US extends mining ban at Lewis and Clark historic site
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Keith Ridler, Associated Press
BOISE (AP) — Mining claims will be prohibited for at least another 20 years on land in east-central Idaho and western Montana where Lewis and Clark crossed the Continental Divide in 1805, U.S. officials said Thursday.
The U.S. Department of the Interior posted a public land order that takes effect Dec. 22 and extends an existing 20-year mining claim ban.
The roughly 2-mile-square (5-kilometer-square) site is a day-use area open to the public and managed by the U.S. Forest Service as the Lemhi Pass National Historic Landmark in the Beaverhead-Deerlodge and Salmon-Challis national forests.
Meriwether Lewis, in a journal entry on Aug. 12, 1805, wrote about first coming on the site when he and others in the Corps of Discovery “proceeded on to the top of the dividing ridge from which I discovered immence ranges of high mountains still to the West of us with their tops partially covered with snow.”
The area was designated a national historic landmark in 1960, and the initial 480-acre boundary set in 1991. The landmark area has increased in size over the decades to about 1,300 acres (535 hectares). The most recent Interior Department order seeks to extend the size by about 175 acres (70 hectares) by acquiring additional U.S. mineral rights.
The site also includes the Sacajawea Memorial Picnic Area. Sacajawea, a Lemhi Shoshone, joined Lewis and Clark and the Corps of Discovery with her husband, a French trader, and is recognized as a key member because of her translating ability with tribes living in the area and knowledge of the landscape.
Two national trails also pass through the area. The 4,900-mile (7,900-kilometer) Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, established in 1978, goes from Pennsylvania to the Pacific Ocean. The 3,028-mile (4,873-kilometer) Continental Divide National Scenic Trail, established in 1968, goes from Mexico to Canada.