- Location
- Texas
- Current protection
- Davis Mountains State Park; The Nature Conservancy's Davis Mountains Preserve
- Status
- No active campaign
- Tier
- Tier 2 · National Monument
- In the book
- Not featured in Undiscovered America
Why should it be a National Park?
The Davis Mountains rise out of the Chihuahuan Desert of West Texas as a sky island, volcanic peaks cool enough for pine and oak woodland, grassland, and springs. Mount Livermore tops out above 8,000 feet, and the McDonald Observatory sits under some of the darkest skies in the country.
Texans called them the Texas Alps and wanted a National Park here before Big Bend was a park. With dark skies, rare wildlife, and the frontier history of Fort Davis, they would make a park unlike any other in the state.
The history of National Park Campaigns
From about 1921, civic officials, bankers, ranchers, and legislators petitioned for a large National Park in the Davis Mountains. Bills went to Congress three times, in the 68th, 69th, and 71st Congresses, and a 1931 Texas measure to buy park land in the Guadalupe Mountains that also proposed a Davis Mountains park died for lack of support. The state built Davis Mountains State Park in the 1930s instead.
- Distinct National Park attempts
- 1 (1920s campaign, three bills)
- Other designation attempts
- 2 (1931 state purchase bill; 1938 state park)
Sources
- The Big Bend Sentinel, "Texas' National Park that never was" (2023)
- Edmund B. Rogers, History of Legislation Relating to the National Park System Through the 82d Congress (NPS, 1958)
- c. 1921
Civic leaders begin petitioning for a National Park in the Davis Mountains.
- 1920s
Bills H.R. 9193, H.R. 3864, and H.R. 3590 go to the 68th, 69th, and 71st Congresses.
- 1931
A Texas bill to buy Guadalupe Mountains park land, proposing a Davis Mountains park alongside, dies for lack of support.
- 1938
Davis Mountains State Park opens, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps.
- 1961
Fort Davis National Historic Site is established.