White Sands Dunes and Dreams: A History of White Sands National Monument Administrative History

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 Spanish-language 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).