A CLG in the Wilderness: Cooperative Local Preservation in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem

Summary

The Shoshone National Forest (Northwestern Wyoming) encompasses some of the most remote, inaccessible landscapes in the continental United States with 56% (1.4 million acres) designated Wilderness. Documenting, researching, and managing heritage resources in these Wilderness areas provides special challenges. A fundamental issue is that little basic archaeological inventory has been conducted and working in the area is logistically difficult. Over the last several years, a partnership between the Park County Historic Preservation Commission (PCHPC), a local certified local government (CLG) entity and the Forest has focused on developing cooperative approaches for addressing the impacts of wild land fire, limited law enforcement presence, and a wide spread public perception that artifact theft in the back country will go un-noticed. By accessing a number of funding sources and extensive volunteer commitment, the PCHPC completed 30-40 days of Wilderness fieldwork a year for the last five years. Of fundamental importance has been the unambiguous documentation that these remote landscapes contain a very rich and complex archaeological record in both the montane and alpine zones. While management of contemporary Wilderness settings focuses on humans as temporary visitors, the prehistoric archaeological record demonstrates that in the past, human land use was much less transient.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 81st Annual Meeting, Orlando, FL (2016)   •
• Celebrating the Contributions of a Community of Preservation: Forest Service Partners and Volunteers

Keywords

Spatial Coverage