Cedar Breaks National Monument - Cedar Breaks UT

City:: Cedar Breaks, UT
Site Type:: Parks and Recreation, Lodges, Ranger Stations and Visitor Centers
New Deal Agencies:: National Park Service (NPS), Conservation and Public Lands, Work Relief Programs, Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC)
Started:: 1937
Quality of Information:: Moderate
Marked:: Yes
Site Survival:: Extant

Description

Cedar Breaks National Monument was created by President Franklin Roosevelt on August 22, 1933, with just over 6,000 acres carved out of Dixie National Forest in southwest Utah. This was Roosevelt’s first national monument declaration and it set a precedent that FDR would follow again and again: transferring monuments and parks from the US Forest Service to the National Parks Service – which grew substantially under the New Deal.

In 1934, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) sent men from Zion Canyon to set up a ‘stub camp’ (closed in winter) at Cedar Breaks, where they started working on improvements to the monument area. From 1934 to 1938, CCC teams built a campground with picnic tables, fireplaces, restrooms, sewer lines, and a disposal system, along with roads, trails, rail guards, and parking areas.

In 1935, the CCC men built a boundary fence around the entire monument to keep out wandering cattle, since national parks and monuments are closed to grazing.

In 1937, another team came up from Zion to construct the visitor center and ranger cabin at Cedar Breaks. These structures exhibit the classic National Park Service rustic architecture and both are on the National Register of Historic Places.