preferred that White Sands "should hold the line strongly against expansion of present facilities or introduction of new adverse activities."[1]
The second aspect of visitation in need of improvement in the 1960s was interpretative services. Whereas the 1930s focused upon museum construction, the 1950s on nature trails and hikes, the 1960s brought an international audience to the dunes among the hundreds of thousands of annual visitors. Acting superintendent Hugh Beattie noted in September 1964 that "at least 500 visitors received information about White Sands by listening to tape recorded talks in German, Spanish, French, Japanese, and Italian." The multilingual staffs at Holloman AFB and WSMR produced these tapes, as they hosted such groups as "the foreign student battalions from Fort Bliss [German and Japanese]." Spanish-language materials were necessary because "family groups from Chihuahua have requested such help frequently." Stimulating the improvement of this program were complaints by native speakers of these languages, like the German linguist from "the Foreign Service Institute of the [U.S.] Department of State." She had informed monument staff in July 1964 of the "poor voice quality, articulation, and content" of the German tapes at the visitors center. "We believe that the appeal of our foreign language program," said Beattie, "justifies further development and upgrading of the presentation." The desire to meet the needs of well-educated foreign visitors thus led Beattie to request funds for the translations into over one-half dozen languages.[2]
Most troubling of the "baby boom" changes at White Sands was the need to improve law enforcement at the park. This phenomenon had touched all NPS units, as it had the nation as a whole, in the 1960s because of the rate of youthful violence in America's urban centers. Rebellion was a feature of Sixties life, fed by such movements as civil rights, antiwar protest, campus unrest, and the drug culture. Superintendents' reports for White Sands show the progression of law enforcement issues from the early 1960s, when speeding, littering, and an occasional fist fight took place, to the decade's end when drunkenness, burning of picnic tables, firing of bullets into monument signs, theft of property, and gang fights prevailed. Don Dayton revealed the severity of such incidents in 1966 when he informed the Southwest regional director: "The subject state law was never enforced here previously . . . . Over the years this has tended to make White Sands the logical place to hold beer parties that were prohibited elsewhere." This led Dayton to stop the use of alcohol at the dunes, with both the usual complaints and the decline of vandalism and violence. Dayton also had to close the park at 10:00PM in the summer, and to implement higher fees to meet increased costs of service to the
- ↑ Beattie to SWR Director, "Master Plan Narrative, Chapter 2, Area Objectives," August 14, 1964; Memorandum of Hill to SWR Director, "Master Plan Narrative—White Sands," August 19, 1964, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.
- ↑ SWNM Monthly Reports, July, August 1964; Memorandum of Beattie to the NPS Director, "Revision of Text for Audiovisual Program—White Sands," September 24, 1964, RG79, NPS, WHSA Files, Denver FRC.
