Working on the Wilderness Bill, September 1957

In the spring of 1957, conservationists for and against the creation of a national wilderness preservation system began a new round of debate in Congress. The summer and fall of 1957 became very difficult for Sigurd in his hometown, where most residents strongly opposed the idea, fearing it would destroy the local economy and take away their freedom to use the wilderness they loved in the ways they had used it for decades. In September 1957 Sigurd proposed changes to the July 22 draft of the wilderness bill that would make clear that the bill was not eliminating outboard motors or proposing an expansion of the size of the canoe country wilderness. (At the time, this wilderness, known today as the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, was called the Superior Roadless Areas.) Page 8 of the bill below shows these changes. Sigurd's own writing appears at the top of the page; someone else working on the bill had already pencilled in Sigurd's suggested change regarding outboard motors near the bottom of the page. Other small changes in this draft--usually suggestions for deleting words or sentences--also were made by Sigurd. For more complete background, and to see these changes in the context of other events during the first crucial period in the wilderness bill campaign, read Sigurd Olson and the Wilderness Act: 1956 and 1957. To see the success of Sigurd's proposed changes, read The Turning Point.