Cecil Garland was born in 1934 or 1935. As a young man, he moved to Lincoln, Montana where owned and operated a hardware store iand worked for the Forest Service. These work experiences allowed Garland the opportunity to use and work with other users of the wilderness from just north of the Lincoln to the Scapegoat Mountains, which boarder the Bob Marshall Wilderness.
Attempts to develop this area lead Garland and William Meyger to form the Lincoln Back Country Protective Association in 1960. The Forest Service had approved the area for road development and the Anaconda Mining Company had applied for a permit to mine copper with the Montana Land Board. Meyger died in 1962 and Garland then became president of the Association. By 1969, the Association’s efforts to hinder logging and mining development in the Scapegoat Wilderness prompted community members to boycott Garland’s hardware store. However, the Associations efforts did receive support from other communities in the state.
The Scapegoat Wilderness became part of the National Wilderness Preservation System in 1972. It is both the first wilderness area proposed only by citizens after passage of the 1964 Wilderness Act and the first de facto wilderness area to enter the system.
Garland moved from Montana in the 1970s and has continued to work for protection of undeveloped land. During the 1980s, he worked with The Great Basin MX Alliance to protect the Utah’s Great Basin from military development and during the 1990s he spoke out against a Las Vegas water project.
From the guide to the Cecil Garland Papers, 1924-2006, (University of Montana--Missoula Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library)
