The National Park Service removed 51 historical signs, exhibits, and educational materials from its sites in 2025. Court filings indicate at least 13 of those items were discarded or lost. A spreadsheet released by court order on June 17 details the changes.
The removals followed an executive order signed by President Trump in March 2025. The directive required federal agencies to review how U.S. history is presented at 433 Park Service-managed locations. Two months later, Secretarial Order 3431 mandated the agency remove anything that “inappropriately disparage[s] Americans past or living” and shift focus toward the nation’s natural beauty.
The spreadsheet lists items taken down from 24 parks. While 36 remain in storage, the locations of two others—one in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve in Alaska, another in Rock Creek Park in Washington, D.C.—are unknown. The 13 missing items include brochures, exhibits, and books covering topics like slavery, Native American history, and climate change.
Joy Beasley, an NPS associate director, acknowledged in a June 17 filing that the spreadsheet is incomplete. She stated it may be difficult to contact park staff familiar with specific removed or revised materials. Summer, she explained, is the busiest season for parks, with employees often working in remote areas with limited communication.
A former park ranger who has tracked the removals since April said the spreadsheet undercounts the total. Melissa Dalley noted some information exists only on the signs themselves, making its loss permanent.
Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area, the ancestral homeland of the Lenape people, is listed in the spreadsheet as having discarded materials. The status of one item is marked as “discarded.”
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Some removals appear temporary. At Fort Sumter and Fort Moultrie National Historical Park in South Carolina, an interpretive display about climate change’s threat to the site was removed, though the research behind it remains valid.
Visitors now encounter gaps in the stories parks tell. A sign at Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument in Mississippi, commemorating the civil rights activists, was flagged as “disparaging” and removed. At First State National Historical Park in Delaware, an exhibit about Caesar Rodney—who owned up to 200 enslaved people—was taken down.
The changes have faced legal challenges. In February 2026, nonprofits sued the federal government, demanding the signs be restored. U.S. District Judge Angel Kelley ordered the materials returned by July 4, but a federal appeals court ruled on July 2 that the administration could continue the removals. The Department of the Interior later requested a halt to all deadlines in the case.
What happens next may depend on how thoroughly the agency can account for what was removed. The incomplete spreadsheet offers only a partial record of a process that has left some parks with less history to share.
The signs remain in storage—or gone entirely.
