The BWCAW itself was formed gradually through a series of actions. By the early 1920s, roads had begun to be built through the Superior National Forest to promote public access to the area for recreation. In 1926 a section of within the Superior National Forest was set aside as a roadless wilderness area by Secretary of Agriculture William Marion Jardine. This area became the nucleus of the BWCAW. In 1930, Congress passed the Shipstead-Newton-Nolan Act, which prohibited logging and dams within the area to preserve its natural water levels. Through additional land purchases and shifts in boundaries, the amount of protected land owned by the government in the area grew even further. In 1938, the area's borders were expanded and altered (roughly matching those of the present day BWCAW), and it was renamed the Superior Roadless Primitive Area.