Page:Michael Welsh - Dunes and Dreams, A History of White Sands National Monument (1995).pdf/68

 56 an approximately equal basis, this office would much prefer to own its own water system."

That source of water, the NPS hoped, would come from the mountain spring 12 miles east of the dunes owned by J.L. Lawson. First discovered by ranchers in 1850, the spring was diverted for extensive use in the 1880s by Oliver Lee. In 1907 the territorial legislature of New Mexico, as part of its efforts to achieve statehood, created the office of territorial engineer, among whose duties was identification of all water rights claims. Because the 1907 law did not extend to "domestic" use (including stock raising), the Lee claim in Dog Canyon transferred in 1910 to Judge Lawson, who also received 440 acres for the hefty sum of $10,000. Lawson, whom NPS attorney Albert Johnson described as "a lawyer of Alamogordo who was inimical to the Government," supposedly in a fit of pique offered to sell Dog Canyon and its water for $2,500; a deal that federal officials pursued secretly so as not to alarm other landowners or boost the sales price. The NPS sent Charles and attorney Johnson to negotiate the sale, paying Lawson $3,000 for an option on his land and water. Then a park service contract examiner, Prentice Lackey, discovered that Lawson had paid the state land office only $66 of a total of $1,320 for title to public acreage in Dog Canyon. Until the remainder was paid to the state, the park service could not begin construction of an estimated $63,000 pipeline project to carry Dog Canyon water to the monument.

The travel year 1938 (October 1937-September 1938) marked the first time since its inception that White Sands could boast of "full-service" status. Completion of the visitors center-headquarters facilities contributed to the high level of patronage (110,000 visitors), with the months of July (16,830), August (22,941), and September (14,446) outdrawing the twelve-month counts of all other SWNM service units, except Frank Pinkley's own Casa Grande. This occurred even though the U.S. Highway 70 paving project stood unfinished. More scholars came to White Sands than at any time since creation of the monument. Prestigious institutions like the University of Michigan sent Dr. Frank Blair, the research associate of L.R. Dice, director of the school's "Laboratory of Vertebrate Genetics" and himself discoverer in 1927 of the dunes' "white