Website Tells Story of Devil’s Den State Park, and Lays Foundation for Its Future

Members of the CCC work on the Devil’s Den bathhouse. (Courtesy of Devil’s Den State Park)

Since it opened in the 1930s, Devil’s Den State Park has attracted generations of Arkansans for its natural beauty. So much of what people love about the park, though, was carefully planned and made by the men of the Civilian Conservation Corps. They built the cabins and laid stone steps on the trails. They aligned roads with the landscape to create dramatic vistas, and even strategically cleared trees to improve the views. 

“The CCC came to Arkansas during a crucial time when state parks were just getting established. They were instrumental in building the infrastructure of key parks like Devil’s Den and Petit Jean,” said Angie Payne, principal investigator on the project led by the Center for Advanced Spatial Technologies (CAST) at the University of Arkansas. 

CAST, in collaboration with the U of A Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design, has documented the CCC’s work at Devil’s Den in a new website, ccc.cast.uark.edu, with a detailed history of the park supplemented with maps, documents and archival photos. 

“The Civilian Conservation Corps not only built the foundation for which Arkansas State Parks is known, but also established a legacy of craftsmanship and environmental stewardship that continues to inspire us today. This new website by CAST and the Fay Jones School brings their story to life, showcasing how their work has shaped beloved places like Devil’s Den State Park,” said Shea Lewis, secretary of the Arkansas Department of Parks, Heritage and Tourism. 

The website is part of a project that aims to eventually document all CCC-built parks in Arkansas. The work was completed in close coordination with Arkansas State Parks and was funded by a grant from the Arkansas Natural and Cultural Resources Council. 

“It’s a resource that not only honors the past but also informs how we preserve and adapt these treasures for future generations,” Lewis said.

DOCUMENTING THE PAST

Hundreds of young men arrived at Devil’s Den in 1933. They had struggled during the Great Depression, but as members of the CCC they would be fed, housed and paid $30 a month. They set to work immediately clearing roads and creating the park. 

In an illustrated, multimedia history or “story-map,” visitors to the website can learn about “parkitecture,” the design style for America’s state and national parks that uses local stone and timber. They can listen to a video interview, recorded in 2003, with a man who was part of the Devil’s Den CCC crew. They can see how workers built the Lee Creek dam or explore a 3-D model of the overlook shelter. 

In another section, an interactive map lets visitors explore Devil’s Den across space and time. Long-vanished CCC camp buildings are marked on the map next to structures that still exist today. Click on a building, and a window appears with a description, historic and contemporary photos, blueprints and related documents.   

“One of the more unique aspects of our site is that the maps are directly connected to our archive. Users can easily go back and forth between the two,” said Manon Wilson, lead archivist on the project from CAST. 

The centralized archive currently features over 600 items (historical photos, documents and more) that have been contributed to the project by key partners including Arkansas State Archives, Arkansas State Parks, the Shiloh Museum of Ozark History and the personal collection of Karen Rollet-Crocker.

Landscape architecture professor Kimball Erdman. (Whit Pruitt, University Relations)

The website also has a detailed Historic American Landscapes Survey (HALS) report, created by Kimball Erdman, a professor of landscape architecture in the Fay Jones School of Architecture and Design, with the support of CAST and U of A students. The report, which includes measured drawings, documents both the past and present state of the park. HALS reports like this one also become part of the Library of Congress’ collection through the National Park Service’s Heritage Documentation Programs.  

The report took first place this year in the National Park Service’s annual HALS Challenge. The award was announced in October at the American Society of Landscape Architects conference in Washington, D.C. The National Park Service recognized the contributions of Erdman, Payne and Wilson along with CAST’s Malcolm Williamson, architects Lori Filbeck and Allen Hart, research assistant Matthew Gauldin, and U of A landscape architecture students or recent graduates Sophia Bobzien, Andreia Alfaro, Emily Booth, Brett Paris and Reed Waters. 

THE FUTURE OF DEVIL’S DEN

The CCC abruptly ended in 1942 after America entered World War II. The young men were needed to fight, not build parks. In Arkansas, the state would not have the resources to resume significant work at Devil’s Den until the 1960s. 

Across the country, the work of the CCC would not be widely appreciated until the 1980s. 

“Devil’s Den is one of the most intact examples of the CCC in the country. It’s been altered, and we’ve lost a number of things, but we have more of that character here than so many other sites,” said Erdman. 

He hopes his team’s HALS report will be the foundation for the future of Devil’s Den. The next step would be for the state to commission a cultural landscape report, which would guide future development of the park in a way that preserves and restores its history. 

“The park has more users than the CCC could have dreamed of, and Northwest Arkansas continues to grow. It needs to fit modern needs in a way that doesn’t destroy the past. It can be done,” Erdman said.