Grant-Kohrs Ranch Kohrs and Bielenberg Home Ranch Historic Resource Study/Historic Structure Report/Historical Data

The park has recently begun and has virtually completed the visitor services development required for its opening, planned for the late summer of 1976. Current planning (February 1976) has resulted in the formation of a General Management Plan team that is preparing this document. Prior to this, the Outline of Planning Requirements and Statement for Management were both prepared. In all phases of their preparation, cultural resource specialists (a historian, an archeologist, and a historical architect) were consulted. The planning team assembled to write the General Management Plan includes a historian, a historical architect, and at the insistence of those two, a curator. It is unlikely that the General Management Plan will be prepared in isolation from cultural resource considerations.

While the Outline of Planning Requirements and the Statement for Management are currently the two active planning and development documents, it is of some value to consider what the planning and development considerations have been to date in order to better understand current and probable future development at the park. Accordingly, the following list, noting the documents involved and containing a brief synopsis of their content, is provided. All are on file at the Denver Service Center, Midwest/Rocky Mountain Team or Historic Preservation Division, Denver Service Center.

A. Planning Studies and Reports Needed

The Task Directive for Package 113 and the "Recommendations" section of the Historic Resource Study denote those studies still required by law and by National Park Service policy in order to compile the necessary data for any projected development at the park.

B. Recommendations or Special Considerations

1. Park Staff

There is little doubt that the park requires the services of a formally trained curator in residence to direct the maintenance of the rich collection of furnishings and ranching and farming equipment at the site. Consideration should be given to this obvious need as soon as possible. Proper care and maintenance of the extensive and fragile collection of artifacts and documents at the ranch is as imperative as is the immediate structural preservation of the buildings. The collections as well as the artifacts come under the protection of the Historic Preservation Act of 1966, Executive Order 11593, and of National Park Service historic preservation policy.

2. Restoration

While the General Management Plan is yet to be written, some documents outlining various interpretive alternatives suggest an emphasis be put on operating the park as an 1880-1900-period ranch. While these are only alternatives and do recommend that later buildings be retained, the concept of returning the ranch or any of its components to a certain period will always carry with it the threat of demolishing buildings equally historic but more modern. The question of setting an interpretive date, therefore, should be answered only after carefully considering the best method of protecting the integrity of the entire site and the most imaginative approach to interpreting the resource and its history. It should be realized that the site represents a unique opportunity to introduce the visitor to ranching history from 1862 to 1972.

3. Scenic Easements

The scenic easements on the land immediately adjacent to the fee simple lands, on which the prime historical properties stand, afford adequate protection for the historical integrity of the scene. Indeed, inasmuch as they permit current livestock management practices, it may be hoped that the ranchers using the scenic easement lands will follow normal stock-growing trends in the future, which will afford visitors a look at current practices in the cattle business while the park shows how it was carried on from 1862 to the present.

Yet there is another consideration regarding scenic easements, and that concerns the lands further removed from the park but in direct visual relationship to it. Specifically, these include the hills and benchlands north and west of the fee simple lands. A careful determination of the lands involved will be needed, since the amount of acreage will probably be considerable. At current land prices in Powell County, Montana, the cost of securing such easements will be great enough to necessitate securing additional funds from Congress. The merits and liabilities of such a course should be considered as soon as possible, and should be addressed in the General Management Plan.

4. Interpretation

Among the aspects of historic preservation involved with the area is the accurate presentation of the significance of the site and its history to the public. This will require considerable research in the near future. The required research is discussed in the "Recommendations" section of the Historic Resource Study.