The United States Forest Service Northern Region consists of twelve national forests and one national grassland across five states (Montana, Idaho, Washington, North Dakota and South Dakota). The Northern Region, also known as Region 1, currently includes the Lewis and Clark National Forest, Bitterroot National Forest, Gallatin National Forest, Flathead National Forest, Custer National Forest, Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, Nez Perce National Forest, Clearwater National Forest, Helena National Forest, Idaho Panhandle National Forests, Lolo National Forest, Kootenai National Forest and the Dakota Prairie Grasslands.
This collection of US Forest Service aerial photography consists of reels of film, 9 inches wide and hundreds of feet long, with anywhere from 200 to 600 images per reel. 157 reels have black and white negative images from the 1930s and 1940s. Each reel has a number of projects (flightlines); there is no logical order to the flightlines on the reels of film. The majority of the images are of Central and Western Montana and Northern Idaho, but some images are of parts of Eastern Montana and Eastern Washington. An access map documenting the center points for images dating from 1932-1944 is available from the
Series II of this collection consists of pdf files of a set of note cards and two binders which provide information relevant to the 1930s and 1940s film. The records provide information about when a flightline was flown, on what date, by whom, and at what altitude. Some pages are annotated with information about when the original film reel was sent to the National Archives and when the duplicate reels of film were received from NARA. Some projects have associated flightline maps, including scans provided by the National Archives and black and white scans provided by the Northern Region, which may be reproductions of original maps held at the National Archives. These scans are considered Series III of this collection. The flightline maps and the pdfs of the binders and notecards were acquired by the Archives to assist with indexing the images.
This collection is still being processed (organized for access). It currently consists of three series:
Series I: Aerial Photographs, 1932-1978, approximately 200 reels
Series II: Aerial Photograph Binders and Notecards, three electronic files
Series III: Flightline Maps, unprocessed
Some images in this collection have been scanned by Archives and Special Collections and made available online in the University of Montana’s institutional repository as the
Researchers must use collection in accordance with the policies of Archives and Special Collections, the Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, and The University of Montana-Missoula.
Researchers are responsible for using in accordance with 17 U.S.C. and any other applicable statutes. These materials are in the public domain.
United States Forest Service Northern Region Aerial Photographs Collection, Archives and Special Collections, Maureen and Mike Mansfield Library, The University of Montana-Missoula.
The aerial images in this collection were held by the USFS Northern Region office until transfer to the Archives.
The aerial images in this collection were delivered to the Archives in 1994 when they were disposed of by the US Forest Service regional headquarters in Missoula. The print indexes (note cards and note books) were loaned by the USFS Northern Region Supervisory Cartographer for scanning and were subsequently returned. Digital copies of flightline maps were given to the Archives by the USFS Northern Region Supervisory Cartographer or acquired from the National Archives.
The original USFS numbering on each can (reel) was retained by Archives and Special Collections (ASC). ASC is creating an ArcGIS map of image centerpoints for the 1930s photographs and has made some scanned images available online. More information about this indexing and access work is available on the
The National Archives and Records Administration holds the records of the United States Forest Service (RG 95). The original imagery of this collection is held by the Cartographic Branch of the National Archives at College Park.
This collection is indexed under the following headings in the online catalog. Researchers desiring materials about related topics, persons, or places should search the catalog using these headings.