With the beginning of the Great Depression in the fall of 1929, conditions became increasingly worse. A combination of disasters which included grasshopper infestations, crop failures, and drought struck the country. The south central and western counties of the state were most severely affected by these disasters.[120]
Several government programs on both the federal and state levels were authorized to assist those in need. The NPS made use of a number of these programs in various ways during the 1930’s.
In November 1934, NPS Director Arno B. Cammerer recommended to Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes that additional area be approved for inclusion in the proposed Badlands National Monument. He contended that the proposed additions, which included a portion of Sheep Mountain, were as outstanding as the area originally authorized by Congress in 1929. Wildlife problems and administrative difficulties of the originally proposed area would be lessened by the change in boundary.[121]
In order to implement the proposed boundary change Mr. Cammerer recommended (1) that the President should be asked to issue an Executive Order withdrawing all public lands involved; (2) that all privately owned lands be acquired through an existing federal government relief program; and (3) that the next session of Congress be asked to establish the Badlands National Monument with the boundaries now recommended.[122]
The Secretary of the Interior approved the proposal for the boundary extension and in the same month President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered that all unreserved and unappropriated public lands in Pennington, Jackson, Fall River, and Custer Counties be
temporarily withdrawn from settlement, location, sale, or entry, for classification and use as a grazing project pursuant to the submarginal land program of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration.[123]
By January 1, 1935, the NPS had already obtained options for 23,000 acres from private land owners living within the proposed boundary extension area. This work was being done under the auspices of the Land Program section of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) which had been authorized by Congress in 1933.[124]
Early in April 1935, the NPS completed the “Final Report on the Badlands National Monument Extension Project, South Dakota R-1.” The report included both the area previously authorized under Public Law 1021 and the proposed extension. The area, to be known as the Badlands Recreational Demonstration Project, would include 119,557.88 acres, of which 72,316.22 were privately owned. The proposed boundary extension received the support of Governor Tom Berry, Senator Norbeck, President C.C. O’Harra of the South Dakota School of Mines, and a number of prominent geologists, naturalists, educators, and others.[125]
In a letter to Harry L. Hopkins, FERA Administrator, on April 15, 1935, Acting Secretary of the Interior T.A. Walters wrote:
I hereby recommend for purchase certain lands for a project known as the Badlands National Monument Extension in Jackson, Pennington, Washington and Washabaugh Counties, South Dakota, proposed by the National Park Service of this Department for the conservation and development of the natural resources of the United States, within the meaning of Section 202 of Title II of the National Industrial Recovery Act, pursuant to which funds have been allotted and transferred to the Land Program, Federal Emergency Relief Administration.[126]