Macy, Preston P., 1891-1979

National Park Service administrator, Washington State.

Preston P. Macy, born in 1891, began his career with the National Park Service (NPS) in 1924 as a ranger-naturalist at Mount Rainier National Park. He was appointed custodian of the Mount Olympus National Monument in 1934, as it passed from the Forest Service to the National Park Service. Macy was in the middle of the battle over the future park's boundaries, and when Olympic National Park was created in 1938, he was named superintendent. He returned to Mount Rainier as superintendent in 1951. Macy was a moderator between opposing viewpoints on park lands, working to build the parks and accommodate the need for expanded access while also striving to preserve wilderness areas. Macy retired from the National Park Service in 1961 but continued to serve as an NPS collaborator and a member of the Washington Forest Area Use Council. He died in 1979.

Preston P. Macy, born in 1891, began his career with the National Park Service (NPS) in 1924 as a ranger-naturalist at Mount Rainier National Park. He remained at Mount Rainier until 1934, when he was appointed custodian of the Mount Olympus National Monument as it passed from the Forest Service to the National Park Service. Macy was in the middle of the battle over the future park's boundaries, and when Olympic National Park was created on June 29, 1938, he was named superintendent. He held this post until September 1951, at which time he returned to Mount Rainier as superintendent.

Throughout his career with the National Park Service, Macy was a moderator between opposing viewpoints on park lands. While at Olympic National Park, Macy not only took on the problems of organizing and building a new park, but he also tried to preserve as much roadless wilderness area in the park as possible. His return to Mount Rainier in 1951 coincided with a period of increasing user demand on the National Park system. In 1955, the NPS's response to the need for expanded access to the parks was a new ten-year master plan named "Mission 66" in honor of the NPS's fiftieth birthday in 1966. At Mount Rainier, Mission 66 brought completion of the Stevens Canyon Road and construction of the Nisqually Glacier Bridge, the Marmot Point-Barn Flat road to Paradise, the Box Canyon Picnic Area, and White River Campgrounds. At the same time as these improvements were made, Macy resisted other development schemes for the Park.

Macy's interest in the region's recreational lands continued after his retirement from the National Park Service in 1961. In that same year he was appointed a National Park Service collaborator. In 1962 Governor Rosellini appointed Macy to serve on the Washington Forest Area Use Council, a 21-member study and advisory group on the uses of the state's forested and mountainous lands chaired by Skagit County commissioner Scott Richards. Preston Macy died in 1979.