Caribou Wilderness - Area History

Area History

Before this area became a federally protected wilderness in 1964, it had been previously protected as a primitive area since 1932. When the National Park Service was created in 1916, most of the first National Parks were carved out of National Forest Lands.

Beginning in 1929, The United States Forest Service set some areas aside as primitive areas to keep the Park Service from continuing to acquire forest lands. At least that is the conclusion of economist David Gerard, who wrote about the competing interests between the two federal agencies: The Park Service under the federal Department of Interior and the Forest Service, managed by the federal Department of Agriculture.

The forest service already managed 151 million acres (610,000 km2) of forest reserves before the National Park Service was even in existence. And each new national park had to be approved by the U.S. Congress.

Stephen T. Mather, Director of the National Park Service had made his ideas of park expansion at the expense of the national forest system increasingly apparent to the Forest Service. He had generated such support for the park system that there was at least a fair chance of many large areas in the forests being transferred to the Park Service. —(Gilligan 1953, 92)

These political maneuverings by the US Forest Service in the years 1929 - 1964 helped in the development of the wilderness preservation system of today.