On June 12, 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the federal legislation that officially established Big Bend National Park, preserving a massive, rugged expanse of the Chihuahuan Desert in southwest Texas. Spanning over eight hundred thousand acres of dramatic canyons, desert plains, and the towering Chisos Mountains, Big Bend immediately ranked as the fourteenth largest park in the entire national system. The creation of the park secured federal protection for a unique, international border landscape where the Rio Grande river makes a sharp, monumental bend along the Mexican frontier.
The long effort to establish Big Bend was a joint achievement between conservationists and the state of Texas, which had spent years acquiring the vast, arid lands from private ranchers during the economic hardships of the Great Depression. The isolated park was designed to preserve not only the striking geological formations and ancient indigenous archaeological sites but also an immense variety of desert wildlife, including hundreds of rare bird species. Today, Big Bend remains one of only two national parks located in Texas, standing as a pristine monument to the untamed, lonely beauty of the American frontier.
