles in return flights from other planets." As proof of the 

wisdom of such personal contacts, Anderson remarked that JFK's visit in December 1962 to the 

Los Alamos and Sandia research laboratories "had a fine effect on nuclear programs and I hope 

his White Sands visit will likewise stimulate space activities." [53]

Forrest Benson did not share the enthusiasm of his colleagues at WSMR and in the city of 

Alamogordo. He read in the Insider's Newsletter where Anderson dismissed allegations of 

political influences, saying: "The decision as to where space projects are located will depend on 
scientific decisions and what is best for the space program and the U.S. Treasury . . . [and] not on 

my being on the Senate Space Committee or [U.S. Representative] Tom Morris [D-NM] . . . on 

the House Space Committee." The superintendent also learned from the local media that "no

mention is made of a possible conflicting land use in the middle of this space port proposal." 

Thomas Allen asked that NPS officials intercede on behalf of White Sands, as he had the 

"impression that one thing will lead to another very swiftly for new use and that the integrity if 

not the very existence of the National Monument is being weighed." Allen cited to his superiors 

in Washington the Anderson quotes, noting how the state's congressional delegation hoped to 

"explain the program to the President on the ground." The regional director then pleaded: 

"Perhaps the National Monument's importance could also be brought to [Kennedy's] attention 

before he arrives." [54]

When the president came to southern New Mexico on June 5, Forrest Benson had little time to 

speak on behalf of his monument. The primary concern was the fitness of WSMR for the Apollo 

program, part of the aura surrounding Kennedy as he basked in public opinion approval ratings 

of 65 percent. His schedule fell behind as the day progressed, and Benson reported that 

Kennedy's staff cancelled the trip to Alkali Flats. The visit, however, led New Mexico governor 

Edwin Mechem to appoint a committee of influential people to encourage the selection of 

WSMR as the primary spaceport site. The group came to the dunes in August 1963, where 

Benson provided them with "an explanation of the position of the Service as to this nonconforming use." Two months later the monument hosted the "National Parks Advisory Board," 

which learned first-hand of the military-NPS relationship. All that this official attention could 

accomplish, however, was a promise by Washington staff that "an integrated geologicalecological study... is the top priority research project in the proposed [NPS] research program for 

the Southwest Region." [55]

Forrest Benson did not remain at White Sands long enough to see the results of his hectic threeyear relationship with the military and space programs. In January 1964, he was detailed to the 

Washington headquarters to serve as the NPS "representative on the 'Wild Rivers' recreation area 

studies," an offshoot of the Wilderness Act passed that year. The park service sent as acting 

superintendent a Southwest Region employee, Lawrence C. Hadley, to manage the monument. 

Donald Dayton, who would assume Hadley's duties later that October, recalled how volatile the 

position of White Sands superintendent had become. Stewart Udall, said Dayton, had wanted to 

"kick out" the military from the dunes. The Defense installations, however, did not change their 

tune under Hadley or Dayton. One example was the discovery in February 1964 of trash dumps 

amid the dunes in the northeast quadrant of the park. Chief Ranger Hugh Beattie reported that 

month being stopped while on patrol by "two investigators from the House Appropriations 

Committee," while another NPS patrol in March was questioned on monument grounds by "a

civilian employee" of WSMR who "asked for security clearance badge and other identification." 

These interceptions also boded ill for plans to expand back-country hiking in areas targeted for 

missile impacts, despite the aforementioned rise of interest in camping and wilderness access to 

the rest of the monument. [56]

By the mid-1960s, tensions between the missile range and White Sands seemed to subside. 

Impacts still occurred with great regularity (the "Lance" program sent ten missiles over the dunes 

in the summer of 1965), and a range fire of 150 acres broke out in June 1965 when a missile 
exploded south of the monument boundary. But that April the Army agreed to provide Donald 

Dayton with money to pay for a six-month ranger position detailed exclusively for recovery 

work. The military also began use of helicopters to carry out missile debris, which reduced 

substantially the damage to the dunes caused by ground vehicles like the 20-ton crane used by 

WSMR to lift missile fragments onto flatbed trucks. The only difficulty with helicopter recovery 

was the escalating demand for their use in Vietnam, where U.S. forces needed them for troop 

transport in that jungle conflict. [57]

The war in Vietnam also ironically shifted the burden on White Sands away from advanced 

weaponry. Primarily fought by ground troops and pilots using conventional weapons, the war 

effort required less funding for sophisticated and experimental technology as that under study at 

WSMR. This did not lessen the intrusions, however, nor the cycle of official apology for 

recovery crew abuse of the dunes. Especially annoying was the phenomenon of "sonic booms," 

where loud noises from high speed aircraft shattered the silence over the dunes. But records for 

White Sands show a decline in staff complaints, perhaps due in part to general acceptance of the 

circumstances surrounding joint-use. Thus it was interesting for Superintendent Dayton in 1966 

to work closely with NASA on "the final test of the Apollo moon probe escape system." Dayton 

called this "the first large-scale NASA test" for White Sands, and he remarked that "the NASA 

people were very cooperative in abiding by the Special Use Agreement and the restrictions that 

we laid down." The project, which involved firing a "Little Joe" booster rocket from WSMR, 

"received nationwide press coverage." Dayton called NASA "much more cooperative than many 

of the organizations testing missiles in the monument in the past." He also learned from NASA 

something that military personnel had refused to admit: that "this area was not now a strong 

contender [for a spaceport] since the alkali flat runs north and south rather than in the east-west 

direction needed for any future landing spot for orbiting space vehicles." [58]

Figure 53. Greeting visitors at old portal entrance at Visitors Center (1960).

Photograph first printed in New Mexico Magazine.

(Courtesy Museum of New Mexico. Negative No. 56438)
The same features of national security that stimulated military and NASA encroachment onto 

White Sands also hindered a generation's efforts to create a monument at nearby Trinity Site to 

the first testing of nuclear weaponry. This proved to be less contentious than missile impacts, but 

no less frustrating for NPS officials eager to meet public demand after 1945 for access to 

"Ground Zero." Interest in the site, proposed in the 1940s as the "Atomic Bomb National 

Monument," the "Trinity Atomic National Monument" in the early 1950s, and finally in the 

1960s as "Trinity National Historic Site," ebbed and flowed according to organizational dictates. 

Yet the journey of this historical location mirrored challenges facing White Sands National 

Monument: eagerness of local boosters to acquire another federally funded tourist attraction; 

NPS officials divided on the historic merits of the site; ecological constraints typical of the 

Tularosa basin; and national security policies at odds with the preservation ethic of the park 

service.

Once the Interior secretary, Harold Ickes, had made known his desire to create the atomic 

monument in late 1945, local interests approached New Mexico's political leadership for help. 

Clinton Anderson, then-secretary of Agriculture (1945-1948), wrote to Oscar L. Chapman, 

assistant secretary of the Interior, in January 1946 to include in the plans for the monument the 

B-29 bomber that had flown over Hiroshima; Governor John J. Dempsey further promoted the 

concept, agreeing to release whatever rights-of way that the park service needed across state 

lands in the basin to provide access to the park. NPS officials were less eager to include the 

George McDonald ranch house, where J. Robert Oppenheimer and his Manhattan Project 

colleagues had assembled the final version of the atomic device prior to its July 16, 1945, 

explosion.

The War Department signaled its support for these efforts in 1946, but wanted to use the B-29 

bomber in atomic testing at the Pacific Ocean site of Bikini Atoll. Thus the legislation introduced 

in the Senate by New Mexico's Carl Hatch (S. 2054) to display the bomber near Alamogordo 

received no support from the Army. [59]

A series of meetings took place between officials of the NPS, Army, state of New Mexico, and 

the recently created Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) to negotiate the terms of the atomic 

monument's creation. By May 1946, the El Paso Herald-Post reported: "Park officials say the site 

in Southern New Mexico may be opened to public inspection within a year." More reason for 

optimism came in June, when Secretary of War Robert Patterson named Major General Leslie A. 

Groves as his representative to the interagency monument committee. Groves' stature as military 

director of the Manhattan Project lent credibility to the park service plan, given the rumors 

already circulating that the Army would invoke national security as its rationale for refusal to 

release the land to the NPS . Groves himself could not attend committee meetings , but informed 

regional officials that his representative, Colonel Lyle E. Seeman, would "extend to you the full 

cooperation of the Manhattan Project in the establishment of this National Monument." [60]

General Groves' endorsement of the park did not reflect the thinking of the Los Alamos staff 

who met on July 31, 1946 with NPS officials from Santa Fe. The concerns of the Army would 

persist throughout the Cold War, primarily because of its desire to restrict access to the Tularosa 

basin indefinitely. Regional director Tillotson learned at that meeting that the Army had already 

ordered "that all of the reinforcing steel and steel supports remaining from the tower which 
supported the bomb have been removed and destroyed." The Army feared "that someone would 

chip off portions of the radio-active steel and suffer harm thereby." Tillotson, in a reaction that 

would occur often in military relations with White Sands, surmised that "certainly one of the 

most spectacular exhibits in connection with the explosion has already been lost." [61]

Even as the NPS worried about gaining access to restricted military land, it also unwittingly 

faced the moral dilemma of the nuclear age: Should the nation commemorate the destruction of 

innocent Japanese civilians following nuclear testing at Trinity? C. Edward Graves, of Carmel, 

California, wrote to the NPS headquarters (still housed in its wartime offices in Chicago) to 

question "whether you have given thorough consideration to the controversial nature of this 

action." Graves cited unnamed citizens , "some of the top men in the Navy and Army, who 

consider the dropping of the bombs on the Japanese cities a national disgrace." Predicting the 

ambiguous future that nuclear energy and weapons would have, Graves concluded: "Personally, 

in view of the world tragedy that may develop from the use of atomic power, I should have no 

feeling of pride, or even of curiosity, in visiting such a spot." Hillory Tolson, acting NPS director 

, replied that the park service wished only to "emphasize in contrast to [the bomb's] . . . 

destructive potentialities . . . the medical and other constructive gains which atomic energy 

makes possible." Tolson also hoped that Graves would believe that the monument "will 

determine mankind to use atomic power only for peaceful ends." [62]

The opinions of antinuclear critics like Edward Graves had less impact on the progress of the 

monument than did military control of Trinity Site. In January 1947, park service officials had 

identified an area of roughly 4,500 acres that they asked President Truman to proclaim the 

"Atomic Bomb National Monument." Authority for such a declaration came from the Antiquities 

Act (1906), but President Roosevelt's Executive Order No. 9029 (January 1942) creating the 

Alamogordo bombing range stood in the way. Truman thus failed to sign the proclamation as 

drafted, and the War Department further clouded title to the land by transferring Trinity Site on 

January 1, 1947, to the AEC. Then the military's demand for 3.5 million acres for the Ordcit 

Project cast a pall not only over White Sands, but also over the NPS planners who believed that 

the AEC would release Trinity by the end of 1948. [63]

An example of the caution adopted by NPS officials over Trinity Site came in a report from 

Ronald F. Lee, chief historian, who visited the Tularosa basin in September 1947. "The approach 

is long, desolate, and forbidding," said Lee, and "Trinity Camp is like a wind-blown desert 

outpost," He found "the physical evidences of the preparation for the experiment and of the 

explosion . . . fascinating and disturbing." As an historian, Lee noted also the "unexpected 

evidence of the human side" of the site. "Some of the scientists' names," he discovered, "are 

written in pencil on the unpainted wood above their stations inside the bunkers." Lee also found 

that "elsewhere , calculations appear in pencil - possibly last minute notes of things to attend to." 

Lee saved his greatest enthusiasm for the McDonald ranch house, especially its "two long tables 

made of composition board and unpainted wood." Clearly not sharing Edward Graves' 

repugnance at the artifacts of nuclear history , Lee predicted: "On these unimpressive tables it 

may well be, something far more important took place than the sort of signing of public 

documents which has elevated so many politicians' desks to American museums." Lee pleaded 

with his superiors to press for "the immediate issuance of an Executive Proclamation," protection 
of the cultural resources, and re-establishment of the interagency committee to decide on the 

timetable for transfer of Trinity Site to the park service. [64]

That timetable lengthened as the nation pursued its diplomatic policy of containment against 

Communism, and its use of the Tularosa basin to prepare for nuclear confrontation. The AEC 

showed little interest in protecting the cultural and ecological resources of Trinity, and made no 

moves to reconstitute the oversight panel mentioned by Chief Historian Lee. Johnwill Faris 

wrote to his superiors on several occasions about the loss of "trinitite" from the Ground Zero 

section (a Chevron gasoline station in nearby Socorro sold samples to its customers for fifty 

cents), and wondered in November 1950 whether "an attempt should be made to secure some 

material from the Atomic Bomb Site before it is all gone." White Sands, where NPS employees 

first learned of the nuclear explosion, had no trinitite, said Faris, even though "I understand that 

anyone can crawl through a fence and pick up all they want." The superintendent was greatly 

surprised to learn from Tillotson that he should display no trinitite at his museum. "This material 

is entirely extraneous to the story of the monument," said Tillotson, and offered as his rationale: 

"It would be just as illogical to exhibit a small model of an atomic bomb at Bandelier National 

Monument, simply because the area is close to Los Alamos." [65]

The thinking of Tillotson and other NPS officials coincided with that of the AEC more than it 

did park employees like Johnwill Faris. Dr. Paul Pearson, of the AEC division of biology and 

medicine, conducted his own study in 1951 of the bomb crater. In a telephone conversation with 

acting NPS chief historian Charles W. Porter III, Pearson informed the park service that his 

agency saw little historical value at the site. "Apparently," Porter told the NPS director, "the 

[Atomic Energy] Commission would like to cover the whole thing up, although there is nothing 

particularly dangerous about the spot now." Pearson then stunned Porter by stating "that 

contracts had been let for bulldozing the trinitite into trenches." The AEC believed that "there 

was little above ground to be seen by the public," and that "part of the equipment or detonating 

and measuring mechanism might be found at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, at the [AEC] Museum." 

Pearson did offer to give the NPS 100 pounds of trinitite "in the event that an atomic bomb 

national monument should ever be established," but he preferred that the park service "cover up 

the trinitite and plan to mark the site rather than to think of it as a future [park unit]." [66]

Indicative of the NPS's resignation over Trinity was Ronald Lee's response to Pearson. The park 

service "regrets" the AEC decision to bulldoze the trinitite, said the chief historian, but agreed 

that "the Commission is the best judge of the need for these precautions," and asked only that the 

100 pounds of trinitite be sent "in a safe and suitable container for preservation" to the Santa Fe 

regional office. Less amenable was New Mexico governor Edwin Mechem, long a champion of 

White Sands. The Alamogordo native expressed his outrage at the AEC in a telegram published 

on March 4, 1952, in the Santa Fe New Mexican. Mechem wired the Washington office of the 

AEC to protest its award of the $23,600 earthmoving contract. "Believe this site ranks 

historically as one of the century's most talked-of places," said the governor. Mechem understood 

the AEC's reasoning that the "present world emergency and military uses of adjacent areas would 

preclude immediate establishment of monument." He asked that the contract be delayed, and 

another meeting of interagency personnel be held to examine the fate of Trinity Site. [67]
Mechem's commitment to the cause of the atomic bomb monument did not end with his telegram 

to Washington. On March 10, 1952, U.S. Representative Antonio M. Fernandez (D-NM) 

introduced H. 6953 to create the monument, subject to negotiations with the AEC and Defense 

department. Two days later, Mechem called into his Santa Fe offices three members of the LosAlamos based commission, plus George Fitzpatrick, editor of the New Mexico Magazine, and 

Melvin Drake, director of the state tourism bureau. M.R. Tillotson had learned of the meeting 

only the day before, and attended to present the park service story. Dr. John Bugher of the AEC's 

Washington office spoke of the "health hazard" posed by trinitite, which as it "weathers and 

becomes powdered . . . presents an inhalation problem . . . [and] has a tendency to cause lung 

cancer." Bugher informed Mechem that his agency was "keenly alive to its medical-legal 

responsibilities and would be held negligent if the rapidly disintegrating trinitite on the ground 

were not properly disposed of." The governor then asked Tillotson if the NPS still had an interest 

in the monument, to which the regional director replied in the affirmative. This convinced 

Mechem to press for the Fernandez bill, arguing that New Mexico had much to gain in publicity 

and federal spending if the AEC would change its mind. [68]

The March 12 meeting had repercussions in Washington, where on April 2, Representative 

Fernandez called to his office Senator Anderson, Representative Dempsey, a staff member for 

Senator Chavez, as well as prominent officials of the Defense Department, AEC, and NPS 

director Conrad L. Wirth. All agreed that Congress should authorize creation of the atomic 

monument, even though "opening it to public use may not be feasible for some years." The NPS 

would resurvey the 1945 boundaries, in light of military needs, and also negotiate how much 

trinitite to preserve and how much to destroy. The AEC and Defense department would share 

responsibility for security of the site, and proceed with an interagency agreement to transfer the 

land to the NPS at some future date. [69]

A series of site visits, memoranda, and news stories followed these meetings in Santa Fe and 

Washington, all hopeful that Governor Mechem's demand for a new monument could be 

fulfilled. The Alamogordo chamber of commerce scheduled the first of many automobile 

caravans to Trinity in early September 1953, in order to show the public the value of the site, and 

also convince the AEC and military of the wisdom of providing public access. But the 

momentum faded in light of the ever-present security imperatives. T.E. Raynor, a free-lance 

writer in Albuquerque, summed up well the realities of Trinity Site in a story for the Arizona 

Republic: "The hitch is still that the site remains under jurisdiction of the defense department." 

The AEC informed Mechem on the eighth anniversary of the atomic test (July 16, 1953), that it 

had removed extra trinitite and had reseeded the bomb crater, as per the interagency negotiations. 

The agency then returned management of the site to the Air Force, terminating its "direct interest 

in this subject." [70]

Attention to the creation of the monument all but disappeared for the next dozen years. No 

official activity commemorated the tenth anniversary of the atomic test (1955), although 

Johnwill Faris reported in February that one of his rangers, Gilbert Wenger, "is currently 

working on a chart of the Atomic Bomb Site which is a very interesting subject in the area and 

one about which we get many questions." Not until the advent of the bomb's twentieth 

anniversary did the idea of a park service unit (labelled the "Trinity National Historic Site," or 

TNHS) reappear. Ironically, it came from AEC chief historian Richard Hewlett, who ranked 
"Trinity Site [in] first place in his listing of five sites recommended by the AEC's Historical 

Advisory Committee for [National] Landmark status." A park service report that year spoke to 

the deterioration of the site a decade after the end of AEC involvement. "The Army's destruction 

of the three command bunkers," said the NPS report, "understandable as a safety measure, is an 

irreparable catastrophe in terms of historic preservation." The report writer, the beneficiary of 

two decades' distance from the paranoia of the early Cold War, predicted that "someday, 20, 30, 

40, 50 years hence, this site [which the author labeled 'as a part of the world's heritage'] will be 

free of present restrictions, and historically it will be even more important than it is now." [71]

From this renewed emphasis on Trinity came one last effort to establish a monument: S . 288, 

introduced on January 12, 1967, by New Mexico Democratic senators Clinton Anderson and 

Joseph Montoya. The senior senator, whose relationship with White Sands had begun nearly 

thirty years earlier with the pageant for the Coronado Cuarto Centennial Commission, called for 

the AEC, park service, and Defense department to share identification of "the structures, objects, 

and lands within the White Sands Missile Range meriting preservation." The remaining language 

in the legislation echoed earlier proposals for Defense to protect the cultural and ecological 

features of the site, and to guarantee transfer to the park service "when the Secretary of Defense 

determines that it is consistent with national security to do so." [72]

Anderson's bill would prove no more successful than previous efforts to set aside the location of 

America's entry into the nuclear age. The park service asked Donald Dayton to become its 

liaison, or "project keyman," with TNHS. This followed a recent policy that would insure that 

"each new area proposal is the personally assigned responsibility of a man in the field." In 

defining his task, Dayton asked his superiors: "I would appreciate instructions on how actively to 

pursue the project at this time." He conducted several surveys of the records, walked the area of 

the site, and interviewed military personnel. Yet in a departure from conclusions drawn by NPS 

officials, Dayton's recommendation reflected the realities he knew so well as superintendent of 

White Sands. He wished neither to fight the Army and Air Force, nor acquiesce to their power, 

but to devise "a way around military opposition to the pending legislation [SB 288]." Instead of 

trying to wedge the park service into the middle of the missile range, Dayton called for 

construction of a visitors center along U.S. Highway 380 north of Trinity. "There are several 

excellent viewpoints along this highway," said Dayton, "from which the general area of the blast 

site is visible." In addition, the site offered a panorama of the "broad open valley and the 

mountain range behind the blast site." Visitors could receive "a unique interpretive story. . . from 

an observation deck" at such a facility, and "periodic automobile or bus caravans" could depart 

for the actual site. [73]

It was fitting that the Cold War generation would close at White Sands with Don Dayton's 

skeptical reports on his discussions with missile range and airbase staff about Trinity Site. 

Dayton was in the midst of drafting a "master plan" for White Sands, an he asked the NPS 

review team to include Trinity as part of their work. Brigadier General H.G. Davisson, WSMR 

commander, claimed that the site still housed "classified" research and testing programs. His 

chief of facilities planning, B.H. Ferdig , disliked the ironic phenomena of tour groups coming to 

the range looking for the test site, even as "Ban the Bomb' Movements" wanted to protest the 

immorality of the nuclear age. To Ferdig, Trinity represented a "nuisance factor" compounded by 

AEC tests that showed high levels of radiation (50 percent above acceptable) at and near Ground 
Zero. Speaking prophetically as well as historically, Dayton reported in July 1967 that only 

"increasing public pressure" would change conditions and make Trinity National Historic Site a 

reality. [74]

Figure 54. Desert Maneuvers by the U.S. Army (1960s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
CHAPTER SIX: A BRAVE NEW WORLD:

WHITE SANDS AND THE CLOSE OF THE 20th CENTURY, 

1970-1994

Promotional literature for White Sands National Monument, from the days of Tom Charles to the 

end of the twentieth century, portrayed the enduring and timeless character of the dunes. Daniel 

Pyne, a movie scriptwriter from Santa Fe, would explain to New Mexico Magazine in May 1992 

that he chose the gypsum deposits for the location shooting of his murder mystery, "White 

Sands," "because [the monument] lends the film a mystical quality, a direct honesty and stark 

beauty that is indigenous to the West." This fascination with the dunes' ecology, echoing stories 

from the National Geographic and other major publications, conveyed to audiences worldwide 

the features of peace and quiet that became more precious, and more elusive, in the tumultuous 

years after 1970. Thus it did not surprise the readers of the Alamogordo Daily News when 

columnist Jack Moore wrote in June 1994 that Superintendent Dennis Ditmanson would host 

three Hollywood film companies that summer, among them industry giants MGM and Walt 

Disney Productions. [1]

Moore's story, however, highlighted other, more mundane issues that New Mexico Magazine (the 

state's official tourist publication) chose to ignore: the cost of another generation of heavy 

visitation, military encroachment, and the competing uses of America's natural resources. Added 

to this was the erosion of federal financial support for the national parks, a consequence of public 

dissatisfaction with government, a dislike of paying taxes, and successful political rhetoric to 

diminish the role of federal agencies in providing services that the American people had come to 

expect and demand. Jack Moore did note that the administration of President Bill Clinton sought 

to make good on its promise to eliminate by 1997 252,000 federal positions. Pete V. Domenici, 

the powerful New Mexico Republican senator, had promised to seek substantial increases in the 

fiscal year 1994 appropriation for White Sands. Yet even the former chairman of the U.S. Senate 

Budget Committee could not overcome the imperatives of budget reductions. "There are a lot of 

things that we could be doing," Ditmanson concluded in his interview with Moore, "that would 

encourage people to spend more time in Alamogordo and provide for better utilization of the 

[White Sands] resource." [2]

The historical forces that touched White Sands from 1970 to 1994 were complex and slow to 

emerge from the confusion of generational change at home and around the world. The "baby 

boom" of young families reached its crest in the 1970s, when the children of postwar America 

became adults. They opted for fewer children of their own, thus reducing the overall population 

growth in the 1980s. This in turn led to economic constraints, as the American consumer devoted 

more attention to income maintenance. Ironically, this did not impact White Sands dramatically, 

as these same years witnessed the continuation of the postwar "Sunbelt" migration from colder 

climates and large urban centers of the North and East, to the open spaces and sunny weather of 

the South and West. Military maneuvers also affected management at the monument. 

Withdrawal of U.S. ground forces from Vietnam in the early 1970s had led military strategists to 

place further emphasis on air power, making missiles and high-speed, high-altitude aircraft even 

more critical to America's national security. Finally, the twin "energy crises" of 1973 and 1979, 

where Americans learned of the power of Arab oil-exporting nations to control supply and price 
for petroleum products, led the Pentagon to prepare for war in the deserts of the Middle East. 

Thus White Sands would witness another generation of weapons testing, with its encroachment 

upon the environment, and disruption of daily life at the dunes. [3]

Studying White Sands in these years reveals the dichotomy of federal policies of preservation

versus use of nature's bounty. The NPS worked with a host of federal regulatory and resource 

agencies to protect the historic and ecological treasures of the Tularosa basin, all the while 

coping with the now-decades-old intrusion of military flights, missile impacts, and recovery 

crews. Then in 1969 the New Mexico State Department of Game and Fish decided to introduce 

"exotic" game animals into the Tularosa basin. Jack Turney, superintendent from 1967-1973, 

met with Frank Hibben of the department to discuss the latter's desire to turn loose a herd of 

African gemsbok, or "oryx," onto White Sands Missile Range. Hibben, also a professor of 

archeology at the University of New Mexico, wanted to increase sport hunting in the state to 

attract well-heeled visitors willing to pay hefty fees to take game animals. The oryx were meant 

to replace antelope introduced by Game and Fish in the early 1940s, which in turn had been 

strafed by Army and Air Force pilots flying training missions over the dunes. The oryx also had 

no natural predators in the basin and consumed much of the ground cover that could have 

sustained more indigenous animals. By the 1990s this animal had numbered 2,000, posing 

potential threats to backcountry hikers and at times being spotted near the picnic grounds in the 

Heart of the Sands. [4]

The oryx invasion ironically ran counter to the larger national effort to mitigate the effects of a 

rapidly industrializing society known as the "environmental movement." Promoted in 1970 with 

such events as the first "Earth Day" (April 22), and the creation of the Environmental Protection 

Agency (EPA), this movement fit the "preservation" ethic of White Sands and the NPS. One 

reads Jack Turney's goals for the monument in 1970-1971 and realizes how easy it could have 

been for the park service to protect natural resources. A high profile program instituted at the 

dunes was the "National Environmental Study Area" (ESA) concept, where the park service 

joined with nearby public schools to promote field research in ecology and in "man's relations 

with the environment." Two areas of White Sands received students under the ESA program: 

Garton Lake for "aquatic ecology," and Big Pedestal for "dune ecology." Also demonstrating the 

uniqueness of the dunes was Turney's hiring of young Mescalero Apache students for the NPS' 

"Indian Conservation Officer" program. The superintendent sent one Mescalero to the NPS' 

Albright Training Center at the Grand Canyon, hoping to bring to White Sands a sense of 

Apache traditions of environmental awareness. [5]

As imaginative and thoughtful as these programs were (the Mescalero hiring reversed the early 

1960s banishment of Apache mint-bush pickers), they could not compensate in the early 1970s 

for the ever-present military usage of the monument. Dietmar Schneider-Hector wrote 

disapprovingly of Jack Turney's procedures in the White Sands Wilderness Area study of 1972, 

claiming that rejection by the Pentagon, local civic boosters, and eventually the regional and 

national NPS was "a startling revelation for the National Park Service because the outcome 

revealed its limited control over [White Sands]." Schneider-Hector, however, did not place the 

wilderness study in the context of ongoing military intrusion, nor did he compare Turney's work 

on wilderness with a similar effort in 1970 to bring Trinity Site into the park service. [6]
Figure 55. Visitors preparing for nature trail hike (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

That year marked the twenty-fifth anniversary of the first atomic test in the New Mexico desert. 

Since the NPS had helped the Army in 1965 to create national landmark status for Trinity, the 

park service had relied upon White Sands personnel to prepare a case for park status. In March 

1970, Jack Turney and other NPS officials released a "master plan" for Trinity that estimated 

attendance at 150,000 annually. The plan called for construction of a visitors center about six 

miles south of Ground Zero (the "South 10,000" bunker site), where patrons would receive

interpretative information and have access to NPS facilities. A road would be paved from the 

center to the McDonald ranch house, where the final assembly of the atomic device would be 

depicted. From there the visitor would drive the two to three miles north to the bomb crater, 

which would require reconstruction in light of Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) contract work 

in the 1950s to remove the trinitite. Hiking trails would fan out from Ground Zero to other 

observation bunkers, and exit routes would take visitors north to U.S. Highway 380, completing 

the trek across the old "Jornada del Muerto" of Spanish renown. [7]

Jack Turney recalled years later the irony of Trinity and the 1970s. The concept had been 

blocked for a generation by military domination of the Tularosa basin; a condition that would 

doom the 25th anniversary plan. Contributing to its demise, however , was an unlikely partner to 

the military: antinuclear and antiwar protestors. The spring of 1970 witnessed convulsions of 

dissent on American college campuses, first against the "secret" bombing of Cambodia ordered 

by President Richard M. Nixon, and then the shooting by Ohio National Guard troops on May 4 

of four young people at Kent State University, itself the target of antiwar demonstrations. The 

NPS believed that public attention drawn to the atomic bomb in the midst of such upheaval 
would only generate more violence, and thus quietly shelved a plan that the U.S. Army, itself the 

focus of antiwar demonstrators, had never wanted in the first place. [8]

Because Schneider-Hector failed to chronicle the troubled journey of Trinity Site as a national 

park unit in the midst of the WSMR, his analysis of the wilderness study for White Sands 

requires some reinterpretation. The 1964 wilderness legislation had prompted in 1971 the 

"roadless area" studies known as RARE (Roadless Area Review and Evaluation). The national 

parks under director George Hartzog had moved to classify the recreational, aesthetic, and 

ecological value of units such as White Sands. The park included 118,700 acres of potential 

RARE consideration (primarily Alkali Flat and the dunes), and merited the category of "Class 

IV," defined as an "outstanding natural area." Other parks in the region also had lands eligible for 

creation of wilderness areas: Bandelier, Great Sand Dunes, and Carlsbad Caverns. Thus 

supporters of the "roadless area" concept called for public hearings to gain support for the 

principle of preservation over development. [9]

The discrepancy between Jack Turney's memory and Schneider-Hector's reading of the evidence 

shows the challenge of grasping the meaning of White Sands, whether historically or 

scientifically. In 1972 the superintendent held a public meeting in Alamogordo to present details 

of the wilderness study plan. Schneider-Hector admitted that the majority of attendees did not 

reside in the Tularosa basin, which explained the majority vote in support of the plan. When 

Turney approached the local chamber of commerce, its members pointed out the clause that 

called for "a complete military evacuation of the Tularosa basin." While Schneider-Hector saw 

this as merely dependence upon military spending, the chamber viewed it as a threat to local 

control of the monument. The organization, whose ranks had included Tom Charles and Johnwill 

Faris, rejected the plan, and prevailed upon Frank Kowski, SWR director, to do the same in his 

report to Washington. Jack Turney did not see this action as Schneider-Hector described it ("a 

startling revelation") given his experience with the imperatives of national security and the desire 

of local boosters to sustain their connections to the Pentagon. He considered it a success that 

negotiations with WSMR removed 30,000 acres around Lake Lucero from targeting by 

"intentional impacts." Thus it is surprising to read Schneider-Hector's criticism of the NPS as 

weak and naive, then hear him say that "the military prevented the private and commercial 

exploitation and despoliation of the land surrounding the monument and its resources." [10]
Figure 56. Expanded museum displays in Visitors Center (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

While the wilderness study moved through the federal bureaucracy, yet another directive on 

environmental issues touched White Sands. On May 13, 1971, Richard Nixon signed Executive 

Order (EO) 11593, whose section 3(e) "directs the Secretary of the Interior to assist federal 

agencies with professional methods and techniques for preserving, improving, restoring and 

maintaining historical properties." The park service applied EO11593 to Trinity Site, and also to 

the Oliver Lee ranch property in Dog Canyon. Jack Turney and his successor, James Thomson 

(1973-1978), entered into yet another round of futile negotiations with the Army. While the 

results were predictable, the regional office finally recognized the struggle facing White Sands 

whenever the subject of Trinity National Historic Site surfaced. "I think that your handling of 

this situation has been exemplary," wrote Carl E. Walker, acting SWR director, to Thomson. 

Walker realized that "both you and Jack Turney bore the brunt of some hurt feelings and 

resentment in this matter." The acting director praised both superintendents because they 

"patiently and constructively healed the wounds and brought the White Sands Missile Range 

officials into the project as real participants." Walker then gave Turney and Thomson a word of 

high esteem: "That's good management in my book." [11]

Inclusion of the Dog Canyon structures in the EO11593 study raised an old question: how to 

maintain a facility 22 miles from monument headquarters that the park service had acquired for 

its access to water. Albert Schroeder, SWR interpretive specialist, walked through the area in 

1972 with Jack Turney and SWR naturalist Dave Petticord. They noted that the Disney film 

company had "stabilized" much of the ranch quarters for a 1970 movie, and that the State of New 

Mexico's Cultural Properties Review Committee (CPRC) had been given a National Register 

petition for the Lee ranch. The CPRC had voted against the nomination, concurring in earlier 

park service opinions not to restore the property. Schroeder concluded that "the area is not 
staffed to provide adequate protection for the Oliver Lee ranch," but conceded that a "final 

decision" on the nomination had yet to be reached. [12]

Schroeder's caution reflected divided thinking in the regional office about the merits of Dog 

Canyon and its historic properties. Dave Battle, SWR historical architect, and William "Bill" 

Brown, regional chief of history, believed that "enough original fabric exists that restoration 

could be accomplished." The historical staff contended "that the significance of the site would 

urge an override of the [CPRC's] recommendation," especially in light of plans to transfer all of 

Dog Canyon from the park service. Robert M. Utley, at this time the director of the NPS office 

of archeology and historic preservation, reviewed the White Sands master plan section on Dog 

Canyon in 1973, and called for a thorough analysis of its "wealth of aboriginal archeological 

remains" before taking any final action on the property. At this point, SWR's Richard W. Sellars 

disagreed, saying that the Lee ranch should be "abandoned and allowed to deteriorate." Sellars 

outlined a host of problems, among them "the relatively minor historical significance of the site," 

the Disney alterations, the isolated setting which posed "the unlikelihood that it would ever 

receive much visitation," and the perennial issue of "the expense of maintenance and 

impossibility of protection." The state of New Mexico, the intended recipient of Dog Canyon, 

disagreed with Sellars, as David King, state planning officer (and son of governor Bruce King) 

encouraged the NPS to press for National Register status and preservation (all of which would be 

funded by federal agencies). [13]

Figure 57. Science class participant in Enviornmental Study Area (ESA) Program (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

While the park staff studied the environmental and historical significance of White Sands, 

visitors continued to flock to the dunes for their own interests. Aiding the rise of attendance 
(which peaked in 1977 at 624,000) were such ideas as the proposal to include U.S. Highway 70 

in the national interstate highway system. James Thomson attended a public meeting in 

Alamogordo in May 1974 that discussed expansion of the route in front of the monument to four 

lanes, and make it part of a limited-access highway from Amarillo and Interstate 40 southwest to 

Las Cruces and Interstate 10. Thomson saw the plan as having merit, if it could eliminate the 

dangerous intersections at Holloman AFB and in front of his monument. Local attendees agreed 

that "safety and the increased tourism which would result" were reason enough to back the 

interstate proposal, though federal highway planners never acted upon the idea. [14]

Even without the highway upgrade, White Sands had its share in the 1970s of unusual visitor 

requests. The sport of "hang-gliding," in which individuals piloting lighter-than-air craft 

launched from high places and rode wind currents without reliance upon motorized equipment, 

came to the monument in 1974. One such glider took off from a dune, crashed and broke his 

arm, leading James Thomson to seek a ruling from NPS officials on park liability for such 

accidents. The park service decided that this fit under the category of "special-use permits," and 

encouraged Thomson to designate a secluded area of the dunes for hang-gliders. Less easy to 

satisfy were users like the New Mexico Motion Picture Industry Commission, and a Spanishlanguage class from Watson Junior High School in Colorado Springs. The former wanted access 

in 1975 to the dunes to film "Damnation Alley," and became upset when Thomson's staff 

required them to follow the permit procedure. Likewise Peggy Setter, a Spanish teacher from 

Colorado Springs, wrote to Senator Gary Hart of her home state, and New Mexico Senators Pete 

Domenici and Joseph Montoya, to complain of rude treatment. Her group had not specifically 

requested an education permit, causing some confusion when Setter's bus tour reached White 

Sands. Several of her students also wrote letters critical of monument staff and facilities, to 

which Superintendent Thomson offered his apologies and an explanation of NPS admission 

procedures. [15]

As White Sands moved closer to completion of a master plan for park management, concerns 

like film and group permits became less important than the sense that the military was easing its 

stand against Trinity National Historic Site. Humbled by the departure in 1975 of American 

forces from Vietnam, subject to close scrutiny by critics of military authority, and affected by 

budget reductions that would reach crisis proportions by 1980, Army officials sought ways to 

improve their image. Among these was a gesture of cooperation with the NPS to co-sponsor 

tours of Trinity Site for visitors. On the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the nuclear age 

(1975), the Army and park service prepared a plaque for a stone obelisk constructed near Ground 

Zero that noted Trinity's national historic landmark status. This mood of collaboration influenced 

discussions about extending the memorandum of agreement (MOA) for Army use of White 

Sands. The WSMR promised in 1977 to be conscious of archeological sites, to seek advance 

permission prior to construction of test facilities on monument lands, and to cease excluding 

NPS employees from the joint-use area. [16]

Along with this spirit of cooperation came the 1976 master plan for White Sands. Not only was 

the military in a more reflective mood, but the nation as a whole celebrated the "bicentennial" 

(two-hundredth anniversary) of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Historical 

themes saturated the public consciousness, and James Thomson's blueprint for White Sands 

spoke to a hopeful era of preservation and enhancement of the visitors' experience at the dunes. 
Among his major concerns was the lack of a thorough archeological and historical survey. 

Human Systems Research, Inc. (HSR), of Tularosa, had conducted an extensive survey of Dog 

Canyon for the National Register nomination, and had also provided a preliminary 

reconnaissance of the monument proper, as well as a search of literature pertinent to future 

documentary research. Thomson spoke of the success of the ESA program at Garton Lake and 

Big Pedestal, and called for expansion of this educational opportunity. The superintendent then 

moved to the most pressing features of management, asking for funds to move the entrance road 

to the west of the visitors center; closure of all non-essential military routes within the 

monument; return of Dog Canyon to the public domain; and a land exchange between the NPS 

and BLM of acreage around Garton Lake and the U.S. Highway 70 corridor. [17]

Figure 58. Opening reception for White Sands Juried Art Exhibit (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 59. Indian dancers prepare for performance (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Figure 60. Dunes wedding (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Whatever optimism that James Thomson detected in the mid-1970s evaporated as the decade 

drew to a close. Donald Harper came to White Sands as Thomson's replacement in 1978, 

embarking as superintendent upon a difficult journey for the next eleven years. Forces 

nationwide and within the Tularosa basin influenced Harper's actions, as did his own style of 

management. Not the least of these issues was the decline of financial support for government in 

general, and the NPS in particular, caused by the victory in the 1980 presidential election of 

Ronald Reagan over the incumbent, Jimmy Carter. Reagan, a conservative Californian who 

campaigned on a promise to restore American military supremacy, appointed as his secretary of 

the Interior James Watt, a conservative Wyoming lawyer and advocate of the return of western 

public lands to private ownership. Watt believed, in the words of Alfred Runte, that "what funds 

might be added to the existing park budget obviously would be spent on the access, comfort, and 

safety of park visitors rather than on the sanctity of park resources." Watt also preferred to 

support the high-visibility national parks of the West (the service's "crown jewels"), with funding 

reduced for other categories of the system. This would mean further deterioration of White 

Sands' physical plant, fewer career opportunities for staff, and reversion to recreational use of the 

park after the 1970s emphasis on historical meaning and ecological experiences. [18]

In his early years as park superintendent, Don Harper compiled the first of several management 

plans as per NPS regulations. His report of December 1981 revealed the shortfall between park 

needs and administration support. It also pointed out in microcosm the concerns expressed in the 

NPS document, State of the Parks-1980, that "external threats to the national parks posed the 

gravest danger to their resources throughout the 1980s and beyond." Yet where other NPS units 

faced obstacles that Runte described as "air and water pollution, energy development, and urban 

encroachment," White Sands added to this list the military and space buildup of the Reagan era. 

This had been designed to restore American pride in its armed forces, to halt the perceived 

resurgence of Communism worldwide, and to rejuvenate a national economy reeling in 1980 

from double-digit percentages of inflation and interest rates, exponential increases in energy 

prices, and a psychological drift or "malaise," in the words of President Jimmy Carter. [19]

The Harper plan for White Sands management lacked the sense of hope that had pervaded 

similar documents earlier in the 1970s, focusing instead upon the spread of African oryx, the 

growth of water-absorbing salt cedar (tamarisk) in the Garton Lake area, and the seepage of 

Holloman AFB sewage from its treatment ponds into Lost River, with a potential to enter the 

dunes' water table. Harper also noted that the 20 species of cactus on monument grounds 

appealed to thieves who took the plants from the dunes, and the infestation of Mexican Freetail 

bats in the residential compound, which could pose a danger of rabies and plague. Despite all 

this, visitor projections would continue to climb, with Harper predicting 790,000 visitors by 

1985, and a staggering 1.01 million by the turn of the century. [20]

The management plan thus underwent extensive review and revision at regional and national 

NPS headquarters. Melody Webb, SWR chief of history, noted that "the Mescalero and Fort Sill 

[Chiricahua] Apaches possibly visit WHSA for religious purposes." She asked Harper "to 

consider addressing this issue in connection with the American Indian Religious Freedom Act 

[1978]," as White Sands "needed to acquire the data to fulfill the act's mandate" to identify and 

protect Indian sacred places on public land. The Air Force also asked permission to conduct 
hydrology tests in Dog Canyon to determine the extent of its water supply, only to decide against 

further study after sinking three wells. [21]

Holloman AFB's interest in Dog Canyon water stemmed from efforts in the early 1980s to locate 

major new supplies for the Air Force, the city of Alamogordo, and WSMR. Don Harper had 

estimated in his 1981 report that by the year 2000, White Sands alone would increase its water 

usage to 5.5 million gallons. To meet the needs of so many water-intensive users in the area, the 

Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory (LASL) agreed in 1980 to study the feasibility of the Tularosa 

Basin Project." Harper called this "an imaginative and daring plan to convert salt water to fresh 

and [to] generate electricity." Part of the non-fossil fuel research promoted by President Carter, 

the project would cover an area of one million acres (40 miles square), with desalinization 

equipment powered by nuclear energy. The LASL hoped to produce 1.1 million acre-feet of 

water annually (comparable to half the storage at nearby Elephant Butte Reservoir and enough 

water to supply a city the size of Albuquerque for two years), and also to generate 2,000 

megawatts of electrical power. A related activity would be "a large mineral extraction industry," 

as the highly saline water of the basin would leave behind deposits that could be mined for other 

industrial uses. The 1981 resource study did note that the project could lower the water table at 

the monument, thus harming the wildlife at Garton Lake and stopping "the replacement of new 

gypsum sand crystals to the dune field." [22]
Figure 61. Horseback patrol (1970s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

Visitation and facility issues, as always, faded in the 1980s at White Sands as the Reagan era of 

weapons research and space exploration took precedence in the Tularosa basin. Walter 

McDougall wrote of the early 1980s that "the political patterns of space technology [were] in 

greater flux than at any time since 1961." The Reagan administration, following ideas prevalent 

in the military since the close of the Vietnam conflict, opted for "big-ticket" weapons systems 

that contributed to what McDougall called the "militarization of space." Among these items were 

the "Missile Experimental [MX]" system of warheads stored on a "race-track" buried in the 

deserts of Utah and Nevada; the Army Desert Training Center at Fort Irwin in the Mojave 

Desert; and the "Space Transportation System [STS]," known commonly as the "space shuttle." 

Elements of all three systems, especially the latter two, would touch WSMR and Holloman AFB, 

along with the new secret bombers and fighter planes known as "Stealth" aircraft, and the 

futuristic "Ground-Based Free-Electron Laser Project" at WSMR. [23]

Superintendent Harper engaged the space shuttle program in the spring of 1982, when NASA 

made a last-minute decision based upon weather conditions to bring the shuttle back to Earth 

across the monument's boundary at Alkali Flats, instead of the landing strip at Edwards AFB, 
California. Because of the speed of re-entry into Earth's orbit, the shuttle required miles of 

smooth runways, preferably on surfaces less rigid than concrete. Alkali Flats also had been the 

alternate for shuttle landings since the program began in the 1970s. The craft's arrival had not 

allowed time for NPS officials to join Harper in the VIP tent, where he mingled with state, 

NASA, and armed services representatives, as well as an international television audience that 

witnessed a classic Tularosa basin dust storm on the first day projected for the landing. [24]

The comparatively peaceful relationship with space and military officials continued in 1983, 

when the Army negotiated the historic rehabilitation of the McDonald ranch house near Trinity 

Site. The Army and park service agreed to spend $150,000 each to restore the property to its 

appearance on July 16, 1945, including stabilization of the outbuildings. The NPS would provide 

in-house staff from the SWR to complete the research, design, and construction. The park service 

then asked WSMR to permit "public visitation to the site . . . with proper escort and access 

during normal daylight hours on weekends." The latter condition could not be met, however, and 

the Army only conducted tours to Trinity and the McDonald property once every spring and fall. 

[25]

One reason that the Army may have been unable to provide weekly access to the Trinity complex 

was the focus in the mid-1980s on desert warfare. The Tularosa basin shared with the Army's 

Mojave training center the aridity, isolation, and vastness of the desert oil fields of the Persian 

Gulf. The Army also wished to test the next generation of tanks (the "M-1"), which needed space 

for maneuvers available only in the desert. Yet another consideration was time. Military 

strategists anticipated some type of action in the Middle East as Islamic fundamentalism spread, 

typified by the seizure in 1979 of U.S. citizens as hostages in Tehran, Iran. Thus the Army turned 

in 1985 to its series of bases in southern New Mexico (Fort Bliss and WSMR) to conduct the 

first of a planned biennial series of maneuvers known as "BorderStar 85."

This scale of desert training caught the park service and other resource agencies off-guard, 

resulting in yet another round of pleas with the military to reconsider encroachment onto 

monument land. BorderStar 85 also revealed the inherent weakness of environmental regulation 

when confronted by national security imperatives. Eldon G. Reyer, associate SWR director for 

planning and cultural resources, corresponded with several high-level Army commanders in late 

1984 and early 1985 to register the park service's dismay. Initial surveys of the area in question 

uncovered 2,500 cultural resources sites endangered by troop and tank movement. Reyer wished 

that the Army would at least conduct a thorough Environmental Impact Statement (EIS), so that 

soldiers would know what areas to avoid in the New Mexican desert. He admitted that time 

constraints would not allow NPS staff and contractors to mark these sites off-limits. Further 

intrusions included the drawdown of 1.5 million gallons of water (enough to serve the monument 

for five months) ; the release of 1.8 million pounds of air pollutants and 30 tons of hydrocarbons; 

and the loss of 20 percent of the "biomass" of the basin's ecology. The monument itself would 

sustain hundreds of overflights at 2,000 feet, shaking buildings and frightening wildlife. Most 

disastrous, said Superintendent Harper, was the Army's plan to drive 30 to 50 M-1 tanks over the 

dunes to see how they handled such terrain. [26]

BorderStar 85 did not unfold on the scale originally planned, but the military's pace of testing 

and land use persisted for the rest of the decade. On May 14, 1987, the "Defense Nuclear Agency 
[DNA]," exploded 4,685 tons of ammonium nitrate and fuel oil (ANFO) about 12,000 feet (or 

two-plus miles) from the McDonald ranch house. Called "MISTY PICTURE," the test recorded 

the effects of "the air blast and ground motion of an 8-KT [kiloton] free-air nuclear detonation." 

Fortunately no serious damage occurred to the $300,000 rehabilitation work at the ranch house, 

but the experience followed upon Superintendent Harper's request that SWR personnel examine 

monument structures for cracking and repair. Richard Geiser, of the regional section of research 

and preservation planning, came to the dunes in April 1987 to discover that White Sands endured 

300-500 overflights daily. While of these only 20 per year emitted "sonic booms," down 

considerably from the daily noises of the 1960s, Geiser reported that the vibrations exacerbated 

the traditional wearing of adobe by water seepage and gravity settlement of the brick. The NPS 

promised to fund repair work, but by the time of Don Harper's departure in 1989, the service still 

lacked the money to send in a contractor. [27]

Figure 62. Ranger patrol (1980s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)

How much the continued military testing affected monument staff was harder to gauge than 

cracks in adobe buildings. Yet the strain of the 1980s on personnel reached crisis proportions 

during "spring break" of 1986, when a large party of visitors (identified as "gang members") 

started fighting after consuming alcohol. One vehicle raced out of the picnic area, careened 

across the dividing line, and struck head-on a car carrying a family into the dunes. One woman 

was killed in the collision, and youths at the picnic grounds overturned a park service vehicle and 

burned it before local law enforcement officials could restore order. Don Harper believed that 

limited funding was to blame for the low level of police protection, but the damage to his career 

had been done. Regional officials decided two years later to replace Harper with Dennis 
Ditmanson, and urged him to seek new directions for the largest and most heavily visited 

national monument in the Southwest. [28]

The arrival of Ditmanson brought a new generation of park service thinking to White Sands. 

Trained as an historian at the University of South Dakota (his home state), Ditmanson 

understood the role of historical forces in shaping the park service. Among his first tasks was 

improvement of staff morale, which began with the hiring as chief ranger a fellow Vietnam 

veteran, Jerry Yarbrough. Yarbrough, who would leave White Sands three years later to become 

superintendent of Fort Davis National Historic Site in west Texas, noted immediately the need 

for strict law enforcement at the dunes. By 1989 the park experienced an average of 4-6 serious 

automobile accidents; a statistic that Yarbrough and his rangers reduced to zero by 1992. This 

was accomplished by rigorous application of underage drinking laws (Yarbrough confiscated 

"rooms full of beer" from teenagers), and by efforts to educate the visitors about the larger 

dimensions of the White Sands experience. [29]

As law enforcement restored equilibrium to the dunes, Dennis Ditmanson then addressed 

problems of military use and chronic NPS underfunding of the unit. His historical training 

showed in a memorandum he prepared in January 1992 for John Cook, SWR director, on the 

status of WSMR's joint-use permit. Ditmanson read through park files to learn that White Sands 

had now endured two generations of subordination to security necessities. "The military operated 

within the park with a heavy hand," Ditmanson told Cook, and he drew special attention to the 

fact that "the Superintendents' reports from [the 1940s] are marked with uncertainty over the 

very existence of the park." Ditmanson characterized the 1960s as "a time of feverish activity for 

the Missile Range, and of dashed hopes for the park." He read Army responses to NPS 

correspondence as "implying that if the Park Service pushed too hard on permit issues that the 

military would simply take over." He was also surprised to learn that questions raised in the 

1980s over military authority to encroach on the monument forestalled a new permit, and that 

"we are today operating under a continuance issued by the National Park Service." [30]

Most damning to Ditmanson was the legacy of fifty years of rocket and missile impacts on the 

dunes. Fragments of test projectiles littered the landscape, some still contaminated by hazardous 

chemicals. "Program development has been stymied by the restrictions, real and imagined," he 

told the director, while "our physical plant dates to the 30's . . . and related facilities are virtually 

unchanged even though visitation has grown tenfold." Ditmanson suggested major revisions of 

the permit, inspired in part by WSMR's failure to negotiate with him prior to submitting an 

unchanged permit directly to the Interior secretary for signature. He wanted NPS backing "to 

take a more assertive position with regard to our resources," and commitment to stand by White 

Sands throughout what the superintendent realized would be "a protracted process." [31]

In order to assess the merits of changes that he sought for the monument, Dennis Ditmanson 

hired the University of Idaho's Cooperative Park Studies Unit in the spring of 1990 to survey 

visitors and seek their input. He learned that large majorities of visitors preferred recreation to 

hiking or study of the dunes. A surprising 45 percent were adults between the ages of 21 and 45, 

and only 59 percent were part of family groups. Fifty-seven percent of visitors came from the 

states of New Mexico and Texas, while eight percent came from foreign countries. This data led 

Ditmanson to promote the educational and aesthetic experiences of White Sands, including the 
hiring of the first natural resources specialist (Bill Fuchs). The superintendent hoped that the 

Fiscal Year 1994 budget would aid his cause, and speakers in attendance at the 60th anniversary 

program for White Sands (August 25, 1993) included Senator Pete V. Domenici, who revealed 

plans to seek an additional $600,000 for the park. [32]

Upon entering its seventh decade, White Sands National Monument had developed qualities of 

endurance and persistence that would be tested yet again by late twentieth century forces of 

budget constraints and increased visitation. At the national level, the Clinton administration in 

1994 called upon the park service to "reorganize" its management structure to reduce costs and 

staffing levels. Preferring to scale back the national debt rather than expand existing programs, 

Congress denied Senator Domenici's request to double the White Sands appropriation. Hiring 

freezes government-wide forced Superintendent Ditmanson to operate in the summer of 1994 

with two fewer positions, even as visitation moved inexorably toward the 600,000 mark.

Despite these limitations, Dennis Ditmanson and his staff of park service professionals could 

identify several accomplishments that the history of the park had made imperative. By working 

closely at the local level with base commanders from Holloman and WSMR, Ditmanson 

negotiated a new memorandum of understanding that treated the park service as the equals of the 

military. Included in this new spirit of interagency cooperation were negotiations for a transfer of 

lands to give the Army acreage west of Range Road 7. In exchange White Sands anticipated 

receipt of several parcels in the southeastern area of the monument near U.S. Highway 70. 

Ditmanson also hired the park's first education specialist in the summer of 1994, to meet the 61-

year-old mandate of Congress to utilize the dunes for the advancement of knowledge. Finally, as 

chair of the Alamogordo chamber of commerce's subcommittee on tourism, Ditmanson worked 

to include White Sands in the city's new "Sunbird" advertising campaign to lure retirees to the 

Tularosa basin. [33]

By emphasizing the historic and cultural value of White Sands, Ditmanson and the NPS staff had 

brought the park in line with late twentieth century park service initiatives to offer visitors and 

scholars more understanding of the broader meaning of the nation's natural resources. By seeking 

stronger ties to the community, the superintendent had reinvigorated the close linkage to the 

Tularosa basin fostered by Tom Charles and Johnwill Faris. And by negotiating with its powerful 

neighbors in the Army and Air Force, Ditmanson sought to balance the nation's needs for 

national security with the interest of visitors in the story of atomic testing and the power of 

nuclear war to change the face of history. White Sands thus had endured much as both a natural 

wonder, and as a force within the National Park Service for preservation of the distinctiveness of 

America's ecological and cultural treasures.
Figure 63. Filming a car commercial (1980s).

(Courtesy White Sands National Monument)
Figure 64. Proposed Trinity National Historic Site (1969).
BIBLIOGRAPHY

Archival Collections

National Archives and Records Administration

Record Group 79, National Park Service

 Rocky Mountain Region, Denver, CO.

 Federal Records Center, Denver, CO.

 Washington, DC

National Park Service

Historical Files, White Sands National Monument Library, NM.

Research Library, Southwest Regional Office, Santa Fe, NM.

New Mexico State Archives and Records Center, Santa Fe.

Territorial Archives of New Mexico, 1846-1912.

Governor Merritt C. Mechem Papers.

Governor Richard C. Dillon Papers.

Rio Grande Historical Collections, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces.

Mr. and Mrs. Tom Charles Family Papers

Private Collections

Mrs. Johnwill Faris Papers, Farmington, NM.

Books

Arthur, O. Fred. Then: 1907 to Now: 1945 in the United States Forest Service. La Habra, CA: 

Pamphlet Press, 1945.

Charles, Tom. Story of the Great White Sands. Alamogordo, NM: n.p., 1938, 1955 reprint.

Deutsch, Sarah J. No Separate Refuge: Culture, Class, and Gender on an Anglo-Hispanic 

Frontier in the American Southwest, 1880-1940. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987.

Dodge, Natt N. The Natural History Story of White Sands National Monument. Tucson: 

Southwestern Parks and Monuments, 1971.
Etulain, Richard W., ed. Contemporary New Mexico, 1940-1990. Albuquerque: University of 

New Mexico, 1994.

Forrest, Suzanne. The Preservation of the Village: New Mexico 's Hispanics and the New Deal.

Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1989.

Freemuth, John C. Islands Under Siege: National Parks and the Politics of External Threats.

Lawrence, KS: University Press of Kansas, 1991.

Gibson, Arrell Morgan. The Santa Fe and Taos Colonies: Age of the Muses, 1900-1942.

Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1983.

Goetzmann, William N. Army Exploration in the American West, 1803-1863. New Haven, CT: 

Yale University Press, 1959.

-----. Exploration and Empire: The Explorer and the Scientist in the Winning of the American 

West. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, 1966.

Hays, Samuel P. Conservation and the Gospel of Efficiency: The Progressive Conservation 

Movement, 1890-1920. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1959.

Jones, Landon Y. Great Expectations: America and the Baby Boom Generation. New York: 

Ballantine Books, 1980, 1986.

Kelly, Lawrence C. The Assault on Assimilation: John Collier and the Origins of Indian Policy 

Reform. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1983.

Lamar, Howard Roberts. The Far Southwest, 1846-1912: A Territorial History. New Haven, CT: 

Yale University Press, 1966, 1970.

Lowitt, Richard W. Bronson M. Cutting: Progressive Politician. Albuquerque: University of 

New Mexico Press, 1992.

-----. The New Deal and the West. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 1984.

McDougall, Walter. . . . the Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age. New 

York: Basic Books, 1985.

Nash, Gerald D. The American West in the Twentieth Century: A Short History of an Urban 

Oasis. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1977.

Opler, Morris E. Apache Odyssey: A Journey Between Two Worlds. New York: Holt, Rinehart, 

and Winston, 1969.

Otero, Miguel Antonio. My Nine Years as Governor of the Territory of New Mexico, 1897-1906.

Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1940.
Rothman, Hal K. Preserving Different Pasts: The American National Monuments. Urbana, IL: 

University of Illinois Press, 1989.

Runte, Alfred. National Parks: The American Experience. Lincoln: University of Nebraska 

Press, 1987.

Schneider-Hector, Dietmar. White Sands: The History of a National Monument. Albuquerque: 

University of New Mexico Press, 1993.

Secor-Welsh, Cynthia, introduction to Miguel Antonio Otero. My Life on the Frontier, 1864-

1882. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1987.

Sonnichsen, C.L. The Mescalero Apache, second edition. Norman: University of Oklahoma 

Press, 1973.

-----. Tularosa: Last of the Frontier West. New York: Devin-Adair Company, 1960.

Voth, Hazel Hunt and Harold Gill. Southwestern National Monuments: A Bibliography.

Washington D.C. [?]: United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service, 1940.

Weber, David J. The Spanish Frontier in North America. New Haven, CT: Yale University 

Press, 1992.

Welsh, Michael. U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: Albuquerque District, 1935-1985. Albuquerque: 

University of New Mexico Press, 1987.

Journals

Belknap, Jr., William. "New Mexico's Great White Sands." National Geographic. Vol. CXII, 

No. One (July 1957).

Bowman, Jon. "Hollywood's On a Roll in the State." New Mexico Magazine. Vol. 70, No. 5 

(May 1992).

Meizner, O.E. and R.F. Hare. "Geology and Water Resources of Tularosa Basin, New Mexico." 

Water Supply Paper 343, United States Geological Survey, Department of the Interior. 

Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1915.

Righter, Robert W. "National Monuments to National Parks: The Use of the Antiquities Act of 

1906." Western Historical Quarterly. XX, No. 3 (August 1989).

Russell, Carl P. "The White Sands of Alamogordo." National Geographic Magazine. Vol. 

LXVIII, No. 2 (August 1935).
Secor Welsh, Cynthia. "A 'Star Will Be Added:' Miguel Antonio Otero and the Struggle for 

Statehood." New Mexico Historical Review. Vol. 67, No. 1 (January 1992).

Unpublished Manuscripts

Eidenbach, Peter L. "The Culture History of White Sands National Monument." White Sands 

National Monument Library, 1992.

Schneider-Hector, Dietmar. "White Sands, Next Right: A History of White Sands National 

Monument." Ph.D. dissertation, Texas Tech University, 1990.

Southwestern National Monuments Monthly Reports, 1933-1967. Southwest Regional Library, 

National Park Service, Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Welsh, Michael. "A History of the University of New Mexico, 1889-1995." In possession of the 

author, 1995.

-----. "Servants of the Golden Dream: The South Pacific Division, U.S. Army Corps of 

Engineers, 1840-1994." In possession of the author, 1994.

Wenger, Gitbert and William Featherstone. "Historical Sketch and Administrative History of 

White Sands National Monument [1933-1973]." White Sands National Monument Library, 1973.

Newspapers

Alamogordo (NM) Advertiser.

Alamogordo (NM) Daily News.

Albuquerque (NM) Journal.

Arizona Republic.

Boulder City (NV) News.

El Paso (TX) Herald-Post

El Paso (TX) Times.

Los Angeles (CA) Times.

Phoenix (AZ) Gazette.

Santa Fe (NM) New Mexican.

Interviews

Dayton, Donald. Interview by author. Tape recording. Santa Fe, NM, April 23, 1993.

Ditmanson, Dennis. Interview by author. Tape recording. White Sands National Monument, NM, 

January 5, April 29, May 27, June 30, July 1, 1993; July 29, 1994.
Faris, Mrs. Johnwill. Interview by author. Tape recording. Farmington, NM, May 13, 1993.

Fuchs, Bill. Interview by author. Tape recording. White Sands National Monument, NM, 

October 5, 1992.

Harper, Donald. Interview by author. Tape recording. Alamogordo, NM, June 30, 1993.

Mahaffey, Jane. Telephone interview by author. Las Cruces, NM, May 4,1994.

Sellars, Richard W. Interview by author. Tape recording. Southwest Regional Office, National 

Park Service, Santa Fe, NM, January 4,1993.

Starkweather, Tom. Telephone interview by author. Las Cruces, NM, May 4,1993.

Turney, John "Jack." Interview by author. Tape recording. Alamogordo, NM, June 30, 1993.

Udall, Stewart. Interview by author. Tape recording. Santa Fe, NM, June 29, 1993.

Yarbrough, Jerry. Interview by author. Tape recording. Fort Davis National Historic Site, TX, 

July 7,1994.
ENDNOTES

Chapter One

1Carl P. Russell, "The White Sands of Alamogordo, National Geographic Magazine, Vol. 

LXVIII, No. 2 (August 1935): 250-64.

2Natt N. Dodge, The Natural History Story of White Sands National Monument (Tucson: 

Southwestern Parks and Monuments, 1971), 58; C. Leland Sonnichsen, Tularosa: Last of the 

Frontier West (New York: Devin-Adair Company, 1960).

3Alfred Runte, National Parks: The American Experience, second edition (Lincoln: University of 

Nebraska Press, 1987), xii-xiii.

4

Ibid., xx, 11, 22, 31.

5

Ibid., 83.

6Robert W. Righter, "National Monuments to National Parks: The Use of the Antiquities Act of 

1906," Western Historical Quarterly, XX, No. 3 (August 1989): 293.

7Hal K. Rothman, Preserving Different Pasts: The American National Monuments (Urbana, IL: 

University of Illinois Press, 1989), 23, 52, 55.

8Hazel Hunt Voth and Harold Gill, Southwestern National Monuments: A Bibliography

(Washington, DC[?]: United States Department of the Interior, National Park Service, 1940), 

166-68.

9Gilbert Wenger and William Featherstone, "Historical Sketch and Administrative History of 

White Sands National Monument [1933-1973]," Peter D. Hendrickson, ed., unpublished 

manuscript (MS), 1973, White Sands National Monument Library, New Mexico (hereafter cited 

as WHSA Library), 1.

10Dodge, Natural History Story of White Sands, 5-6.

11Ibid., 15, 21.

12Ibid., 33, 41.

13Wenger and Featherstone, "Administrative History of White Sands," 2-5.

14For a popular narrative of the Inde, see C.L. Sonnichsen, The Mescalero Apache, second 

edition (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1973); a more thorough anthropological 

treatment is Morris E. Opler, Apache Odyssey: A Journey Between Two Worlds (New York: 

Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1969).
15David J. Weber, The Spanish Frontier in North America (New Haven, CT: Yale University 

Press, 1992), 79, 80, 82.

16Dietmar Schneider-Hector, "White Sands, Next Right: A History of White Sands National 

Monument," unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, Texas Tech University, 1990, 105-08, 113-15. For 

a more complete analysis of the U. S. Army Corps of Topographical Engineers, see William N. 

Goetzmann, Army Exploration in the American West, 1803-1863 (New Haven: Yale University 

Press, 1959); also see Goetzmann, Exploration and Empire: The Explorer and the Scientist in the 

Winning of the American West (New York: W. W. Norton and Company, 1966). The latter 

volume won the 1967 Pulitzer Prize for history.

17O.E. Meinzer and R.F. Hare, "Geology and Water Resources of Tularosa Basin, New Mexico," 

Water Supply Paper 343, United States Geological Survey, Department of the Interior 

(Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1915), 17; Schneider-Hector, "White 

Sands," 117-18.

18Meinzer and H are, "Tularosa Basin," 18; Schneider-Hector, "White Sands," 118.

19Schneider-Hector, "White Sands," 119.

20Ibid., 120.

21Ibid., 121-22; Meinzer and Hare, "Tularosa Basin," 18; Peter L. Eidenbach, "The Culture 

History of White Sands National Monument," 1992, unpublished MS, WHSA Library.

22Cynthia Secor Welsh, "A 'Star Will Be Added:' Miguel Antonio Otero and the Struggle for 

Statehood," New Mexico Historical Review, Vol. 67, no. 1 (January 1992): 33-51; Michael 

Welsh, "A History of the University of New Mexico, 1889-1994," unpublished MS in possession 

of the author.

23Meinzer and Hare, Tularosa Basin," 22-23.

24Ibid., 23.

25Welsh, "A History of the University of New Mexico."

26Ibid.; Meinzer and Hare, "Tularosa Basin," 23-24.

27Meinzer and Hare, "Tularosa Basin," 24; Welsh, "A History of the University of New Mexico."

Chapter Two

1Howard Roberts Lamar, The Far Southwest, 1846-1912: A Territorial History (New Haven: 

Yale University Press, 1966), 137.
2

Ibid.,146; Cynthia Secor-Welsh, introduction to Miguel A: Otero, My Life on the Frontier, 

1864-1882 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1987 reprint), xvii, xx.

3

Transcript of news feature by Mrs. Tom Charles, Alamogordo, NM, April 6, 1942, Mr. and Mrs. 

Tom Charles Papers, MS 18, File 3-2, Rio Grande Historical Collections, New Mexico State 

University Library, Las Cruces (cited as Charles Papers, NMSU).

4

Ibid.

5

Ibid.; Transcript of news feature by Mrs. Tom Charles, September 21, 1954, Charles Papers, MS 

18, File 3-2, NMSU.

6Dietmar Schneider-Hector, White Sands: The History of a National Monument (Albuquerque: 

University of New Mexico, 1993),52-54; Samuel P. Hays, Conservation and the Gospel of 

Efficiency: The Progressive Conservation Movement, 1890-1920 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard 

University Press, 1959).

7

Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 54-55.

8Miguel A. Otero, "Report of the Governor of New Mexico to the Secretary of the Interior, 

1903," 122, cited in Territorial Archives of New Mexico (TANM), Microfilm Roll 149, Frame 

411, NMSRCA.

9

"Plant was Once Live Outfit," Alamogordo News, n:d., Charles Papers, NMSU.

10Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 50-52; "Funeral Services Held Sunday for the Late Tom 

Charles " Alamogordo News. April 1, 1943; Advertisement, "Meet Your Tom Charles Agency 

Neighbors," n.d., Charles Family Papers, MS 18, File 2-1, NMSU.

11Lawrence C. Kelly, The Assault on Assimilation: John Collier and the Origins of Indian Policy 

Reform (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1983), 163-66, 171.

12Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 56-57; Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 172.

13Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 56, 58, 60; Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 173; Michael 

Welsh, "A Land of Extremes: The Economy of Modern New Mexico, 1940-1990," in Richard 

W. Etulain, ed. Contemporary New Mexico, 1940-1990 (Albuquerque: University of New 

Mexico Press, 1994), 69-81.

14Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 168-69.

15Runte, National Parks, 106; William Boone Douglass, Secretary, National Park Association of 

New Mexico, to Merritt C. Mechem, Governor of New Mexico, May 4, 1921, Letters Received 

and Letters Sent Files, Governor Merritt C. Mechem Papers, NMSRCA (cited as Mechem 

Papers).
16James G. McNary, President, The First National Bank, El Paso, TX, to Mechem, November 9 

1921; Mechem to U. S. Senator Holm O. Bursum, November 15, 1921; Alva L. Hobbs, 

Chairman, New Mexico State Game and Fish Commission, to Stephen T. Mather, Director, 

National Park Service, May 11, June 12, 1922; Mather to Hobbs, May 20, July 8, 1922; Hobbs to 

Mechem, July 12, 1922, Letters Received and Letters Sent Files, Mechem Papers.

17Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 174-75.

18Ibid., 173-74; Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 61; H. H. Brook, Chairman, Southwestern AllYear National Park Association, to "The Members of the Executive Committee . . . ," July 22, 

1922, Letters Received and Letters Sent Files, Mechem Papers.

19Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 174; Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 61; "Protest Against 

Secretary Fall's All Year Park," Bulletin Number 30, National Parks Association, November 8, 

1922, Letters Received and Letters Sent Files, Mechem Papers.

20Runte, National Parks, 81, 83, 95.

21Press Release, "What Others Say Of the Park Site," n.d. 1922, Letters Received and Letters 

Sent Files, Mechem Papers.

22Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 65-66.

23For a discussion of the role of the "Lost Generation" in the 1920s Southwest, see Arrell 

Morgan Gibson, The Santa Fe and Taos Colonies: Age of the Muses, 1900-1942 (Norman: 

University of Oklahoma Press, 1983).

24Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 176-79; S. 3519, "An Act Defining the Rights of the Mescalero 

Apache Indians in the Mescalero Indian Reservation . . .," August 17, 1922, 67th Congress, 2nd 

session.

25Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 179-80, 202, 232; Bulletin Number 30, National Parks 

Association.

26"Foundation Principle of National Parks System Hit Extremely Hard," Bulletin Number 29, 

National Parks Association, July 26, 1922, Letters Received and Letters Sent Files, Mechem 

Papers.

27Ibid

28Kelly, Assault on Assimilation, 236.

29Louis W. Galles, State Director, Coolidge and Dawes Clubs, Albuquerque, to L.O. Piersol, 

Alamogordo, October 11, 1924, Charles Family Papers, MS 18, File 1-7, NMSU.

30Welsh, "A Land of Extremes;" Seventeenth Census of the United States: 1950.
31Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 49.

32Tom Charles to the Honorable John W. Morrow, U.S. Representative, n.d. 1923, Charles 

Family Papers, MS 18, File 1-1, NMSU.

33H.L. Kent, President, New Mexico College of Agriculture and Mechanical Arts, Las Cruces, to 

Charles, July 8, 1924; Frank W. Pooler, District Forester, U.S. Forest Service, Southwestern 

District, Albuquerque, to Charles, July 21, 1924; L.W. Lawson, U.S. Bureau of Reclamation, El 

Paso, to Charles, July 31, 1924; Bursum to Charles, January 5, 1925; Sam G. Bratton, U.S. 

Senate, to Charles, March 30, May 8, 1925, Charles Family Papers, MS 18, File 1-1, NMSU.

34Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 52; N.C. Frenger, Alamogordo, to Charles, March 23, 1926; 

Charles to Frenger, March 24, 1926, Charles Family Papers, MS 18, File 1-7, NMSU.

35Charles to M.B. Stevens, Las Cruces, January 28, 1928; Charles to Fall, n.d., 1928 (?), Charles 

Family Papers, MS 18, File 1-7, NMSU.

36Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 78-79; George Keith Dodson, Topeka, KS, to Jim Thomson, 

Superintendent, White Sands National Monument (WHSA), October 8, 1975, Area History 

Folder, File 2, WHSA Library.

37William Ashton Hawkins, El Paso, to Bratton, January 18, 1930, Governor Richard C. Dillon 

Papers, NMSRCA.

38Hawkins to Richard C. Dillon, Governor of New Mexico, March 18, 1930; Dillon to Ray 

Lyman Wilbur, Secretary of the Interior, March 24, 1930; Wilbur to Dillon, April 4, 1930, Dillon 

Papers, NMSRCA; Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 79.

39Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 79, 82; L.M. Richard, La Luz Clay Products Company, La 

Luz, NM, to Bronson M. Cutting, U.S. Senator, January 28, 1931; Charles to "Mr. Hunter," July 

6, 1931; A.E. Demaray, Acting Associate Director, National Park Service (NPS), to J.S.B. 

Woolford, President, Roswell Chamber of Commerce, July 9, 1931, Historical Files 1931-1932, 

WHSA Library.

40Woolford to Charles, July 25, 1931; Charles to Claude Simpson, Roswell, July 30, 1931, 

Historical Files 1931-1932, WHSA Library.

41George L. Boundey, Custodian, Tumacacori National Monument, Arizona, to Charles, 

September 28, 1931; Charles to Frank Pinkley, Superintendent, Southwestern National 

Monument, Coolidge, AZ, September 30, 1931; Pinkley to Charles, October 3, 1931; Charles to 

W.D. Bryars, Santa Fe, November 16, 1931; Charles to Roger Toll, Denver, CO, November 30, 

1931, Historical Files 1931-1932, WHSA Library.

42Runte, National Parks, 140; Tom Charles, Story of the Great White Sands (Alamogordo: n.p., 

1938, 1955 reprint).
43Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 90; Richard Lowitt, Bronson M. Cutting: Progressive 

Politician (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1992).

44"Charles, Story of the Great White Sands; O. Fred Arthur, Then: 1907 to Now: 1945 in the 

United States Forest Service (La Habra, CA: Pamphlet Press, 1945).

Chapter Three

1Gerald D. Nash, The American West in the Twentieth Century: A Short History of an Urban 

Oasis (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1977), 137-38; Welsh, "A Land of 

Extremes," 67-68.

2Nash, American West in the Twentieth Century, 155, 169; Richard Lowitt, The New Deal and 

the West (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984), 218.

3Report of Hugh Miller, Superintendent, Southwestern National Monuments (SWNM), 

September 4, 1940, RG 79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Nash, American West in the 

Twentieth Century, 169.

4Horace M. Albright, NPS Director, to Charles, February 6, 1933; Frank Pinkley, SWNM 

Superintendent, to Charles, February 12, 16, 1933, National Park Service, Central Consolidated 

Files (NPS, CCF) 1933-1949, New Mexico, White Sands Files, Box 2424, National Archives 

and Records Administration, Washington, DC (NARA, DC); Charles to Pinkley, February 14, 

1933, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

5A.E. Demaray, Acting NPS Director, to Charles, April 24, 1933, Historical Files, WHSA 

(1933), WHSA Library.

6C.C. Merchant, Alamogordo, to U.S. Senator Sam G. Bratton, February 10, 1933; Mrs. Emma 

Fall, El Paso, to Albright, May 23, 1933; Albright to Fall, June 5,1933, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.

7Alamogordo (NM) News. July 1933 clippings; Charles to Pinkley, July 19, 1933, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

8

Southwestern National Monuments (SWNM) Monthly Report, August, September, October, 

November, December 1933.

9

Ferris Shelton and Fred L. Yelton, Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce, to G.D. Macy and Jess 

Nusbaum, Santa Fe, August 31, 1933; Pinkley to Charles, September 2, 1933; Pinkley to NPS 

Field Headquarters, San Francisco, CA, September 4, 1933; Pinkley to Nusbaum, September 4, 

1933; Nusbaum to Pinkley, September 12, 1933; Demaray to Shelton, September 19, 1933; F.A. 

Kittredge, NPS Chief Engineer, San Francisco, to Pinkley, November 15, 1933; Report of 

Charles F. Richey, NPS Junior Landscape Architect, December 13, 1933, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.
10Calendar of Events at White Sands National Monument, n.d., RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, 

White Sands General 1935-1938 Files, Box 2425, NARA, DC; SWNM Monthly Report, October 

1933.

11SWNM Monthly Report, January 1933.

12Telegram of Cutting to Charles, January 20, 1934; Charles to Miss Margaret Reeves, Civil 

Works Administration (CWA) Director, Santa Fe, January 20, 1934; Charles to Pinkley, January 

23, 24, 1934, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

13Hatch to Charles, January 29, 1934; Pinkley to the Southwestern Custodians, February 17, 

1934; Pinkley to Charles, March 1,1934, 1934 File L, WHSA Library.

14SWNM Monthly Report, February 1933; Telegram of Cutting to Charles, March 7, 1934; 

Charles to Pinkley, March 8, 1934, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Demaray to Pinkley, 

March 8, 1934, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, National Monuments White Sands 605.01-

660.04.1, Box 2428, NARA, DC.

15SWNM Monthly Report, March 1934; Laurence Cone to Charles, March 18, 1934; H.B. Chase, 

CWA Project Engineer, to Charles, April 10, 1934, 1934 File L; Kittredge to Cammerer, April 

17, 1934; Charles to Cammerer, April 18, 1934; Charles to Pinkley, April 18, 1934, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

16"Old Timers Reunion," Alamogordo Advertiser, April 26, 1934.

17Ibid.; "The Big White Sands Dedicatory, Sunday, April 29," Alamogordo News, May 3, 1934; 

"White Sands Picnic," Alamogordo Advertiser, May 3, 1934. The appearance of black baseball 

teams in an area with a scant black population reflected the temper of the times, where majorand minor-league baseball excluded black players because of their race. Instead, such athletes 

performed in the famed "Negro Leagues," mostly local teams who played for gate receipts (semiprofessional status). At the White Sands game, fans donated a total of twelve dollars to be 

divided between the two squads.

18Ibid.; "Fall Tells of Early Southwest Days at White Sands Ceremonies," El Paso (TX) Times. 

April 30, 1934; "Fall Rests After White Sands Talk," El Paso Herald-Post. April 30, 1934.

19Phoenix (AZ) Gazette. April 30, 1934; SWNM Monthly Report, June 1934.

20Frederick A. Blossom, Huntington Free Library and Reading Room, New York City, to NPS, 

May 31, 1934, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2424; Gilbert Grosvenor, Editor, National 

Geographic Society, to Charles, August 7, 1934, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Earl A. 

Trager, Chief, NPS Naturalist Division, to Charles, November 3, 1934; George A. Grant, 

Carlsbad Caverns National Park, to Charles, November 11, 1934, 1934 File L.
21SWNM Monthly Reports, May, July 1934. Similar exhibits with gypsum from White Sands 

were built that year at the New Mexico State Fair in Albuquerque, and the nearby Roswell fair 

(Chaves County) [SWNM Monthly Report, October 1934].

22Charles to Pinkley, March 19, 1934, 1934 File L; SWNM Monthly Report, March 1934.

23Eugene Stevens, Southern Dusting Company, Inc., Tallulah, LA, to Albright, January 9, 1934; 

Charles to Pinkley, January 29, 1934; Pinkley to NPS Director, March 8, 1934, 1934 File L.

24J.L. Lawson, Alamogordo, to Frank Vesely, State Land Commissioner, Santa Fe, December 11, 

1934, 1934 File L; Hazel Ridinger to Pinkley, n.d. 1934; Pinkley to Mrs. Ridinger, April 24, 

1934, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

25Pinkley to Charles, April 28, 1934; Pinkley to Robert H. Rose, Acting Assistant SWNM 

Superintendent, Aztec Ruins National Monument, NM, September 15, 1934; Rose to "Boss" 

(Pinkley), September 22, 1934, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Lawson to Vesely, 

December 11, 1934.

26Conrad Wirth, Assistant NPS Director, to Hatch, October 26, 1934; Pinkley to Charles, 

November 10, 1934, 1934 File L; Proclamation No. 2108, White Sands National MonumentNew Mexico, Franklin D. Roosevelt, November 28, 1934, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC; Pinkley to NPS Director, May 15, 1934, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2424.

27Rose to Ansel F. Hall, Chief, NPS Field Division of Education, Berkeley, CA, November 6, 

1934, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2424; Runte, National Parks, 138-40, 153; SWNM 

Monthly Report. November 1934.

28Rose to Hall, November 6, 1934; SWNM Monthly Report, September 1934.

29Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 103; SWNM Monthly Report, January 1935; Charles to Rose, 

January 10, 1935; W.A. Warford, San Francisco, to Charles, March 20, 1935, Historical Files, 

WHSA (1935), January 1-July 31, 1935, WHSA Library.

30Welsh, "A Land of Extremes," 69; Welsh, U. S. Army Corps of Engineers: Albuquerque 

District, 1935-1985 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1987), 34-35.

31Charles to George Grant, May 20, 1935, Historical Files, WHSA (1935), January 1-July 31, 

1935; W.D. Bryars, Santa Fe, to Charles, September 5,1935, Historical Files, WHSA (1935), 

August 1-December 31, 1935, WHSA Library.

32SWNM Monthly Reports, April, May, August 1935; Charles to Grant, May 20, 1935.

33Boles to Charles, October 19, 1935, Historical Files, WHSA (1935), August 1-December 31, 

1935.
34Charles to Pinkley, February 18, April 29, 1935, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; 

Charles to Pinkley, May 6, 1935, Historical Files, WHSA (1935), January 1-July 31, 1935.

35G.A. Moskey, Assistant NPS Director, to J.B. Willis, El Paso, May 7, 1935, Historical Files, 

WHSA (1935), January 1-July 31, 1935; Pinkley to Charles, May 9, 1935, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC. Tom Charles had first irritated Pinkley in December 1933 with a scheme to 

dredge an artificial "lake" in the dunes, as the water table lay close to the surface and visitors 

preferred an aquatic setting to neutralize desert conditions. [Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 106]

36Charles to Pinkley, May 11, 29, 1935; Pinkley to Charles, May 14, 16, 1935, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

37Demaray to E.H. Simons, Executive Vice President and General Manager, El Paso Chamber of 

Commerce, May 13, 1935; Pinkley to A.T. Kuntz, El Paso, July 9,1935, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.

38Memorandum of Alexander B. Stump, NPS Wildlife Technician, to "Mr. [George] Wright," 

October 15, 1935, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, White Sands General 1935-1938 Files, Box 

2425.

39Ibid.; Ardey Borell, SWNM Naturalist Technician, "Special Report on White Sands National 

Monument," March 18-26, 1935, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2424.

40Stump to Wright, October 15, 1935.

41Charles to Pinkley, August 3, 1935; Pinkley to Charles, August 6, 1935; Kittredge to NPS 

Director, August 9, 1935; John H. Diehl, SWNM Park Engineer, to Pinkley, August 8, 1934, 

RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

42Charles to Pinkley, August 21, 1935; Pinkley to Charles, August 22, 1935, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC; Pinkley to NPS Director, September 12, 1935, Historical Files, WHSA 

(1935), August 1-December 31, 1935.

43Kittredge to NPS Director, September 17, 1935; Thomas C. Vint, Chief Architect, NPS Branch 

of Plans and Designs, to Richey, October 29, 1935; John A. Happer, Project Manager, 

Recreation Demonstration Project (RDP), WHSA, to L. Vernon Randau, Regional Projects 

Manager, RDP, NPS, Oklahoma City, November 13, 1935, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC; Ralph Charles to "Dad," November 7, 1935, Historical Files, WHSA (1935), August 1-

December 31, 1935.

44Randau to M.C. Huppuch, Supervisor, RDP, NPS, December 5, 1935, RG79, NPS 1934-1947, 

Recreation Demonstration Area Program Files (RDA), Region 3, New Mexico, General WHSA 

201 to 601-12 File, Box 201, NARA, DC; Diehl to Kittredge, December 5, 1935; Kittredge to 

Diehl, December 17, 1935, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Charles to Pinkley, 

December 12, 1935, Historical Files, WHSA (1935), August 1-December 31, 1935.
45Pinkley to NPS Director, October 30, 1936, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2425; R.T. 

Spence to D.M. Wootton, Vacation Travel Tours, Rock Island Railroad, Chicago, IL, February 7, 

1936; Charles to Wootton, March 14, 1936; Charles to Albright, February 6, 1936; Mrs. Elsie E. 

Aspinwall, Lew Wallace Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, Albuquerque, to 

Charles, May 21, 27, 1936; Charles to Aspinwall, May 23, 1936, Historical Files, WHSA (1936), 

January 1-May 30, 1936, WHSA Library.

46Ina Sizer Cassidy, Director, New Mexico State Writers' Project, Santa Fe, to Charles, February 

10, 1936; Charles to Cassidy, February 14, 1936, Charles Family Papers, MS 18, File 1-2, 

NMSU; SWNM Monthly Report, January 1936.

47SWNM Monthly Report, February, August 1936; Charles to NPS Director, March 28, 1936, 

Historical Files, WHSA (1936), January 1-May 30, 1936; "Chamber of Commerce News Note," 

May 7, 1936, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Maier to Huppuch, June 17, 1936, RG79, 

NPS 1934-1947, RDA, Box 201; Charles to Pinkley, July 3, 1936, Historical Files, WHSA 

(1936), June 1-December 31, 1936, WHSA Library; Charles to Cammerer, August 4, 1936, 

RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2425.

48Memorandum of Kittredge to NPS Branch of Plans and Design, April 26, 1935, January 14, 

1936; W.G. Carnes, NPS Deputy Chief Architect, to NPS Director, January 18, 1936; George L. 

Collins, NPS Region Three, Oklahoma City, to Maier, November 4, 1936, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC; Charles to Pinkley, Historical Files, WHSA (1936), January 1-May 30, 1936; 

Memorandum of R.E. Dunning to Huppuch, June 2, 15, 1936, RG79, NPS 1934-1947, RDA, 

Region 3, General White Sands National Monument 605-01 to 660-03, Box 202, NARA, DC; 

Turner W. Battle, Assistant to the Secretary, U.S. Department of Labor, "Decision of the 

Secretary," November 14, 1936, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2425.

49Fred A. Weller, NPS Regional Attorney, to Robert C. Dow, Regional Attorney, Resettlement 

Administration, Amarillo, TX, February 14, 1936; Gould to Maier, n.d. 1936; E.H. Wells, 

President, New Mexico School of Mines, to Gould, February 14, 1936; H.A. Kiker, Special 

Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, Santa Fe, to Dow, June 17, 1936; Happer to Randau, July 

28, 1936; Borell, "Special Report on White Sands National Monument," August 4, 1936; Victor 

E. Cahalane, Acting Chief, NPS Wildlife Division, to NPS Region Three Officer, September 21, 

1936, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Ward Charles, ECW (Emergency Conservation 

Work) Technician, Tularosa, NM, to J.E. Stablein, Acting Regional Grazier, U.S. Department of 

the Interior, Albuquerque, May 26, 1936; Pinkley to G.F. Conroy, New Mexico State Highway 

Engineer, Santa Fe, March 21, 1936, Historical Files, WHSA (1936), January 1-May 30, 1936; 

Maier to NPS Director, August 21, 1936; H.E. Rothrock, Acting Chief, NPS Naturalist Division, 

to Region Three Officer, October 3, 1936, RG79, NPS 1934-1947, RDA, Box 202.

50R.G. Finney, Chief, Fiscal Division, NPS Region Three, Santa Fe, to SWNM Superintendent 

Miller, September 10, 1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Schneider-Hector, White 

Sands, 103.

51SWNM Monthly Report, December 1937.
52Ibid., July, October 1937.

53Ibid., January 1937.

54Vint to the NPS Director, June 22, 1937; C.H. Gerner to "Mr. Johnston," July 6, 1937, RG79, 

NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2425; Memorandum of Richey to "Mr. Cornell," October 20, 1937, 

RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

55"Regional Officer ECW," Oklahoma City, to Happer, March 9, 1937; Happer to Maier, March 

11, 1937; Wirth to NPS Region Three Officer, March 21, 1937; McColm to Assistant NPS 

Regional Officer, June 21, 1937, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

56John H. Veale to NPS Region Three Officer, July 17, 1937, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC; SWNM Monthly Reports, July, September 1937.

57Pinkley to the New Mexico State Land Commissioner, June 29, 1937; Miller to Jack F. Guion, 

Los Angeles, CA, March 5, 1937, Historical Files, WHSA (1937), January 1-June 30, 1937, 

WHSA Library; Vesely to Cammerer, August 8, 1937; Charles to "Boss [Pinkley]," October 12, 

1937, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

58Thomas H. MacDonald, Chief, U.S. Bureau of Public Roads, to Cammerer, March 23, 1937; 

Miller to Kittredge, March 25, 1937; Charles to Boss, September 17, 1937, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC; Milker to NPS Director, March 16, 1937, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 

2425.

59J. B. Hamilton, NPS Associate Engineer, Santa Fe, to Kittredge, March 23, 1937; Veale, 

"Report of Condition, Work Done and Recommendations for Restoring the Garton Well," July 9, 

1937; Diehl to Maier, "Report of Proposed Water Supply System for White Sands National 

Monument," June 1937; E. B. Hommon, NPS Sanitary Engineer, San Francisco, to Pinkley, May 

21, 1937; Pinkley to Diehl, November 30, 1937, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

60Rothrock, "Report on Inspection of White Sands National Monument," April 1937; Pinkley to 

NPS Chief Engineer, April 7, 1937; Regional Officer, ECW Region Three, to NPS Director, 

June 4, 1937; Charles to Raymond Higgins, Inspector, ECW, Region Three, June 21, 1937; E.F. 

Preece, Assistant NPS Chief Engineer, "Comments on the Reconnaissance Report, Proposed 

Water Supply System for White Sands National Monument," August 19, 1937; Albert Johnson, 

NPS Associate Attorney, to "Mr. Taylor," September 1, 1937; A.W. Burney, Acting NPS Chief 

Engineer, to Regional Engineer, September 7, 1937; Prentice C. Lackey, NPS Contract 

Examiner, Santa Fe, to McColm, October 21, 1937; Gould, "Second Geological Report on White 

Sands National Monument," December 4, 1937, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

61U.S. Department of the Interior, Memorandum for the Press, October 17, 1938; L.R. Dice, 

Director, Laboratory of Vertebrate Genetics, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, to Charles, 

September 14, 1938; Pinkley to Dice, September 20, 1938; Pinkley to Director, Museum of 

Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley, December 27, 1938, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Charles B. Lipman, Dean of the Graduate Division, University of 
California, Berkeley, to Charles, June 16, 1938, Historical Files, WHSA (1938), January 1-June 

30, 1938, WHSA Library; Lipman to Charles, July 7, 1938; Dice to Charles, August 31, 

December 28, 1938; Charles E. Olmsted, University of Chicago, to Charles, December 31, 1938, 

Historical Files, WHSA (1938), July 1-December 31, 1938, WHSA Library.

62Charles to Mrs. A.F. Quisenberry, El Paso, February 15, 1938, Historical Files, WHSA (1938), 

January 1-June 30, 1938; Coe Howard, State Representative, Portales, NM, to Charles, 

September 3, 1938; Marlin Butler, Manager, Yam and Kiva Theaters, Portales, to Charles, 

September 6, 1938; Harvey Hickox, Manager, Lobo Theater, Albuquerque, to Charles, 

November 29, 1938, Historical Files, WHSA (1938), July 1-December 31, 1938; Charles to 

"Boss," September 5, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Wootton to Charles, May 2, 

1938; Charles to Story, May 4, 1938, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2425.

63Natt Dodge to "Tom [Charles]," September 17, 1938, Historical Files, WHSA (1938), July 1-

December 31, 1938.

64Memorandum of Ronald F. Lee, NPS Supervisor of Historic Sites, to Charles, September 12, 

1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

65SWNM Monthly Report, January 1937; Charles to Bill Robinson, Roswell, NM, n.d.; C.E. 

Castaneda, University of Texas, Austin, to Charles, November 18, 1938; Charles to Castaneda, 

December 9, 1938, Historical Files, WHSA (1938), July 1-December 31, 1938; Charles to 

Donald F. Lee, NPS, Washington, DC, October 3, 1928, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2426, 

The "Donald F. Lee" of Charles' October 3 correspondence was actually "Ronald" F. Lee, 

supervisor of NPS historic sites.

66Pinkley to Charles, November 12, 1938; Charles to "Boss," November 17, December 30, 1938, 

RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

67McColm to the NPS Director, January 13, 1938; Memorandum of Franklin C. Potter, Associate 

NPS Geologist, to "Mr. [Earl] Trager," April 2, 1938; Charles to "Boss," June 13, 1938, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; W.L. Spalding, Arizona Chemical Company, New York City, 

to the NPS Director, March 11, 1938, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2425.

68Charles to Pinkley, November 25, 1938; Maier to the SWNM Superintendent, December 28, 

1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Pinkley to the NPS Director, December 20, 1938, 

RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

69J.L. Lawson, Alamogordo, to Acting NPS Regional Director, Santa Fe, January 24, 1938; P.C. 

Lackey, NPS Contract Examiner, Santa Fe, to Maier, February 2, 1938; Diehl, "White Sands 

National Monument Dog Canyon Water Supply Report," June 1938; Pinkley to the NPS 

Director, September 24, December 23, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

70Memorandum of Agreement, G.F. Speechly, District Manager, Mountain States Telephone and 

Telegraph Company, and Hugh Miller, Assistant SWNM Superintendent, August 4, 1938, 

Historical Files, WHSA (1938), July 1-December 31, 1938; Richey, "Technical Comment -
Branch of Plans and Designs, February 24, 1938; Pinkley to the Acting NPS Regional Director, 

Santa Fe, February 21,1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

71Steen, "A Revised Plan of Exhibits for the White Sands National Monument Museum," July 

15, 1938; Pinkley to Dorr G. Yeager, Assistant NPS Museum Chief, Berkeley, October 29, 1938, 

RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Acting Chief, NPS Museum Division, to SWNM 

Superintendent, December 21, 1938, Historical Files, WHSA (1938), July 1-December 31, 1938.

72Suzanne Forrest, The Preservation of the Village: New Mexico's Hispanics and the New Deal

(Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1989), 115.

73Ibid.; Sarah J. Deutsch, No Separate Refuge: Culture, Class, and Gender on an Anglo-Hispanic 

Frontier in the American Southwest, 1880-1940 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1987).

74Lucy Lepper Shaw, Director, National Youth Administration (NYA) Educational Camp for 

Girls, Capitan, NM, to Randau, June 28, 1938; Bennett to Randau, n.d. 1938: McColm to the 

NPS Director, July 1, 1938: Pinkley to Acting NPS Regional Director, Santa Fe, July 25, 1938, 

RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

75Jim B. Felton, WHSA Park Ranger, to Pinkley, February 28, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

76Pinkley to Felton, March 2, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

77Felton to Pinkley, March 30, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; SWNM Monthly 

Reports, March, April 1938.

78Charles to "Boss," April 4, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

79Charles to Pinkley, November 25, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Pinkley to 

the NPS Director, December 7, 1938, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

80Welsh, Albuquerque District, 44.

81Mrs. J. Atwood Maulding, NPS Director of Personnel, Washington, DC, to the NPS Director, 

December 21, 1938; E.A. Pesonen, Assistant NPS Regional Director, Santa Fe, to the NPS 

Director, January 16, 1939, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2428.

82Charles to "Boss," November 17, 1938, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

83Randau, "Field Report to Acting Regional Director," February 18-22, 1939; Andrew J. Taylor, 

Alamogordo, to John J. Dempsey, U.S. House of Representatives, Washington, DC, February 27, 

1939; Diehl, "Report on Taylor Spring, San Andreas Canyon," March 27, 1939, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC; SWNM Monthly Report, March 1939.
84Richard E. Manson, Assistant U.S. Attorney, Santa Fe, to the U.S. Attorney General, 

Washington, DC, July 6, 1939, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2496; Charles to Pinkley, June 

13, 1939; Tolson to Pinkley, July 7, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

85Pinkley to the NPS Director, January 27, 1939; Pinkley to Charles, January 30, 1939, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Jack McFarland, El Paso, to Charles, February 7, 1939, 

Historical Files, WHSA (1939), January 1-April 30, 1939, WHSA Library.

86Pinkley to Charles, February 10, 1939; Faris to Pinkley, February 13, 1939; Charles to "Boss," 

February 14, 1939; Pinkley to Johnwill [Faris] and Tom [Charles]," February 23, 1939, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

87Allan D. Walker, Executive Secretary, Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce, to Harold D. 

Ickes, Secretary of the Interior, April 6, 1939, Historical Files, WHSA (1939), January 1-April 

30, 1939; Faris to Pinkley, May 3, 29, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; "Two-Bit 

Policy," Albuquerque Journal, July 21, 1939; SWNM Monthly Report, May 1939.

88Faris to Pinkley, April 18, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

89Pinkley to Faris, April 26, 1939; Faris to Pinkley, April 28, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

90Maier to SWNM Superintendent, January 21, 1939; Pinkley to Acting NPS Regional Director, 

Santa Fe, February 4, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; E.P. Simms, President, 

Alamogordo Chamber of Commerce, to Charles, January 23, 1939, Historical Files, WHSA 

(1939), January 1-April 30, 1939.

91Tolson to Pinkley, February 24, 1939; Dale S. King to Aubrey Neasham, NPS Regional 

Historian, Santa Fe, February 7, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

92Yeager to Steen, July 20, 1939; Steen to Assistant Chief, NPS Museum Division, August 7, 

September 18, 1939; King to Pinkley, June 3, 1939; Yeager to SWNM Superintendent, August 

21, 1939; Tolson to Yeager October 6, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

93Faris to Steen, April 16, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

94Faris to Pinkley, March 13, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

95Ibid.

96King to SWNM Superintendent, March 10, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files. Denver FRC.

97Charles to Pinkley, March 20, 1939; Pinkley to Charles, April 6, 1939; Major James T. Duke, 

General Staff,First Cavalry Division, Fort Bliss, TX, to Charles, January 24. 1939, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.
98Charles to "Boss, " January 25, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Pinkley to the 

NPS Director, January 31, 1939; John R. White, Acting NPS Director, to the SWNM 

Superintendent, February 16, 1939, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2426.

99Charles to Tolson, October 11, 1939; Maier to Charles, October 18, 1939; Clinton P. Anderson, 

Managing Director, United States Coronado Exposition Commission, Albuquerque, to Tolson, 

October 19, 1939; Tolson to Anderson, October 23, 1939; Tolson to the NPS Director, October 

23, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

100Memorandum of Pinkley for the Files, June 15, 1939; Miller to the SWNM Superintendent, 

June 16, 1939, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Charles to Cammerer, December 20, 

1939. RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2429.

101Cammerer to Charles, October 27, 1939, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2426; 

Memorandum of S. Herbert Evison, NPS, Washington, DC, to Faris, "Transcription of Tape 

Recording," January 9, 1963, Mrs. Johnwill Faris Papers, Fannington, NM.

Chapter Four

1Nash, American West in the Twentieth Century, 191-92, 198, 211.

2Runte, National Parks, 259-65; Rothman, Preserving Different Pasts 212-30.

3

Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 103; Carl A. Hatch to Cammerer, September 4, 1939, RG79, 

NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2429.

4

SWNM Monthly Report, December 1940; M.C. Cauthen, President. Alamogordo Chamber of 

Commerce, to Hugh Miller, February 3,17, 1941, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

5Memorandum of Miller to the NPS Director, February 17, 1941, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, 

Box 2430.

6

Faris to Pinkley, December 13, 1939; Pinkley to Faris, December 16, 1939; Bursey to Col. John 

R. White, Region III Director, May 8, 1940; Miller to Faris, June 4, 1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC; F.B. Evans, Chairman, Recreation Committee, Alamogordo Chamber of 

Commerce, to Dempsey, March 25, 1940; Dempsey to Cammerer, March 29, 1940, RG79, NPSCCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

7Charles C. Brunacini, Director, WPA Division of Employment, Santa Fe, to "Other Federal 

Agencies," February 21, 1940; Tolson to J.J. Connelly, State WPA Administrator, Santa Fe, 

March 19, 1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

8Robert Hoath LaFollette, Albuquerque, to Maier, January 25, 1940; Tolson to Michael Reardon, 

Albuquerque, June 12, 1940, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2428.
9

SWNM Monthly Report, June 1941; Faris to "Hugh [Miller]," n.d., RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

10Memorandum of the Acting SWNM Superintendent to the Acting Region III Director, 

November 19, 1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

11H. B. Hommon, "Report of Inspection at White Sands National Monument, N.M.," April 27, 

1941; Memorandum of Tolson to the SWNM Superintendent, May 21, 1941; Richey, "Report of 

Inspection, White Sands National Monument," May 27-28, 1941; Memorandum of Hugh Miller 

to Region III Director, June 26, 1941; Memorandum of William H. Richardson, Associate NPS 

Engineer, Santa Fe, to Acting Regional Engineer Hamilton, November 4, 1941, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

12"Notice of Presidential Project Authorization, Fiscal Year 1940, White Sands National 

Monument (LD-NM-14)," May 3, 1940; Lyle E. Bennett, "Field Report, Plans and Design 

Division, White Sands National Monument, June 20-23, 1940," RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC; SWNM Monthly Report, June 1940.

13SWNM Monthly Report, June 1940; Miller, "Report of Inspection, White Sands National 

Monument," September 4,1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

14Memorandum of Miller, September 4, 1940; Memorandum of Milo L. Christiansen, Acting 

Region III Director, to Miller, September 13, 1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

15Faris to Miller, December 3, 1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

16Faris to the SWNM Superintendent, June 23, 1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; 

Pinkley to Charles, January 11, 1940, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2429.

17Alvin F. Taylor, NPS Chief of Concessions, to the NPS Director, May 5, 1946; Memorandum 

of Charles L. Gable, Chief, Park Operators Division, NPS Branch of Operations, to "Colonel 

[John] White," April 3, 1940, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2429; Tolson to Charles, March

20, 1940, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

18Miller to Charles, April 24, 1940; Memorandum of White to the NPS Director, July 13, 1940, 

RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

19Miller to the Region III Director, September 9, 1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

20Miller, "Report of Inspection, White Sands National Monument," October 14, 1940, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Charles to Miller, January 10, 1941, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-

1949, Box 2429; Memorandum of Bennett to Regional Chief of Planning Cornell, November 25, 

1941, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2428.

21Elliott S. Barker, New Mexico State Game Warden, to McColm, January 17, 1941; McColm to 

Barker, January 20, 1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.
22Memorandum of Pinkley to the Region III Director, February 12, 1940; R.D. Nielson, U.S. 

Grazing Service, Albuquerque, to the Region III Director, March 25, 1940; McColm to Frank 

Worden, Commissioner, New Mexico state Land Office, April 12, 1940; Memorandum of Miller 

for the Files, "White Sands National Monument," April 24, 1940; Sroaf to Miller, September 6, 

1940; Miller, "Report of Inspection," September 4, 1940, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC.

23Miller to the NPS Director, October 3,1940, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2427; A.J. 

Wirtz, Undersecretary of the Interior, "Appeal From the Grazing Service," March 7, 1941, 

Historical Files, Boundary Adjustments, History (1940s), WHSA.

24Memorandum of Ed Pierson, Acting Regional Grazier, U.S. Grazing Service, Albuquerque, to 

Tillotson, April 4, 1941, Historical Files, Boundary Adjustments, History (1940s), WHSA; Faris 

to Miller, April 12, 1941; Memorandum of Robert F. Upton, Park Ranger, WHSA, to Faris, April 

12, 1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA, Denver FRC.

25Miller, "Report of Inspection, White Sands National Monument," April 25-27, 1941; H. 2685, 

"An Act to Authorize the disposition of recreational projects and for other purposes," May 6, 

1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; McDougall to the Region III Director, April 29, 

1941, Historical Files, Boundary Adjustments, History (1940s), WHSA.

26Pierson to NPS, Santa Fe, August 2,1941; Memorandum of Newton B. Drury, NPS Director, to 

the Region III Director, August 21, 1941; John J. Dempsey, "Supplementary Decision," August 

26, 1941, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Memorandum of Drury for the Acting Region 

III Director, November 10, 1941, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

27SWNM Monthly Reports, January, July, December 1941; Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 133.

28John C. Freemuth, Islands Under Siege: National Parks and the Polities of External Threats

(Lawrence: University Press of Kansas, 1991); SWNM Monthly Report, December 1941.

29Memorandum of Ickes to FDR, January 5,1942; "Executive Order Withdrawing Public Lands 

for Use of the War Department as a General Bombing Range, New Mexico," No. 9029, January 

20, 1942, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

30SWNM Monthly Reports, February, April 1942; Memorandum of Faris to the SWNM 

Superintendent, April 3, 1942; Memorandum of Acting SWNM Superintendent to WHSA 

Custodian, April 7, 1942; Memorandum of the Region III Director to the NPS Director, April 9, 

1942, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

31Memorandum of Tillotson to Faris, April 25, 1942; Memorandum of Acting SWNM 

Superintendent to the NPS Director, May 19,1942; Memorandum of the SWNM Superintendent 

to the NPS Director, July 22, 1942, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

32Memorandum of Tillotson to the NPS Director, July 9, 1942; Memorandum of the SWNM 

Superintendent to the WHSA Custodian, July 17, 1942, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.
33Colonel A.S. Albro, Commander, Alamogordo Army Air Base (AAAB), to Richey, August 19, 

1942; Tillotson to the NPS Director, July 9,1942; Memorandum of the SWNM Superintendent to 

the WHSA Custodian, July 24, 1942; Richey to Faris, July 24, 1942; Memorandum of Richey to 

the Region III Director, September 9, 1942, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

34Memorandum of Tillotson to the SWNM Superintendent, August 20, 1942; Memorandum of 

McColm to Richey, July 14, 1942, Historical Files, Boundary Adjustments, History (1940s), 

WHSA; R. W. Soule, Chief Clerk, SWNM, to the SWNM Superintendent, October 22, 1942; 

Memorandum of Faris to the Region III Director, November 1, 1944, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

35SWNM Monthly Reports, September, October, December 1942, January, April, September 

1943.

36Ibid., January, March, May, October 1943, February 1944; Memorandum of Richey to Faris, 

November 18, 1942, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

37Miller to Charles, January 23, 1942; Charles to Miller, June 24, 1942, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-

1949, Box 2429; Charles to R.T. Anderson, Santa Fe Railroad, Topeka, KS, November 6,1942, 

File 18-1-2, Charles Papers, NMSU.

38Memorandum of Alvin G. Taylor to the NPS Director, May 5,1948; Richey to Faris, May 8, 

1943, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Mrs. Tom Charles to Drury, March 29, 1943, 

RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2429; SWNM Monthly Reports, January, February, April 

1943.

39SWNM Monthly Reports, October 1941, March 1943, October 1944.

40Memorandum of Faris to the SWNM Superintendent, April 19, 1943, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC; Johnwill Faris Interview, January 9, 1963, Mrs. Lena Faris Collection, 

Farmington, NM.

41Memorandum of J.L. Lassiter, Acting Region III Director, to Richey, April 12, 1945; 

Memorandum of Tolson to Region III Director, April 21,1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC; Lassiter to the Region III Director, April 13, 1945, Historical Files, Boundary 

Adjustments, History (1940s), WHSA; SWNM Monthly Reports, January-May, 1945.

42Captain Floyd T. Snyder, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE), Albuquerque, to Scoyen, 

May 3, 1945; Faris to the Region III Director, May 23, 28, 1945; Scoyen to Demaray, May 29, 

31, 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

43Demaray to Region III Director, June 1, 1945; Telegram of Demaray to Region III Director, 

June 4, 1945; Memorandum of Faris to Region III Director, June 5, 10, 1945, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.
44Memorandum of Faris to Region III Director, July 6, 14, August 3. 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.

45Scoyen to the NPS Director, August 7, 1945, Historical Files, Trinity Site History (1940s), 

WHSA; Press Release, "Atomic Bomb . . . ," Boulder City (NV) News, August 9, 1945, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

46Faris to "Chuck [Richey]," August 9, 1945; A.P. Grider and Fritz Heilbron, Alamogordo 

Chamber of Commerce, to the Director of the United States Park Service, August 11, 1945, 

RG79, NPS, New Mexico Atomic Bomb Monument File L-58, Trinity Site 1945, Box 1 of 1, 

RG79, NPS, Denver NARA; Faris to Natt [Dodge]," n.d. 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, DEN 

FRC; Tillotson to the NPS Director, August 14, 1945, Historical Files, Trinity Site (1940s), 

WHSA.

47SWNM Monthly Reports, August, September 1945; Memorandum of Faris to the Region III 

Director, August 14, 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; Charles McCollum, Farm 

Security Administration, Las Cruces, to Hatch, August 16, 1945, Historical Files, Trinity Site 

(1940s), WHSA.

48Los Angeles (CA) Times, September 12, 1945.

49Scoyen to the NPS Director, August 22, 1945, Historical Files, Trinity Site (1940s), WHSA; 

Tolson to Demaray, September 13, 1945; Memorandum of Scoyen for the Files, September 14, 

1945; Memorandum of Scoyen to the WHSA Custodian, September 20, 1945; Memorandum of 

Tillotson to the WHSA Custodian, September 25, 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

50"Site of Atomic Bomb Test to Be Made Monument," Albuquerque Journal, September 9, 1945.

51Demaray to the Region III Director, September 14, 1945; Tillotson to Dempsey, September 14, 

1945; Scoyen to Demaray, September 19, 1945, RG79, NPS, Atomic Bomb Monument File L58, Denver NARA; Richey to the WHSA Custodian, October 11, 1945; Albright to Oscar L. 

Chapman, Assistant Secretary of the Interior, October 31, 1945; Chapman to Albright, 

November 14, 1945, Historical Files, Trinity Site (1940s), WHSA.

52Drury to the Region III Director, October 31, 1945; Drury to Dempsey, October 31, 1945; 

Tolson to the Region III Director, November 16, 1945; Tillotson to Demaray, November 5, 

1945, RG79, NPS, Atomic Bomb Monument File L-58, Denver NARA; Faris to the Region III 

Director, November 12,1945; Andrew H. Hepburn, Travel Editor, Look Magazine, New York, to 

George A. Grant, NPS, Santa Fe, November 13, 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

53Memorandum of Tolson to Demaray, November 19, 1945; "Memorandum of Understanding," 

Department of the Interior and War Department, Corps of Engineers, n.d., Historical Files, Land 

Use White Sands Missile Range History (1940s), WHSA.

54Tillotson to the NPS Director, November 23, 1945, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; 

Telegram of L. A. Hendrix, Mayor of Alamogordo. to Clinton P. Anderson, November 29, 1945, 
RG79, NPS, Atomic Bomb Monument File L-58, Denver NARA; Tolson to Faris, December 19, 

1945, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2427.

Chapter Five

1William Belknap, Jr., "New Mexico's Great White Sands," National Geographic, Volume CXII, 

No. One (July 1957): 113.

2Nash, American West in the Twentieth Century, 213-14, For a thorough analysis of the social 

changes of the post-War II era, see Landon Y. Jones, Great Expectations: America and the Baby 

Boom Generation (New York: Ballantine Books, 1980, 1986).

3

Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 103; SWNM Monthly Reports, May 1946, March 1964.

4

Interview with Dennis Ditmanson, Superintendent, WHSA, July 1, 1993; SWNM Monthly 

Report, February 1961.

5

Faris to Region Three Director, July 24, 1946, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

6Memorandum of Tillotson to the NPS Director, January 28, 1947, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

7Memorandum of Faris to the Regional Director, February 24, 1947; Memorandum of John M. 

Davis, Acting Associate Regional Director, to Faris, February 28, July 29, 1947; Mrs. Tom 

Charles to Faris, June 1,1948, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2429.

8

SWNM Monthly Report, July 1948; Memorandum of NPS Chief of Concessions to the NPS 

Director, May 2, 1949, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430; Faris to Davis, SWNM, August 

17, October 22, 1952; Davis to Faris, October 27, 1952, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

9

SWNM Monthly Report, July 1947; Memorandum of Faris to Davis, January 18, 1953, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

10SWNM Monthly Reports, June 1947, December 1949; Memorandum of Luis Gastellum, 

Acting SWNM General Superintendent, to Faris, June 15, 1953; Hugh Miller to Faris, July 22, 

1954; Faris to Region Three Director, October 28, 1954, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC.

11NPS Region Three, "Area Management Plan, White Sands National Monument," January 

1957, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

12Memorandum of Faris to Region Three Director, September 4, 1957, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.
13George B. Medlicott, "Master Plan for the Preservation and Use of White Sands National 

Monument," May 1960, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; SWNM Monthly Report, 

September 1956.

14SWNM Monthly Report, May 1960.

15Memorandum of Sanford Hill, Chief, NPS Western Office, Division of Design and 

Construction, to Region Three Director, "Master Plan - White Sands," April 18, 1961, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

16SWNM Monthly Reports, November, December 1960, January 1961; Mrs. Lena Faris 

interview, May 13, 1993.

17Interview with Donald R. Dayton, April 23, 1993, Santa Fe, NM; Mrs. Lena Faris interview, 

May 13, 1993; SWNM Monthly Reports, January, March 1961.

18Memorandum of Forrest M. Benson, Junior, Superintendent, WHSA, to Region Three Director, 

"Chamber of Commerce Meeting," April 5,1961; E.L. Mechem, U.S. Senator, to Tolson, July 29, 

1963; Tolson to Mechem, September 9, 1963; Memorandum of Hugh P. Beattie, Acting 

Superintendent, WHSA, to Southwest Regional Director (SWR), "Campground Proposal, " 

October 10, 1963; Memorandum of Leslie P. Arnberger, Acting SWR Director, to the NPS 

Director, "Campground Proposal, White Sands," October 23, 1963, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

19Beattie to SWR Director, ""Master Plan Narrative, Chapter 2, Area Objectives," August 14, 

1964; Memorandum of Hill to SWR Director, "Master Plan Narrative - White Sands," August 

19, 1964, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

20SWNM Monthly Reports, July, August 1964; Memorandum of Beattie to the NPS Director, 

"Revision of Text for Audiovisual Program - White Sands," September 24, 1964, RG79, NPS, 

WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

21Memorandum of Dayton to SWR Director, "Enforcement of state law prohibiting consumption 

of alcoholic beverages in public," April 13, 1966, RG79, NPS, W34, 1965-1967, WHSA, Box 

28, Denver NARA.

22Dodge, Natural History of White Sands; Edwin D. McKee, Project Chief, Paleotectonic Map 

Branch, USGS, to David J. Jones, Interpretative Planner, NPS Region Three, Santa Fe, May 4, 

1965, WHSA Files, SWR Library, Santa Fe; Lowell Sumner, "White Sands National Monument 

Natural Sciences Studies Plan,"" November 1969, RG79, NPS, SWR, 1968-1970, Box 28, 

Denver NARA; Interview with Stewart Udall, June 29, 1993, Santa Fe, NM; SWNM Monthly 

Report, August 1965.

23SWNM Monthly Report, September 1956; Nash, American West in the Twentieth Century,

214, 229, 299.
24SWNM Monthly Reports, February, May 1946; Memorandum of Faris to Region Three 

Director, January 30, May 31, 1946, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

25SWNM Monthly Report, January 1947.

26Memorandum of Faris to the Region Three Director, May 31, August 25, 1946, February 10, 

1947; Memorandum of Faris for the Files, October 23, 1946, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC; Faris to Captain Van Sandt, White Sands Signal Project Officer, Alamogordo Army Air 

Field (AAAF), July 24, 1946, RG79, NPS-CCF 1933-1949, Box 2430.

27Memorandum of Faris for the Region Three Director, March 3, 1947, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.

28SWNM Monthly Report, July 1947; "Statement of E. Ray Schaffner," WHSA Ranger, June 29, 

1947; Faris, ""Statement of Incident," June 29, 1947; Memorandum of Faris to the Region Three 

Director, July 1, 1947, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

29Kenneth C. Royall, Secretary of War, to the Secretary of the Interior, August 5, 1947, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC. For an analysis of the Army land transfer controversy in the 

Tularosa basin, see Welsh, Albuquerque District, 93-108.

30SWNM Monthly Reports, July, October-December 1948; Memorandum of Faris to the Region 

Three Director, September 17, 1947, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

31Memorandum of Tolson to BLM Director, "Proposed Withdrawal for Army, White Sands 

Project (Ordcit Project), New Mexico," July 29, 1948; Memorandum of John M. Davis, Acting 

Region Three Director, to the NPS Director, July 21, 1948, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver 

FRC.

32Memorandum of McColm to the Region Three Director, August 9, 1948, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.

33Memorandum of Faris to Region Three Director, March 14, 1949, March 10, 1950, RG79, 

NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

34Secretary of the Interior to the Secretary of the Army, March 17, 1949, RG79, NPS, WHSA 

Files, Denver FRC.

35SWNM Monthly Reports, November 1949, March, October 1950.

36Ibid., January 1951; A. van Dunn, Chief, NPS Water Resources Branch, ""Comments on 

Proposed Agreement with U.S. Air Force to Obtain Water from Holloman Air Force Base Water 

System ...," September 28, 1950, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

37Memorandum of Demaray to the Region Three Director, March 22, 1951; Memorandum of 

Tillotson to the NPS Director, May 8, 1951; Memorandum of Diehl to the Region Three 
Engineer, August 13, 1951; Memorandum of Merritt Barton, Region Three Counsel, to the 

Region Three Director, August 15, 1951, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

38Memorandum of Gastellum to the SWNM General Superintendent, March 24, 1953 , RG79, 

NPS , WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

39SWNM Monthly Reports, January, May 1954; Memorandum of Charles E. Krueger, NPS Park 

Landscape Architect, to the Chief, NPS Western Office, Division of Design and Construction, 

March 6, 1956, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

40Fred A. Seaton, Secretary of the Interior, to Charles E. Wilson, Secretary of Defense, January 

12, 1957; Bruce M. Kilgore, Editor, National Parks Magazine, to Seaton, May 1957, L30 Land 

Use White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) History 1950s File, WHSA Library.

41Seaton to Kilgore, August 19, 1957, L30 Land Use WSMR History 1950s File.

42Memorandum of Faris to the Region Three Director, June 9, 1959, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, 

Denver FRC.

43SWNM Monthly Reports, October 1959, January 1960.

44Walter McDougall, . . . the Heavens and the Earth: A Political History of the Space Age (New 

York: Basic Books, 1985), 302-303, 305-307.

45SWNM Monthly Reports, January, March, April, October 1961; ""Potential Space Port Site 

Found at White Sands," Albuquerque Journal. September 17, 1961.

46Memorandum of Benson to the Region Three Director, October 18,1961; Memorandum of 

John E. Kell, NPS Regional Chief of Lands, to the Region Three Director, October 30, 1961, 

RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.

47Memorandum of George W. Miller, Acting Region Three Director, to the NPS Director, 

October 30, 1961; Memorandum of Thomas J. Allen, Region Three Director, to the NPS 

Director, December 22, 1961, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC; SWNM Monthly Report, 

December 1961.

48"Kennedy Planning Area Visit on June 6," Alamogordo Daily News. April 2, 1963; 

Memorandum of George Miller to the NPS Director, March 2, 1962; Memorandum of Benson to 

the Region Three Director, February 27, 1962, L30 Land Use WSMR History 1960s (1 of 2) 

File, WHSA Library.

49SWNM Monthly Reports, February, July 1962; Memorandum of Benson to the Region Three 

Director, March 1, 1962, L30 Land Use WSMR History 1960s (1 of 2) File.

50Memorandum of Allen to the NPS Director, March 6, 1962, L30 Land Use WSMR History 

1960s (1 of 2) File.
51Memorandum of Benson to SWR Director, August 9, 1962, L30 Land Use WSMR History 

1960s (1 of 2) File.

52Stewart Udall interview, June 29, 1993; Memorandum of Allen to the NPS Director, April 8, 

1963, L30 Land Use WSMR History 1960s (1 of 2) File.

53Welsh, Albuquerque District, 103; Alamogordo Daily News, April 2,1963.

54Ibid.; SWNM Monthly Report, April 1963; Memorandum of Allen to the NPS Director, April 

8, 1963.

55SWNM Monthly Reports, June-October 1963; Memorandum of Allen to the NPS Director, 

April 23, 1963, L30 Land Use WSMR History 1960s (1 of 2) File.

56SWNM Monthly Reports, January-March, May 1964; Donald Dayton interview, April 23, 

1994; Memorandum of Dayton to SWR Director, February 24, 1965, RG79, NPS, A7019, 1965-

1967, WSHA, Box 8, Denver NARA.

57Memorandum of Dayton to the SWR Director, March 16, November 19, 1965; Dayton to MG 

J.F. Thorlin, Commanding General, WSMR, April 9, 27, 1965, RG79, NPS A7019, 1965-1967, 

WHSA File; SWNM Monthly Reports, April, June 1965,

58SWNM Monthly Report, March 1967; Memorandum of Dayton to the SWR Director, January 

24, 1966, RG79, NPS, A7019, 1965-1967, WHSA File.

59"[Clinton Anderson]," Secretary of Agriculture, to Oscar L. Chapman, Assistant Secretary of 

the Interior, January 8, 1946; "Dempsey Backs Plan For Bomb Site Monument," Santa Fe New 

Mexican, January 17, 1946; Ickes to Patterson, January 28, 1946; Memorandum of Drury to the 

Region Three Director, January 25, 1946; Patterson to the Secretary of the Interior, March 1, 

1946; S. 2054, "A Bill to provide for the reservation and maintenance of the B-29 bomber . . .," 

April 11, 1946, 70th Congress, 2nd session, RG79, NPS, New Mexico, Atomic Bomb 

Monument, File L58, Trinity, 1946, Box 1 of 1, Denver NARA (cited as NPS, File L58, 1946).

60Memorandum of Scoyen to the NPS Director, May 22, 1946; Chapman to Patterson, June 21, 

1946; Memorandum of Tolson to Demaray, July 16, 1946; MG Leslie R. Groves to Tillotson, 

July 31, 1946, NPS File L58, 1946.

61Memorandum of Tillotson to the NPS Director, August 1, 1946, NPS File L58, 1946.

62C. Edward Graves, Carmel, CA, to the National Park Service, Chicago, IL, October 26, 1946; 

Tolson to Graves, November 12, 1946, NPS File L58, 1946.

63Julius A. Krug, Secretary of the Interior, to Patterson, January 2, 1947, RG79, NPS, New 

Mexico, Atomic Bomb Monument, File L58, Trinity Site, 1947-April 1953, Box 1 of 1, Denver 

NARA (cited as NPS, File L58, 1947-1953); Patterson to the Secretary of the Interior, March 4, 

1957, H3417 Trinity Site History 1940s File, WHSA Library.
64Memorandum of Ronald F. Lee, NPS Chief Historian, to the NPS Director, October 7, 1947, 

NPS File L58, 1947-1953.

65B.O. Wells, Director of Security, to Commanding Officer, Holloman AFB, July 7, 1949; 

Memorandum of Kell to McColm, November 15, 1950; Memorandum of Faris to SWNM 

General Superintendent, November 27, 1950; Memorandum of Tillotson to the SWNM General 

Superintendent, December 29, 1950; Carroll L. Tyler, Manager, Santa Fe Operations Office, 

Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), to P.P. Patraw, Assistant Region Three Director, August 29, 

1951, NPS File L58, 1947-1953.

66Memorandum of Charles W. Porter III, Acting NPS Chief Historian, to the NPS Director, 

December 27, 1951, January 3, 1952, NPS File L58, 1947-1953.

67Lee to Pearson, January 7, 1952; ""A-Bomb Site Bid Made," Santa Fe New Mexican, March 4, 

1952, NPS File L58, 1947-1953.

68Memorandum of Tillotson to the NPS Director, March 12, 1952; ""Mechem Urges A-Bomb 

Site Preservation," Santa Fe New Mexican, March 12, 1952, NPS File L58, 1947-1953.

69Conrad Wirth, NPS Director, to Dempsey, April 16, 1952, NPS File L58, 1947-1953.

70Tyler to Mechem, July 16, 1953; Tillotson to T.E. Raynor, Albuquerque, August 7,1953; 

Raynor, "A-Test Site Fate is Still in Balance," Arizona Republic, August 23, 1953, RG79, NPS, 

New Mexico, Atomic Bomb Monument, File L58, Trinity Site, April 1953-1957, Box 1 of 1, 

Denver NARA (cited as NPS File L58, 1953-1957).

71SWNM Monthly Report, February 1955; "Trinity Site, New Mexico," n.d. 1965 (?), H3417 

Trinity Site History 1960s File, WHSA Library.

72S. 288, "A Bill to provide for establishment of the Trinity National Historic Site . . .," January 

12, 1967, 90th Congress, 1st session, H3417 Trinity Site History 1960s File.

73A.O. Stratton, Acting NPS Director, to Dayton, December 8, 1966; Memorandum of Dayton to 

SWR Director, January 4, 31, 1967, H3417 Trinity Site History 1960s File.

74Dayton to BG H.G. Davisson, Commanding General, WSMR, March 9, 1967; Davisson to 

Dayton, March 27, 1967; Memorandum of Dayton to the SWR Director, March 30, July 3, 1967; 

L.P. Gise, Manager, AEC, Albuquerque Operations Office, to B.H. Ferdig, WSMR, June 23, 

1967, H3417 Trinity Site History 1960s File.

Chapter Six

1

Jon Bowman, "Hollywood's On a Roll in the State," New Mexico Magazine, volume 70, no. 5 

(May 1992): 80-84; "White sands film making on the rise," Alamogordo Daily News, June 5, 

1994.
2

"White sands film making on the rise."

3

For an analysis of social, economic, and national security issues affecting the nation and the 

West in the postwar years, see Welsh, "Servants of the Golden Dream: The South Pacific 

Division, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, 1840-1994," unpublished MS, Chapter 9.

4

Interview with John "Jack" Turney, Alamogordo, NM, June 30, 1994; Colonel Thomas C. 

Kearns, WSMR Post Engineer, to SWR Director, February 20, 1970, RG79, NPS, SWR, 1968-

1970, Box 28, Folder N16, Denver NARA.

5Memorandum of Turney to the SWR Director, May 16, 1970, RG79, NPS, 1968-1970, Goals, 

WHSA File A6423, Box 7, Denver NARA; Press Release, David V. Petticord, Acting WHSA 

Superintendent, March 3, 1971, NPS, WHSA Files, SWR Library, Santa Fe.

6

Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 171.

7

"A Master Plan for Trinity National Historic Site, New Mexico," March 1970, NPS, WHSA 

Files, SWR Library.

8

Jack Turney interview, June 30, 1993.

9

Schneider-Hector, White Sands, 158-60, 163.

10Ibid., 64-65, 167-68, 175; Jack Turney interview, June 30, 1993.

11Ann Webster Smith, Director, Office of Compliance, Advisory Council on Historic 

Preservation, Washington, DC, to George Brazier, Deputy for Installations and Housing, 

Department of the Army, February 5,1974, Lands and Recreation 1972-1986 File, NPS, SWR 

History Files, Division of History, Santa Fe; Memorandum of Carl E. Walker, Acting SWR 

Director, to WHSA Superintendent, May 22, 1974, H3417 Trinity Site History 1970s File, HF, 

WHSA Library.

12Memorandum of Albert H. Schroeder, SWR Interpretive Specialist, to the SWR Assistant 

Director, Operations, May 18, 1972, K-Interpretation and Information (WSNM) 1972-1982 File, 

SWR History Files.

13Memorandum of William E. Brown, Chief, SWR Division of History, to SWR Assistant 

Director, Cooperative Activities, February 13, 1973; Richard W. Sellars, "Comments on the 

White Sands National Monument Resource Management Plan," May 23, 1974; David W. King, 

New Mexico State Planning Officer, to Joseph C. Rumburg, Jr., SWR Director, May 21, 1974, 

D18 Development and Maintenance (WHSA) 1973-1986 File, SWR History Files; 

Memorandum of Robert Utley to the Assistant NPS Director, Park Management, April 19, 1973, 

Lands and Recreation 1973-1986 File, SWR History Files.
14Memorandum of James A. Thomson, WHSA Superintendent, May 24, 1974, RG79, NPS, New 

Mexico, Atomic Bomb Monument File, A3815-a, 1974-1976, WHSA, Box 2 of 6, Denver 

NARA.

15Memorandum of Thomson to the SWR Director, July 12, 1974; Thomson to T. Destry Jarvis, 

Administrative Assistant, National Parks and Conservation Association, April 20, 1975, RG79, 

NPS, New Mexico, White Sands, File L34, 1974-1976, WHSA, Box 4 of 6; Memorandum of 

Jonathan Bickley, Santa Fe, to Howard A. Rubin, Director, New Mexico Motion Picture Industry 

Commission, September 30, 1975; Rubin to Rumburg, October 14, 1975; Memorandum of 

Thomson to SWR Director, October 22, 1975; Peggy Setter, Watson Junior High School, 

Colorado Springs, CO, to U.S. Senator Gary Hart, May 7,1976; Theodore R. Thompson, Deputy 

SWR Director, to U.S. Senator Joseph M. Montoya, June 16, 1976; Monte E. Fitch, Acting SWR 

Director, to Hart, June 25, 1976, RG79, NPS, New Mexico, Atomic Bomb Monument, File 

A3615-b, 1974-1976, WHSA, Box 1 of 6, Denver NARA.

16News Release No. 313, Dave McNully, WSMR Information Office, September 18, 1975; 

Speech, "Trinity Site Dedication as National Historic Landmark," October 4, 1975, H3417 

Trinity Site History 1970s File; Master Special Use Agreement, Cecil D. Andrus, Secretary of 

the Interior, and Clifford A. Alexander, Secretary of the Army, April 29, 1977, L30 Land Use 

WSMR Army File, Historical Files, WHSA Library.

17Final Master Plan, White Sands National Monument, March 1976, NPS, SWR History Files.

18Interview with Donald Harper, June 30, 1993, Alamogordo, NM, ; Runte, National Parks, 259-

60.

19Runte, National Parks, 262, 264.

20"Preliminary Draft Resources Management Plan and Environmental Assessment for White 

Sands National Monument," December 198 1, NPS, SWR History Files; Memorandum of 

Thomas W. Lucke, Acting Associate SWR Director, Planning and Cultural Resources, to WHSA 

Superintendent, July 2, 1980, D18 WHSA 1973-1986 File, SWR History Files.

21Memorandum of Melody Webb, Chief, SWR Division of History, to WHSA Superintendent, 

October 6, 1981; Memorandum of Jack Neckells, Acting SWR Director, to the NPS Director, 

September 15, 1983, D18 WHSA 1969-1982 Files, NPS, SWR History Files; Memorandum of 

Roger J. Siglin, Acting Associate SWR Director, Park Operations, to the WHSA Superintendent, 

November 19, 1981, L1425 Acquisition of Land Holdings (Dog Canyon) File, Historical Files, 

WHSA Library.

22Lucke to WHSA Superintendent, July 2, 1980.

23McDougall Heavens and the Earth, 431, 434, 436, 438; Welsh, "Servants of the Golden 

Dream," Chapter 9.

24Don Harper interview, June 30, 1993.
25Ibid.; Colonel Robert G. Ferrari, USACE, Director, Facilities Engineering, WSMR, to Harper, 

September 29, 1983, H3417 Trinity Site 1980s File, Historical Files, WHSA Library; 

Memorandum of Harper to the Deputy SWR Director, October 3, 1983, Lands and Recreation 

1972-1986 File, NPS, SWR History Files.

26Don Harper interview, June 30, 1993; Eldon G. Reyer, Associate SWR Director, Planning and 

Cultural Resources, to MG Hemphill, U.S. Readiness Command, McDill AFB, FL, November 

9,1984; Reyer to Dr. C. Calmbacher, USARRED/AFEW-MS, Fort McPherson, FL, January 18, 

1985, Lands and Recreation 1972-1986 File, NPS, SWR History Files.

27LTC David S. Barber, Chief, Test Engineering Division, WSMR, to George Thorsen/Tony 

Crosby, NPS, Denver Service Center (DSC)-TCE, June 8, 1987, H3417 Trinity Site History 

1980s File, HF, WHSA Library; Memorandum of Richard Geiser, SWR Section of Research and 

Preservation Planning, to Associate SWR Director, Planning and Cultural Resources, April 29, 

1987; Memorandum of Barry Sulam, Chief, SWR Division of Conservation, to Associate SWR 

Director, Planning and Resources Management, February 28, 1989, A-Administrative WHSA 

1957-1987 File, NPS, SWR History Files.

28Don Harper interview, June 30, 1993; Dennis Ditmanson interview, WHSA, July 1,1993.

29Interview with Jerry Yarbrough, Superintendent, Fort Davis National Historic Site, Texas, July 

7, 1994.

30Memorandum of Ditmanson to the SWR Director, December 17, 1991, D18 WHSA 1973-1986 

File, NPS, SWR History Files.

31Ibid.

32Ibid.; "Visitor Services Project, White Sands National Monument," Dwight L. Madison, Editor, 

Report 29, Cooperative Park Studies Unit, University of Idaho, January 1991, WHSA Library.

33Dennis Ditmanson interview, July 1, 1993, July 29, 1994.