---
kind: "section"
citation: "16 U.S.C. § 433k"
title: "16"
title_heading: "Conservation"
number: "433k"
heading: "Whitman Mission National Historic Site; acquisition of land; establishment, supervision and maintenance"
release: "119-102"
date: "2026-07-12"
url: "https://uscodex.org/usc/16/433k"
units:
  - "Chapter 1 — National Parks, Military Parks, Monuments, and Seashores"
  - "Subchapter LXI — National and International Monuments and Memorials"
---

# §433k. Whitman Mission National Historic Site; acquisition of land; establishment, supervision and maintenance


The [Secretary](/usc/16/410r–5.md?p=c-1) of the Interior is authorized and directed to [acquire](/usc/16/620e.md?p=1), on behalf of the United States, by gift, the site of the Indian mission established in 1836 by Marcus Whitman on the Walla Walla River in what is now Walla Walla County, Washington, together with such additional land, including a right-of-way to the nearest highway, as the [Secretary](/usc/16/410r–5.md?p=c-1) may deem necessary to carry out the purposes of this section.

The property acquired under the provisions of the first paragraph of this section shall constitute the Whitman Mission National Historic Site and shall be a public national [memorial](/usc/16/450ss–1.md?p=2) to Marcus Whitman and his wife, Narcissa Prentiss Whitman, who here established their Indian mission and school, and ministered to the physical and spiritual needs of the Indians until massacred with twelve others[^1] [persons](/usc/16/450rr–1.md?p=b) in 1847. The Director of the National [Park](/usc/16/410r–5.md?p=c-3) Service, under the direction of the [Secretary](/usc/16/410r–5.md?p=c-1) of the Interior, shall have the supervision, management, and control of such national historic site, and shall maintain and [preserve](/usc/16/698u–1.md?p=2) it for the benefit and enjoyment of the people of the United States.


## Footnotes

[^1]: So in original.

## Source credit

(June 29, 1936, ch. 863, §§ 1, 2, 49 Stat. 2028; Pub. L. 87–471, May 31, 1962, 76 Stat. 90.)

## Notes

### Statutory Notes and Related Subsidiaries

### Change of Name

“Whitman Mission National Historic Site” and “national historic site” substituted in text for “Whitman National Monument” and “national monument”, respectively, pursuant to Pub. L. 87–471, which redesignated Whitman National Monument as Whitman Mission National Historic Site. See section 433n of this title.

### Executive Documents

### Transfer of Functions

For transfer of functions of other officers, employees, and agencies of Department of the Interior, with certain exceptions, to Secretary of the Interior, with power to delegate, see Reorg. Plan No. 3 of 1950, §§ 1, 2, eff. May 24, 1950, 15 F.R. 3174, 64 Stat. 1262, set out in the Appendix to Title 5, Government Organization and Employees.