Many early refuge areas were to protect colonial 

 birds like these egrets from plume hunters. 



the Izaak Walton League raised funds to acquire 

 lands on which to feed the elk, which normally 

 starved by the thousands during the severe Wyo- 

 ming winters. The National Audubon Society 

 and the Boone and Crockett Club raised funds to 

 acquire the first unit of the Charles Sheldon An- 

 telope Refuge in northern Nevada. 



By 1929, public interest in the preservation and 

 conservation of waterfowl resulted in the first real 

 Federal legislative authority for a broad program 

 of refuge acquisition and development. This act, 

 based on the Migratory Bird Treaty with Great 

 Britain (signed in 1916), was known as the 

 Nbrbeck-Andresen Migratory Bird Conservation 

 Act. Its declared purpose was — 



in more effectively meet the obligations of the United 

 States under the migratory bird treaty with Great Brit- 

 ain by lessening the dangers threatening migratory game 

 birds from drainage and other causes, by the acquisition 

 of areas of land and of water to furnish in perpetuity 

 reservations for the adequate protection of such birds: 

 and authorizing appropriations for the establishment of 

 sucb areas, their maintenance and improvement, and 

 for other purposes 



Section 12 of this act enlarges upon its intended 

 purposes to include — 



the acquisition ... of suitable areas of laud, water . . . 

 for use as migratory bird reservations . . . and for the 

 administration, maintenance, and development of such 

 areas and other preserves, reservations, or breeding 

 grounds frequented by migratory game birds . . . includ- 

 ing the construction of dams, dikes, ditches, flumes, spill- 

 ways, buildings, and other necessary improvements, and 

 for the elimination of the loss of migratory birds from 

 alkali poisoning, oil pollution of waters, or other causes, 

 for cooperation with local authorities in wildlife con- 

 servation, for investigations and publications relating 

 to North American birds, for personal service, printing, 

 engraving, and issuance of circulars, posters, and other 

 necessary matter and for the enforcement of the pro- 

 visions of this act . . . 



To carry out the acquisition of lands in a busi- 

 nesslike fashion, and to ensure close cooperation 

 between the executive and the legislative branches 

 of the Government, this act established the Mi- 

 gratory Bird Conservation Commission, composed 

 of the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, and 

 Interior, and two Members each from the Senate 

 and the House. The Commission has since that 

 time passed upon all purchases of hind made 

 under the provisions of the act. The Biological 

 Survey, a predecessor of the Fish and Wildlife 

 Service, immediately started surveys of areas 

 throughout the 48 States in an effort to locate 

 lands suitable for purchase under the newly ac- 

 quired authority of the Conservation Act. 



During the next year, Congress passed a special 

 bill which authorized $250,000 for the purchase 

 of the Cheyenne Bottoms Refuge in Kansas, a 

 project never completed by the Federal Govern- 

 ment because of a subsequent inflation in land 

 prices due to an oil boom. This fine project has 

 now been restored by the State of Kansas through 

 the expenditure of $1,741,000 of Pittman-Robert- 

 son funds. There also followed shortly the pur- 

 chase of St. Marks Refuge in Florida. Salton Sea 

 in California, Swanquarter in North Carolina, 

 and Crescent Lake in Nebraska. By 1932, several 

 other areas were added to the system, some by 

 purchase, some by withdrawal of public lands, and 

 one by gift. 



The Frenzied Thirties 



Then came the early thirties, with the great 

 drought at its height. Water from prairie pot- 

 holes, ponds, and marshes had disappeared; dust- 

 storms raged, and farmers throughout the Dust 



