Montana Wilderness Association - Background and Directives

Background and Directives

Since 1958, the Montana Wilderness Association has worked to protect Montana’s wilderness, wildlife habitat, and traditional recreation opportunities. The organization was instrumental in the passage of the 1964 Wilderness Act and in the designation of every Wilderness area in the state, like the Bob Marshall, Scapegoat, and Absaroka-Beartooth Wildernesses. It also helped win Wild and Scenic designations for the Missouri and Flathead rivers, and National Monument status for the Upper Missouri River Breaks.

Origin

The Montana Wilderness Association was founded in 1958 by Ken and Florence Baldwin. The grassroots organization’s mission was to preserve wilderness and influence policy on public land management. Initially the association contained a group of individuals all with the goals to protect the heritage of Montana land and the proper management of public lands. The group was inspired by similar wilderness oriented individuals and associations around the nation at the time. John Muir has recently founded the Sierra Club and was very active in protecting Yosemite; Aldo Leopold wrote about the ethics involved in conservation and was a co-founder of the Wilderness Society; Bob Marshall wrote several essays about conservation in forestry publications and was also a founder of the Wilderness Society. The MWA is the nation’s premiere Wilderness grassroots organization and was significantly influential in the passing of the Wilderness Act by Lyndon Johnson in 1964. With the passing of this Act came the designation of the Montana’s first Wilderness. The state and nation’s first was the Bob Marshal along with the Cabinet Mountains, the Gates of the Mountains, the Selway-Bitterroot, and Anaconda Pintler.