Caribou Gear Tarp

C Ben White Memorial FAS Acquisition

Ben Lamb

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Aug 6, 2010
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Location
Cedar, MI
Here's another outstanding project in the works, and up for a vote at the Landboard next week. It would add 97 acres to the current FAS, and would be a fantastic gateway to the West Fork, and the public lands beyond. There's been fantastic work by the Bitterroot Valley Land Trust, Ravalli County Fish & Wildlife Association and DFWP, as well as the Stromberg & White families.

 
Here's a good profile of the potential acquisition:


At the turn of the 20th century, Wilfred W. White bought a pretty little place up the West Fork of the Bitterroot.
Back then White was the third supervisor of the relatively new Bitterroot National Forest and he kept his eye open for land that he could afford to buy. His children were raised spending time on the West Fork and up Kootenai Creek, caring for orchards, thinning the pines, and enjoying everything life in the outdoors has to offer.
Marty Stomberg married into that family. In 1980, she moved to the 160-acre piece on West Fork.
“When I moved here it was with the idea that my job was to take care of the land,” Stomberg said. “I’ve been a caretaker the entire time that I lived here. My sense of ownership has always been tempered by that fact.

“The complexity of the ownership has kept this piece of ground together for so many years,” she said. “It’s been a good thing for the land.”
Her son, Ben, had a connection with that piece of land that ran deep.

“He was a fly fisherman,” Stomberg said. “He grew up down there fishing and swimming with his friends.”
As a young man, he started talking with his mother about finding a way to preserve this land for future generations. Stomberg and her sister purchased a quarter interest in the property. Ben inherited half when his grandfather died.


He had created maps on how he thought it might be preserved. Ben White died in a motorcycle accident just before he turned 24.

More a decade later, Stomberg is one step away from making her son’s dream a reality.
 
Psssh! I had to wipe my popcorn buttered fingers from the other thread to type a message for this thread.

Nice to see some enhanced public access corridor potential. Thanks for sharing. :)
 
Thanks for all the work on this Ben.

BTW you should have worked mask, covid or AR15 into the title. public access is soooo last year.


I simply follow in the footsteps of some fantastic conservationists who did the actual work here. One more vote next week and we'll hopefully have a new FAS, thanks to you, BVLT, FWP & the family!
 
That's is really freakin' cool. I commend anyone who values public access as high as she does.
 
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