Helena National Forest

Moose Creek Ranger Station: A Snapshot of Forest Service History

In 1881, a Division of Forestry was created in the Department of the Interior. It had no real staff or legal authority. Ten years later, the Organic Act established the Forest Reserves. In 1897, President Grover Cleveland created substantial Forest Reserves in the western United States. The reserves comprised some 21 million acres, including 3 million in the Lewis and Clark Reserve, which is now encompassed by the Helena National Forest. These large reserves were eventually broken into smaller tracts so that they could be more efficiently managed and protected.

Politically appointed supervisors and rangers with the Department of Interior’s Government Land Office (GLO) administered the Forest Reserves. The USDA Division of Forestry was largely a technical advisory position. Thanks to the efforts of Gifford Pinchot and President Theodore Roosevelt, however, forest administration consolidated under the USDA Bureau of Forestry in 1905. The agency became the Forest Service. Rangers became competitive civil service positions.

In 1907, the term “national forest” replaced the old “forest reserve” nomenclature. District offices were created. Montana and parts of the Pacific Northwest fell under District 1—later to be named Region 1. Its headquarters was Missoula. Larger forests were divided into smaller units. The Helena National Forest was created in 1908. It was consolidated from the Big Belt (est. 1905), Elkhorn (est. 1905) and Helena (est. 1906) Forest Reserves.

In 1908, the Forest Service began a program of obtaining or building administrative and field offices for local on-the-ground control. Many old homesteads and mining cabins were converted into field offices. Ranger stations were also built to a standard design. Rangers patrolled the forests on foot and by horse to administer mining and grazing permits, as well as for forest fire protection. Although there was constant political pressure for more commodity production, the years between 1908 and the late 1930s are often termed the “conservation era” in FS administrative history because the agency focus was on forest resource and watershed protection.

The Great Depression of the 1930s provided the Forest Service with a workforce of unparalleled size and enthusiasm: the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC). Comprised of young men ranging in age from 17 to 25, the corps delivered on President Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal promise to engage the unemployed in productive work. Camps were established throughout the West, including the Ten Mile Creek drainage (see below). The CCC crews built trails and recreation facilities, planted trees and thinned forests and fought wildfires. Today, the Forest Service owes much of its historic “infrastructure” to the young men of the CCC.

World War II brought many changes to the Forest Service. The agency geared up timber production to meet the supply demands of a world war. This wartime demand translated into high production to support the post-war housing boom in the 1950s and early 1960s. Ranger districts were built up to support the timber program, as well as growing recreation and other resource demands on National Forest land. This focus on commodity production eventually became a contentious issue in the 1960s. Since this time, the Forest Service has gone through many changes in an effort to balance resource protection with commodity outputs in a multiple-resource and ecosystem management framework.

In the 1970s, the agency began to add archaeologists and historians to their staff to enable the agency to comply with the National Historic Preservation Act (1966) and other federal legislation. The Forest Service now routinely considers heritage resources in all of its project planning and conducts a variety of heritage stewardship work, ranging from archaeological site investigations to historic building stabilization to public interpretation. Restoration of the Moose Creek Ranger Station (RS) is a good example.

Moose Creek Ranger Station

The Moose Creek Ranger Station in the Ten Mile drainage west of Helena was constructed early in the 20th Century. Evidence from old maps and records, and a pencil date exposed on a wall during restoration work, indicate that the ranger station was built in 1908. Agency correspondence indicates that the station was fully operating by 1910. Walter Derrick was the ranger in 1911 but by 1919 he had been replaced by D.H. Lewis, who kept this job until 1928 or 1929 when the Moose Creek and McClellan Ranger districts were combined. During the 1930s, Ranger Bert Goodman was in charge of the facility.

The building is very similar to other early Forest Service-built ranger and guard stations in Region 1, such as the Burnt Hollow RS on the neighboring Deerlodge NF. The building was intended to be both economic and functional, with office, kitchen, sleeping and storage space. Site plans dated to 1921 shows a barn and tool shed on the north side of Moose Creek, but nothing except a grassy meadow is found there today. Moose Creek functioned as a guard station and, in the 1930s, served as the access point to a lookout atop Colorado Mountain (which was removed by the Forest Service in the 1960s). Today, the site is comprised of the old ranger station, root cellar and garage.

The Moose Creek RS played a role in the CCC-operated Camp Rimini, located directly across the road in what is now Moose Creek Campground. Camp Rimini (or Camp A-76) was opened on June 11, 1939, during the waning years of the Great Depression. The camp housed from 137-200 young men. They preformed a variety of work on the Helena NF, including campground improvements, road maintenance and fire hazard reduction.

World War II soon led to the closure of Camp Rimini in 1942. It was quickly transformed into an army dog-training facility—or War Dog Reception and Training Center. It accommodated some 235 military personnel and 700-900 dogs of various breeds. The dogs were to be used for the proposed Allied invasion of Nazi Europe through Norway. When these plans were abandoned for an alternative plan to invade through northern France (Normandy), the camp refocused on training dogs and men for Artic Search and Rescue units. Forest Service personnel stationed or working out of Moose Creek RS also indirectly helped in the management of this facility (i.e., laying out dog sledding trails, rescue of lost men, bear control).

The Camp Rimini dog training facility was closed in March of 1944. The Forest Service held a public sale of many of the portable buildings at Camp Rimini. Because ranger district headquarters had been moved to Helena, the old Moose Creek RS was also sold. The building complex (cabin, garage and cellar) had a succession of private owners (who used the cabin under a Special Use Permit authorization) until 1998, when the cabin came back into FS ownership.

In 2001, the Helena National Forest began restoring the old ranger station for use as summer educational facility and winter rental cabin. The facility will be open for public use in the summer of 2005, the Forest Service’s centennial year. Please check the Helena National Forest website for upcoming Centennial and other events there.

While You Are In the Ten Mile Drainage...

The Moose Creek Ranger Station is surrounded by other historical sites that you may want to visit:

Ten Mile Municipal Water Ditch: This may be the oldest municipal water ditch in Montana. Built in the mid-1860s by William Chessman, the ditch extends from the mouth of Minnehaha Creek to the present day Ten Mile Water Treatment Plant. Chessman Reservoir supplied water to the ditch system during times of low water. Portions of the old water transport system are still visible on the east side of the Rimini road near the base of the mountains. Chessman Reservoir is an easy 7-mile drive from the Moose Creek RS.

Helena and Red Mountain RR Spur Line: The branch or spur line of the Northern Pacific Railroad (NP) reached the mining town of Rimini in the fall of 1886. The NP had won an intense competition with the Montana Central (Great Northern) railroad to build rail access to Rimini area mines. Some of the big players in early Helena and Montana history—Charles Broadwater, Samuel Hauser, James Hill, Anton Holter—were involved in this fierce and litigious rivalry. The H&RM railroad line operated for about 14 years, when market decline and limited ore production forced Rimini mines to close. Today, the old H&RM line is located on the west side of the Rimini road and can be accessed from Moose Creek Campground. It is a great place to hike or mountain bike. Incidentally, no tracks were ever laid on the competing Montana Central RR bed; it became the country road to Rimini in 1908.

Early Lode Mines: Between 1885-1905, the Rimini area was an important lode or underground mining center near Helena. The tiny community of Rimini (named after an Italian opera) owes its birth to underground mining. Mines on Lee and Red Mountains created the intense competition to build a railroad branch line to Rimini, whereby processed ore could be transported more quickly to the East Helena and Anaconda smelters. The great boom was not to be and the town of Rimini nearly passed from existence. The need for base metals (copper, lead, zinc, silver) during WWI and especially WWII caused a small resurgence in mining but this too was not too last. By the 1950s, open-pit mining had become the order of the day. Evidence of mining is still abundant everywhere—waste rock piles, collapsed adits, old machinery and industrial debris. The remains of old ore tram systems can still be seen in Rimini.

Camp Rimini CCC and World War II Dog Training Camp: This unique historic site can be accessed from the Moose Creek Campground or the nearby snowmobile trailhead. The trailhead is located in the old CCC and army camp parade grounds. Cement building pads and rock walls above and below the parade grounds identify the locations of over 25 CCC and military buildings—barracks, mess and recreation halls, infirmary, class rooms and administrative offices. With a little imagination, you can still envision the sights and sounds of both the old CCC and military camps in operation.

Historic Rimini: The Ten Mile drainage was a poor producer of placer gold. But things got moving in the late 1870s with the development of lode or underground mining on Lee and Red Mountains. Historic Rimini was quickly borne and by 1890 it comprised several hotels and stores; a school; saloons, gambling houses and pool halls; livery stable; physician’s office; church; several boarding houses; and a sawmill. About 300 people lived there. The Helena and Red Mountain Spur Line gave the community a socioeconomic boost. But the community quickly went into demise at the turn of the 20th Century. By 1920, only 20 people lived there.

Today, Rimini has a growing population of year-round residents. It retains a number of picturesque buildings (many being renovated by their owners) dating from about 1885 to 1900. You can still pick out Rose Wilson’s store, the Red Mountain Tavern and the old livery-garage. The restored Rimini School-Community Center was built in 1904. It is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

 

Links:
Heritage Resources
Forest Prehistory
Prehistoric Rock Art
Mining History-Charter Oak Mine and Mill
Industrial Helena Limekilns
Lewis & Clark Expedition
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USDA Forest Service - Helena National Forest
Last Modified: Thursday, 17 May 2007 at 12:55:15 EDT