Lewis and Clark park dedicated

ILWACO, Wash. — The Pacific Coast camp site of the Lewis and Clark expedition was dedicated Friday as the country’s newest national park.

After a vote by Congress and approval from President Bush, the former Cape Disappointment State Park in Ilwaco and Fort Clatsop in Astoria, Ore., are now the Lewis and Clark National and State Historical Parks.

The park was created to honor the bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark exploration, which ended in Oregon and Washington in 1806.

“We have never brought two state park systems together with national parks to be able to do what we are doing today,” said National Park Service Director Fran Mainella.

Rex Ziak, a local historian whose research into the Corps of Discovery’s arrival at the Pacific brought new attention to the Washington sites, said he always imagined the Lewis and Clark story as a giant chain stretching across the continent.

“What was always missing was the link that represented their arrival here at the Pacific,” he told the Daily Astorian. “Today we’re forging this link that’s completing the chain.”