Preservation: The Man Who Saved the West
A Custer film inspired National Park Service historian Robert Utley.
By: Jana Bommersbach 06/01/2007
Ask him to pick a favorite and he says, “It’s hard to select one, but my pick would be Fort Davis. In addition to the historical studies, I was part of the master planning team and the museum planning team, and I also influenced some of the early personnel selections for managing, preserving and interpreting the park. Of all ‘my’ parks, Fort Davis is a double ‘my.’”
It’s easy to see why. Fort Davis was established in 1854 on the site of an Indian village. The Army abandoned it in the early 1890s, and over the next seven decades, many eyed the fort for everything from a Western movie center to a resort. Today, it is considered perhaps the best preserved of all the 19th-century frontier forts and one of the best “Buffalo Soldier” forts in the entire West. Both partially and fully-restored buildings are scattered over its 474 acres, with interpretive displays, an excellent book shop and museum.
But Utley has a soft spot for all the places he helped save:
• Hubbell Trading Post National Historic Site in northern Arizona is the oldest operating trading post on the Navajo Nation. You can literally step back in time and experience this original 160-acre homestead, which includes the trading post, Hubble home and a visitor center with Navajo weavers at work.
• Fort Bowie National Historic Site in southern Arizona commemorates the bitter conflict between Chiricahua Apaches and the U.S. military. It’s considered a “lasting monument to the bravery and endurance of U.S. soldiers paving the way for settlement and the taming of the western frontier,” as well as an insight into the clashing of cultures as the Apaches fought to preserve their existence.
• Golden Spike National Historic Site in Utah was the place, on May 10, 1869, where workers completed the transcontinental railroad, placing the final spikes in the tracks connecting the eastern and western legs. The event is re-enacted every year on the anniversary.
• Chamizal National Memorial in El Paso, Texas, marks the 1963 milestone in diplomatic relations between Mexico and the United States—a treaty that settled a century-long boundary dispute.
After a successful stint in Santa Fe, Utley’s next stop was Washington, D.C., where he was named chief historian for the Park Service. He also was director of the Office of Archaeology and Historic Preservation, and finally, he was promoted to deputy executive director, reporting directly to the President of the United States. While there, he was a “key player” in the creation of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. He devised the program to implement the act, which was approved by Congress to give grants to states and tribes for conservation.
“I believe that preservation of the Western heritage and historic places is a priority of the public and government alike,” he tells us. But then he delivers the bad news: “During the past few presidential administrations, preservation has suffered from higher priorities, and the Bush administration has been especially hard on the National Park Service. NPS is in bad shape now. Morale is low. Funds are drying up. Services are down, despite the rhetoric. But it is still a priority with the public.”
The public, he believes, must pressure the government. He says he sees public interest everywhere he turns—by the popularity of the History Channel on cable TV, where he’s a regular guest; the numerous historical chapters operating in many towns and counties; and the “booming” need to save historic homes and neighborhoods, filled by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
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