The Great Death Valley National Monument Mission 66 Conspiracy (That Never Was)

Abstract

In 1956 the National Park Service (NPS) launched Mission 66, a ten-year program to rebuild and improve infrastructure within hundreds of units of the national park system, among them Death Valley National Monument in California. As elsewhere, plans in this unit centered on a visitor center, new employee housing, administrative and maintenance facilities, and campgrounds. The original plans developed for Death Valley were abruptly changed, leading to allegations that the NPS was involved in a deal with a mining company that operated a resort in the park, in which the NPS would receive a land donation in exchange for overlooking illegal use of monument water by the resort. This Great Death Valley Mission 66 Conspiracy reached the ears of Congress, and in 1962 Congressional hearings were held to investigate these matters. The NPS director, Horace Albright (the second director of the NPS and later an executive with the mining company), and many others were called to give testimony, though no wrongdoing was ever found. This story gives a fascinating glimpse into the development of Mission 66 facilities in a large park, and how the plans for these facilities depended on an underlying geography of land ownership, water rights, dubious surveys, and expectations by far away bureaucrats; these in turn reveal much about possibilities and limitations on opportunities for park development. The Mission 66 facilities in Death Valley have stood the test of time and remain central to visitation in the park to this day.