Text of other pages in this issue: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
3-A The Obsidian June 1969
'OH BEAUTIFUL FOR SPACIOUS SMOG.....'
AMERICA THE RAPED - By Gene Marine Simon & Schuster - Publishers
The title is a shocker, but so is the book. In an effort to rouse the public from the lethargy with which it permits the despoliation of what remains of this continent's pristine beauty, Gene Marine has leveled a blunt j'accuse against the primary villains of the piece, "the engineers." His subtitle spells it out: "The Engineering Mentality and the Devastation of a Continent."
For "engineers," read all who seek to raze our forests,poison our air, defile our rivers, dam our gorges, drain our swamps and level our dunes. Marine admits the spoilers are no longer as crude as they were in Teddy Roosevelt's time.
"The old rapists," he tells us, "have learned technique." A lumber company, while continuing to strip virgin redwoods in Northern California, contributed a few thousand public relations dollars for a study of the vanishing American eagle. Detergent makers have learned to substitute "seduction" for "rape". Compelled by law to reduce water pollution, they now claim it as a virtue - "water conservation."
But Marine isn't fooled. His book is a chilling catalogue of efforts by engineers to bulldoze and concretize in the name of progress. "The engineers," he asserts, "are straining to fill in the Grand Canyon and dam the last wild stretch of the Missouri, to wall off the rich estuaries of Long Island, and to cover New Jersey's Great Swamp with asphalt." (In fairness to New Jersey, it should be noted that the state will preserve the Great Swamp from "improvement,")
Throughout his book the author cites chapter and verse across the continent for his blasts against the engineers. At the heart of his attack is the seeming indifference of the engineers and the developers to ecology - that is, the natural relationship between all living things and the regions in which they dwell.
One of his many examples describes how the Army Corps of Engineers "completely ruined" the beaches of San Diego by removing 11 million cubic yards of sand over the last 20 years and is now proposing to dredge out San Diego Bay to try to repair the damage. This dredging, according to the California State Resources Agency, will destroy marine life In the bay. All this, of course, was before an oil company recently caused oil to float onto the beaches of Santa Barbara,
Marine writes as an angry man, employing a rich arsenal of accusations to state his case. He is not subtle but forthright, not gentle but stentorian, and he makes effective use of sarcasm to ridicule the engineers. He is alarmed for instance at the effects on human and animal life of the sonic boom once the SSTs start flying across America. He quotes an Air Force general as saying blandly:
"A boom has a startling effect. The first time you might jump. But the thousandth time you don't do anything."
Urging a halt to the widespread despoliation, the author appeals to public opinion to stop the engineers before they turn our affluent society into an effluent one. A good way to start would be to read the book yourself and then suggest that your Congressman do the same. W. G.Rogers, Saturday Review Service.
The above was copied from the Sunday Register Guard, May 11, 1969, in the hope that Obsidians who may have missed it in the paper will take note and read it now.
On the back page of the Alaska Sportsman, June issue, is a beautiful picture of Lake Kluane, Yukon Territory, Canada, taken by Maxcine Williams. This is one of the areas in which Maxcine collected Botanical specimens for various universities. Some of the beautiful flowers to be found are dwarf Fireweed, wild Crocus, wild Sweet Pea, Northern Ladies' Slipper, and the tail Fireweed. Maxcine reports this to be a beautiful, forty-mile long lake on the Alaska Highway. It is a big game area where Sheep Moose and Bear can be found.
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