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000692 appeared in 1925. In October, 1922, Leopold prepared a three-page proposal,59 in outline form, for the establishment of a wilderness area within the Gila National Forest; this was the first written proposal for wilderness preservation in District 3 of the Forest Service. Leopold's proposal did not become a burning issue in District 3, as may be seen by the casual handling it received; it was routed inadvertently to the files without action by other district officials and was not read until February 5, 1923.60 The proposal was written in final form by staff members and submitted for approval March 28,1924. On June 3,1924, District Forester Frank C. W. Pooler gave his approval, and Leopold left the district the following June 15.61 This marked the third de facto application of the wilderness principle. There is no need to rehearse here the complicated legal procedure involved in the passage of the Wilderness Act of 1964, but some of its implications for the future of the nation's wilderness areas should be noted. Having secured the necessary legislation to convert de facto wilderness areas into de jure ones, has the fight been won? As the late Howard Zahnizer noted when passage of the Wilderness Act seemed assured: "We are establishing for the first time in history of the earth, a program, a national policy, whereby areas of wilderness can be preserved. That will not be the end of our efforts. That is just the beginning,"62 More recently, Stewart M. Brandborg, Executive Director of the Wilderness Society, wrote that when President Lyndon B. Johnson approved the Wilderness Bill on September 3, 1964, he "brought to a successful culmination one of the nation's longest and most hard-fought conservation battles." Brandborg also emphasized that an important part of the programs under the act would be "development of plans" which would provide for "various uses of wilderness areas without impairing the natural environment or wild character of the lands involved," features which were provided by Arthur H. Carhart's recreational plans almost half a century ago.63 Still more recently President Johnson, in a message transmitting the Wilderness Act, remarked in part: . . .Onlv in OUr country have such positive measures been taken to preserve the wilderness adequately for its scenic and spiritual beauty.... In the new conservation of this century, our concern is with the total relation between man and world around him. . . . Generations of Americans to come will enjoy a finer and more meaningful life because of these actions taken in these times.64 This view has now become widely accepted. But in the decade of the 1920's it was a distinctly minority position emanating from Colorado. It would appear that among the men who were ahead of their time in planning for recreational development and the preservation of wilderness areas in our National Forests, Arthur H. Carhart was in the front rank. Surely it would seem reasonable to conclude from the evidence that if Gifford Pinchot was the "father of the Forest Service," then Arthur Carhart might be considered among the most eligible candidates for the title "father of the wilderness concept." 9 DONALD N. BALDWIN, whose doctoral dissertation at the University of Denver concerned the wilderness concept, is associate professor of history at Belknap College, Center Harbor, New Hampshire.