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United States Department of the Interior

U.S. federal executive department

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 11, 2026
Entity authorityQ608427
Source-derived summary

The United States Department of the Interior (DOI) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the management and conservation of most federal lands and natural resources. It also administers programs relating to Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and four of the five inhabited insular areas of the United States, as well as programs related to historic preservation. About 75% of federal public land is managed by the department, with most of the remainder managed by the Department of Agriculture's Forest Service. The department was created on March 3, 1849. It is headquartered at the Main Interior Building, located at 1849 C Street NW in Washington, D.C.

The department is headed by the secretary of the interior, who reports directly to the president of the United States and is a member of the president's Cabinet. The current interior secretary is Doug Burgum, who was sworn in on February 1, 2025.

As of mid-2004, the department managed 507 million acres (2,050,000 km2) of surface land, or about one-fifth of the land in the United States. It manages 476 dams and 348 reservoirs through the Bureau of Reclamation, 433 national parks, monuments, historical sites, etc. through the National Park Service, and 544 national wildlife refuges through the Fish and Wildlife Service. The largest land management agency is the Bureau of Land Management, managing about one-eighth of the land in the United States.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “United States Department of the Interior” as u.S. federal executive department. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around United, States and Department.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1849, 2025, 2004—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1849-03-03. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with United, States and Department providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “United States Department of the Interior”, the useful work is to connect “u.S. federal executive department” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q608427. VIAF identifies the subject as 140720803. The Library of Congress control number is n80126051. Authority coordinates are 38.894, -77.043. 2 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1849, 2025 and 2004.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “United States Department of the Interior”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow United States Department of the Interior primary sources, United States Department of the Interior archive and United research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from United States Department of the Interior” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.