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11 Most Endangered
South Pass
Year Listed: 1995
Location: South Pass , Wyoming
Current Status: Favorable
Threat: Development, Road Construction
To westbound travelers on the Oregon Trail, South Pass provided the least rigorous crossing of the awesome barrier of the Continental Divide.
Credit: Alliance for Historic Wyoming
Significance
To westbound travelers on the Oregon Trail, South Pass provided the least rigorous crossing of the awesome barrier of the Continental Divide. Original trail ruts, clearly visible more than a century after the big wagons rolled, are not the only nationally significant resources in the South Pass area: prehistoric archeological remains, Native American sacred sites and a 19th-century mining town are all nearby. But a proposed natural gas pipeline set to cut through the landscape, requiring rock blasting and trenching, would cause extensive and irreparable damage.
Updates
April 2008: Congress passes legislation that will expand the boundaries of the Historic Site and will add an important related site bringing more resources under protection. This legislation complements legislation that authorizes the creation of a $38 million grant program to ensure the protection of all ten former Japanese Internment Camps. Unfortunately, funds for the program have yet to be appropriated.
Legal challenges brought by the National Trust and the Wyoming Outdoor Council caused the Altamont Gas Transmission company to withdraw its project proposal. However, there has been additional development interest in the area over the past few years. Large portions of Wyoming's public lands have cultural resources that are being threatened by increased energy development. Currently, the strongest threat to this National Historic Landmark is the absence of a Landmark boundary, making it difficult for the Bureau of Land Management to properly manage the contributing cultural resources. A thorough documentation of the landscape and creation of a boundary is direly needed in order to properly protect this site.
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