There is a 3,300-acre piece of land in the middle of Georgia that has been home to human habitation for more than 12,000 years. Before colonization, four prehistoric cultures lived in today’s Ocmulgee Mounds National Historical Park.
With such an important history, it’s no surprise that FDR named the site a national monument in 1936. And now a local congressman is trying to turn it into a national park.
What is Ocmulgee Mounds?
This area, Macon, Ga. Not far from, there were people’s homes even before the Ice Age. multiple culturesArchaic, including Woodland and Mississippian Indians, lived here. From 1300 to 1650, lamar culture The designated mounds of this site were built as temples. The area was also the homeland of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation before the U.S. government expelled them in the 1820s.
This region is extremely important in our understanding of the Americas before European colonization. archaeologist Thousands of artifacts were discovered that helped them understand the timeline and cultures of the people who once lived here.
From 1933 to 1936, members of FDR’s Works Progress Administration, the Civilian Conservation Corps, and other New Deal organizations conducted large-scale archaeological surveys and excavations. In 1936, the President declared it a national monument and placed it under the control of the National Park Service (NPS). In 2019, it became a national historical park after a bill was passed by Congress. Only 9% of the NPS’s 433 sites have this designation.
For last 33 yearsThe park hosts an annual indigenous festival, a multi-day event with traditional cultural crafts, storytelling, live performances, music and dance.
The number of visitors to the park has varied over the years, but from 2021 to 2025, it averaged about 143,000 visitors per year.
Effort to make it a national park
National parks can receive this designation only by an act of Congress. Representative Austin Scott (R-GA) introduced a bill To do so for Ocmulgee Mounds in the House on June 24. Next, the bill will be considered at a hearing of the House Subcommittee on Federal Lands on July 1.
There is a long history of representatives introducing bills to make their local areas national parks to boost economic development and tourism dollars, as well as previous examples of converting national monuments and historic sites into national parks.
A prominent example of both is the push by Missouri lawmakers to create Gateway Arch National Park in 2018. The area was once a national monument and was designated a national park, despite having no natural resources or wildlife to protect.
A California Congressman Spent several years in the 1970s trying (unsuccessfully) to have the Santa Monica Mountains declared a national park. In 2025, two senators from Arizona, Mark Kelly and Ruben Gallego, introduced a bill to make Chiricahua National Monument a national park. In 2026, Representative Tom Tiffany (R-WI) introduced a bill to grant the same elevated status to the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, despite objections from local groups.
In the late 2010s Congress began a redesignation spree, creating four new national parks: Gateway Arch in Missouri (2018), White Sands in New Mexico (2019), Indiana Dunes in Indiana (2019), and New River Gorge in West Virginia (2020). Since then, no new parks have been built.
GearJunkie contacted Austin Scott and the Choctaw Nation for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
