Historical information
Millersylvania State Park lies within the accustomed territory of multiple Native American tribes, including Southern Lushootseed peoples and the Upper Chehalis groups.
Beginning in the mid-1800s, the land that is now Millersylvania was claimed by homesteaders over a period of about 30 years. The John L. Miller family arrived in Thurston County in 1881 and purchased land near Deep Lake in 1882. Miller, his wife Anna Barbara, his daughters Christina Mary and Matilda Sophia, and his son Frederick J.X., established a farm and sold surplus food products in town. Remnants of the family’s fruit orchard are still visible near the geographic center of the park.
After his parents and siblings passed, Frederick obtained sole ownership of his family’s land, more than 700 acres in total. He willed it to the state for use as a park upon his death in 1921.
The park opened in 1924. The name “Millersylvania Park” (literally, Miller-Forest Land Park) was a stipulation of Frederick’s will.
The first major development of Millersylvania as a public park occurred during the Great Depression. In 1933, a Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) camp was established at the park. Through 1940, young CCC enrollees constructed trails, roads and amenities, including picnic shelters, bathhouses and a caretaker’s home. They built the structures primarily by hand, using logs from within the park and sandstone from nearby Tenino. Most of these rustic buildings remain in the park to this day.
In 2009, the park was listed on the National Register of Historic Places due to its largely intact CCC landscape.