Home |  PublicationsEncyclopedia |  Quartz Mountain State Park

The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture

Quartz Mountain Resort, 1978
(2012.201.B1006.0106, Oklahoma Publishing Company Photography Collection, OHS).

Quartz Mountain State Park
(2012.201.B1006.0083, Oklahoma Publishing Company Photography Collection, OHS).

A view of Quartz Mountain State Park
(23389.418.225, Jim Argo Collection, OHS).

QUARTZ MOUNTAIN STATE PARK.

Quartz Mountain State Park (since 2002 called Quartz Mountain Nature Park) is one of ten original sites contemplated by the Oklahoma Legislature in 1935 when it appropriated twenty-five thousand dollars to create a State Park Commission to work with the National Park Service in securing funds and labor through the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), a federal government job program. The legislature asked local residents to purchase the land and donate it to the state. Citizens of Greer County purchased 158.3 acres of land adjacent to Lake Altus for $51.58. Additional acreage has been added over the intervening years, bringing the total park area to 4,540 acres.

Construction began in 1936, with CCC labor building hiking trails, picnic areas, and boat ramps, finishing their work in 1940. That same year the Bureau of Reclamation, under the U.S. Department of the Interior, began reconstruction of Lugert Dam using Works Progress Administration (WPA) labor. The new, larger Altus-Lugert Lake enhanced the attractiveness of the park. Because the primary purpose of the dam and lake is for irrigation, park visitors have often found water levels in the lake disappointingly low.

A park lodge, dedicated in 1956, was totally destroyed by fire in 1995. In 1978 the resort became the home of the Summer Arts Institute, in which students between the ages of fourteen and eighteen study with well-known Oklahoma artists. The State of Oklahoma spent $17 million to build a new Resort and Arts Conference Center, which opened on March 8, 2001. In 2002 the facility became an asset of the Oklahoma Board of Regents for Higher Education and was renamed Quartz Mountain Nature Park. It lies at the end of State Highway 44A, approximately nine miles southwest of Lone Wolf, Oklahoma.

Thomas L. Hedglen

Browse By Topic

Environment

Explore

Place
Other

Learn More

Final Survey Report, Intensive-Level Survey of New Deal-Era State Parks in Oklahoma (Oklahoma City: Oklahoma Tourism and Recreation Department, 1993).

The Oklahoman (Oklahoma City), 27 October 2003 and 2 November 2003.

Citation

The following (as per The Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition) is the preferred citation for articles:
Thomas L. Hedglen, “Quartz Mountain State Park,” The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and Culture, https://www.okhistory.org/publications/enc/entry?entry=QA005.

Published January 15, 2010
Last updated August 2, 2016

Copyright and Terms of Use

No part of this site may be construed as in the public domain.

Copyright to all articles and other content in the online and print versions of The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History is held by the Oklahoma Historical Society (OHS). This includes individual articles (copyright to OHS by author assignment) and corporately (as a complete body of work), including web design, graphics, searching functions, and listing/browsing methods. Copyright to all of these materials is protected under United States and International law.

Users agree not to download, copy, modify, sell, lease, rent, reprint, or otherwise distribute these materials, or to link to these materials on another web site, without authorization of the Oklahoma Historical Society. Individual users must determine if their use of the Materials falls under United States copyright law's "Fair Use" guidelines and does not infringe on the proprietary rights of the Oklahoma Historical Society as the legal copyright holder of The Encyclopedia of Oklahoma History and part or in whole.