Compilation of Documents and Writing of a Book Documenting the History of the Establishment of Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument

Project ID: J8W07080008

Federal Agency: National Park Service

Partner Institution: University of Washington

Fiscal Year: 2008

Initial Funding: $5,000

Total Funding: $5,000

Project Type: Education

Project Disciplines: Social

National Park: Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument

Principal Investigator: Leopold, Estella

Agreement Technical Representative: Meyer, Herbert

Abstract: The establishment of Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument from private lands in 1969 assured the protection of the area’s world-renowned paleontological resources. This action narrowly averted the impending destruction of the fossil beds from a planned housing development that was underway. Dr. Estella Leopold was one of three women who organized the legal battle and hired the famous lawyers who brought the effort forward as one of the first environmental cases to come before the U.S. Court system. The project defined by this Task Agreement will assemble documents for the monument’s archive from Dr. Leopold’s collection, including court records, legal journals, old newspaper articles, published cartoons, letters of correspondence, photographs, press releases, and law briefs. The project will also produce a book that will retrace Dr. Leopold’s personal account of these events. The outcome will provide the monument with better documentation of these papers and events, and it will enhance the public’s education about the history of the environmental movement and its relation to the paleontological resources at Florissant.