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Show 109 explorers until the uranium boom of the 1950s, which brought prospectors looking to capitalize on the country's nuclear ambitions. Mining brought more roads. The roads provided more recreational access, which in tum brought more attention. Yet it was only in the 1960s that the area took a prominent place on the journalism map. In 1961, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall proposed that the area - then administered by the Bureau of Land Management - become a national park. The ensuing debate played prominently in Utah newspapers and, over time, in the national press. The conflict about the size of the proposed park and what development, if any, to allow in its boundaries embroiled ranchers, miners, politicians, conservationists, and others with passions invested in the land. The debate that bad briefly surfaced when Bryce Canyon was declared a national park took center stage. National parks, which bad originally been created on "useless" lands - those without economic potential beyond tourism - now were vying for territory that contained resources for grazing, mining, hunting, and other development. To gather support for Canyonlands, Secretary Udall invited politicians and journalists to join him and bis family on a five-day tour of the area. So, ninety-two years after Powell scrambled to the top of the cliffs to get a clear view of the area, military helicopters would lift a delegation of journalists and politicians from the same river gorge to get a clear view of the proposed Canyonlands National Park. Secretary Udall hoped a positive impression of the area would influence how these politicians would vote and how these journalists would cover the ensuing debate. |
