2008 Woodie Awards
Thinking Green
Lynne Zummo
Issue date: 3/30/06 Section: Features
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Historically, Middlebury's weeklong vacations have given me the chance to pack up my climbing gear and fly west or drive south on the quest for adventure. One year it was Kentucky for a few precious days of dry weather salvation; another it was southern California. This past week found me in McCardell Bicentennial Hall, writing my thesis and reading, among other things, John McPhee's Encounters with the Archdruid, a glimpse into the life and enemies of David Brower.
Brower, the first executive director of the Sierra Club and founder of Friends of the Earth, lived with a passion for wilderness that won him equal amounts of love and hate throughout the past few decades of environmental action. Where conservationists praised the man, industry cursed him. Were it not for Brower's fervor, Dinosaur National Monument, parts of the Grand Canyon, and pieces of the Yukon might be underwater today, dammed by concrete. Fewer national parks would dot the map and the National Wilderness Preservation System could have faltered at the start. Wild America might not be so wild, and it would surely not be so widespread.
McPhee's book served as a timely reminder of the environmentalism that surged in the decades preceding ours. The degree to which Brower and his contemporaries impacted the state of our lands is undeniable. While we owe a great deal to those early crusaders, however, much work lies ahead. The youngest generation of environmentalists is quickly approaching a new challenge in land conservation: although we treasure our public parks, refuges, wilderness areas and monuments, the privately owned forests that cover nearly 20% of our nation's land are increasingly facing the threat of development.
A recent study by the U.S. Forest Service predicted that more than 44 million acres of private forestland would be sold within the next 25 years. As timber companies and paper manufacturers find larger profits in real estate development than in traditional manufacture and sales, pieces of essentially pristine forest could vanish, replaced by condominiums and strip malls. Large tracts of habitat could become fragmented, endangering populations of larger mammals and further decaying our wealth of biodiversity.
In an effort to combat the dissolution of America's forests, conservation groups across the country are attempting to buy these private lands. Groups, such as the Conservation Fund, have succeeded in purchasing pieces of the most ecologically sensitive land in some areas. However, skyrocketing real estate prices render this means of conservation untenable in the long tern. It is in our generation's interest to support these land conservation efforts in whatever ways we can.
Brower, the first executive director of the Sierra Club and founder of Friends of the Earth, lived with a passion for wilderness that won him equal amounts of love and hate throughout the past few decades of environmental action. Where conservationists praised the man, industry cursed him. Were it not for Brower's fervor, Dinosaur National Monument, parts of the Grand Canyon, and pieces of the Yukon might be underwater today, dammed by concrete. Fewer national parks would dot the map and the National Wilderness Preservation System could have faltered at the start. Wild America might not be so wild, and it would surely not be so widespread.
McPhee's book served as a timely reminder of the environmentalism that surged in the decades preceding ours. The degree to which Brower and his contemporaries impacted the state of our lands is undeniable. While we owe a great deal to those early crusaders, however, much work lies ahead. The youngest generation of environmentalists is quickly approaching a new challenge in land conservation: although we treasure our public parks, refuges, wilderness areas and monuments, the privately owned forests that cover nearly 20% of our nation's land are increasingly facing the threat of development.
A recent study by the U.S. Forest Service predicted that more than 44 million acres of private forestland would be sold within the next 25 years. As timber companies and paper manufacturers find larger profits in real estate development than in traditional manufacture and sales, pieces of essentially pristine forest could vanish, replaced by condominiums and strip malls. Large tracts of habitat could become fragmented, endangering populations of larger mammals and further decaying our wealth of biodiversity.
In an effort to combat the dissolution of America's forests, conservation groups across the country are attempting to buy these private lands. Groups, such as the Conservation Fund, have succeeded in purchasing pieces of the most ecologically sensitive land in some areas. However, skyrocketing real estate prices render this means of conservation untenable in the long tern. It is in our generation's interest to support these land conservation efforts in whatever ways we can.