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--- ." ,..,. .... -.,~ ~ r ...,,, I.~. ;\" , 7 8 4 l.,L V concept of an expanding wilderness has extcnd,'d far b,'yond the limits of the original bill. To understand how it happen- ed and what it may imply for the futurc calls for a brief review of our recent history. I , The Growth of the Wilderness Concept As finally enacted into law in 1964, the original Wilderness Act created 54 "instant" wilderness areas totaling 9.1 million acres. In addition, the 34 existing primitive areas in our national forests were to be reviewed and their boundaries redrawn, with the objective of then admitting them, one by one, into the wilderness system. The road less land within the national parks and wildlife refuges was also to be reviewed, and tracts found appropriate were to be recommended to Congress for inclusion. Alto. gether, a wilderness system of 40 to 50 million acres was anticipated. f, ". I , .' i', " o. f " " " r " i ! I Since then, despite growing pressures for more wilder- ness, Congress has acted with restraint. In 1975, the Eastern Wilderness Act was approved. It designated 16 national forest areas - some 207,000 acres - as wilderness, and directed a study of 17 other areas - an additional 125,000 acres. Considering the urgent need for wilderness in the densely populated regions of the East, this was hardly a runaway program. Then came the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) Organic Act last year. It requires a study of BLM's 13 primi- tive and natural areas, encompassing 307,000 acres, for possible wilderness classification, and within the next 15 years an inventory of all the 90 million acres of road less lands within the vast domain of the BLM,1 looking toward the selection of new wilderness study areas. Since most of li .11 6