Distinctly Montana Magazine

W W W. D I S T I N C T LY M O N TA N A . C O M 73 it would satisfy Lane's desire to use the park for food production Pen- well and any other applicants could be justifiably denied. Albright loved the idea. But could he pull it off ? e most im- mediate problem was Hansen's companion: J. Bruce Kremer, a Butte attorney and politico who was associated with the Montana Council of Defense. Organized to aid the war effort at home, the Council's initial priorities involved raising Montana food production by at least 30 percent. Kremer was also vice-chairman of the Democratic National Committee and a strong ally of Senator Walsh. Albright feared that Kremer would leak the news to Albright's enemy Walsh. Walsh might alert Penwell or Lane to the subterfuge. But Albright may not have realized a couple of other things about Kremer. One was that the Council of Defense's agricultural goals were proving difficult to achieve in the face of region-wide drought. Indeed the Council would soon start battling a radical Butte labor union, as well as favoring Inquisition-like tactics to suppress dissent—moves that have since made it notorious, but may have been at least partly motivated by the impossibility of achieving its original agricultural goals. Another was that Kremer's brother Alfred, also a Butte attorney, was a business partner of Hansen's. Bruce's personal relationships could outweigh his politi- cal loyalties. Bruce pledged to Albright that he would pretend he "couldn't remember a thing" about this conversation. But could Albright trust him? Butte has long been known throughout Montana for hard- nosed dealings in business and politics. If Albright's scheme were exposed, it could be not just embarrassing, but politically dangerous, given Walsh's power. Or perhaps Hansen, having beaten Penwell to the contract, would exploit it as fully as Penwell would have. Albright gambled. In the memoir, he recalled how it paid off: "Late in the summer of 1918, Hansen unloaded a carload or so of cattle in the southern end of the park. After the war ended a few months later, every head of Hansen's cattle was removed, leaving Glacier unharmed." Records that have survived in the Glacier archives suggest a slightly different story. e 1918 concession contract with the Glacier Park Hotel Company included — for the first and last time — a clause regarding livestock grazing "to supply and accommodate its guests and employees in the park." If we accept this version of the story, Hansen wasn't involved in the solution, but Albright's insight from that con- versation — to make an end run around Penwell with a less damaging alternative—was instead applied with a familiar party. is version also highlights Albright's concern: not grazing so much as grazing for external, commercial purposes. To many ecolo- gists today, the issue is that grazing animals — including the horses that Albright loved to use for pack trips in Glacier and elsewhere — alter the ecosystem. (Meanwhile, some national park ecosys- tems are so altered by past grazing that they are best maintained by continued grazing. is scientific judgment, along with political factors such as how a park was acquired or commissioned, means that although Glacier remains off-limits to grazing, other parks have other policies.) But to Albright the issue was not ecology so much as commerce. And his ideal proved lasting: Today, many people see national parks as set aside from common economic purposes such as raising stock for food or damming rivers for electricity—because they have assimilated Albright's views. Albright and Mather were trying to establish parks as sacred sites, set aside from any day-to-day concerns. Although this view may be overly simplistic (because parks can't be — never have been — utterly segregated from the effects of their surroundings, whether historical indigenous cultures or future climate change), it has fostered a worthy and meaningful conservation movement for over a century. And had Walter Hansen not admired the wildflowers in Glacier — and then voiced that admiration to a desperate man in the Glacier Park Hotel — those ideals might well have been stymied by the perceived hunger of a nation at war. Horace Albright with President Herbert Hoover in 1928 Glacier Wildflowers RAY BUELLER

• Cover