As Friends of the Boundary Waters marks our 50th anniversary, we’re not just celebrating past victories, we’re mobilizing for the battles ahead.

The Boundary Waters is facing its greatest threat in decades. 

Trump began his second term with a flurry of aggressive measures designed to pave the way for Twin Metals, the Chilean owned mining company, to open its toxic mine near the edge of the Boundary Waters.

The assault on the Boundary Waters was well underway when the Trump administration announced plans to lift the 20-year mining ban and reinstate Twin Metals’ expired mineral leases. This would pave the way for a toxic sulfide mine that would contaminate some of the most pristine water in the country. 

The danger to this national treasure, to America’s most visited Wilderness Area is real.

Though we have built a national movement to protect the Boundary Waters, we know that all victories are temporary. And all defeats are permanent.

But with your support, we are ready.

Friends of the Boundary Waters has been preparing for this fight for 50 years.

If our track record tells us anything, it’s that we know how to win.

We were born from a struggle and rose to form a movement. 

In the 1970s, a series of crises threatened to erase the Boundary Waters. The future of this wilderness hung in the balance. 

Despite being included in the 1964 Wilderness Act, it remained a wilderness in name only, with special provisions allowing motor use, timber harvesting, and even mining. Little by little, the old growth forests, the wilderness feel, was being chipped away. When Congressman Jim Oberstar introduced a bill that would have opened half the Boundary Waters to logging, motors, and extraction. 

Something had to be done. And it was in this moment a group of ordinary people who were united by a love of this wild place came together to form Friends of the Boundary Waters.

What followed was a two-year political struggle. At times, the fight seemed impossible to win.

Yet grassroots activists refused to give up. 

Some quit their jobs to work fulltime in favor of wilderness protection. Others made countless trips to Washington, D.C., or talked to their neighbors and brought in other community organizations. 

The sacrifice was worth it. 

October 21, 1978, President Jimmy Carter signed the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness Act into law, protecting over a million acres as true wilderness.

That victory wasn’t the first fight for the Boundary Waters, and it wasn’t the last. 

The Boundary Waters has always been controversial precisely because it is blessed with both extraordinary natural beauty and valuable natural resources. 

The tension between preservation and profit has made this the most continually controversial land in the United States.

Fur traders trapped beavers to near extinction. Iron mining gouged the land. Logging reduced vast forests to stubble. Industrialists sought to dam its rivers. And now, foreign mining companies seek to extract copper and nickel from its watershed. 

For five decades, Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness has stood as guardians of that hard-won victory. We’ve stopped toxic mining projects. We’ve defended these waters in federal and state courts. We’ve built a powerful coalition of businesses, Indigenous organizations, faith communities, and everyday Minnesotans. We’ve mobilized the 70% of Minnesotans who oppose sulfide mining near the Boundary Waters into political action.

50 years ago, we were up against powerful economic interests, political machines, and entrenched opposition. But we understood something essential: some places are worth fighting for, no matter the cost. 

We are proud of this legacy. We’ve learned from our victories. We know how to organize grassroots opposition. We know how to win in court. We know how to build coalitions that transcend political divisions. We know how to turn public support into political power.

The Trump administration’s assault on the Boundary Waters is serious, but it’s not unprecedented. 

We’ve protected the Boundary Waters for 50 years. And with your support, we’ll protect the Boundary Waters for another 50 years.