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In 2005, Peter Jackson released his movie, King Kong, on December 14.  Wanna know why?  Because it was World Monkey Day!  At least that’s what Wikipedia says—and they don’t monkey around.

World Monkey Day was first celebrated on December 14, 2000.  Why that day?  Michigan State University student Casey Sorrow was monkeying (!) around and wrote “Monkey Day” on an unoccupied date on a friend’s calendar.  When the day came around, they felt obligated to celebrate—costumes, grunting, jumping around, drinking beer (recognize that December 14 is near the end of finals at most universities, and students are no doubt in need of some reason to go ape!). The traditional continued, as Sorrow and another friend began drawing a college-based comic strip and promoted Monkey Day each year when the calendar rolled around to December 14^th again.

What clearly began as a college stunt has continued, but still in an unofficial status.  Despite Sorrow’s attempt to get the U.S. Congress and the world as a whole interested in endorsing the day, it remains an underground affair.  But it has spread around the world—chimps off the old block—with celebrations in many countries.  The World Monkey Day website (at least that is official) sums up the situation:

“Monkey Day is an annual celebration of all things simian, a festival of primates, a chance to scream like a monkey and throw feces at whomever you choose. Or perhaps just a reason to hang out with your friends while grunting and picking fleas off each other.”

(The official website and just about everyone else who writes about monkey day issues a caveat that they don’t actually endorse throwing feces around—and neither do I.)

There is a serious side to all this monkey business.  Primates, other than humans, are in great peril in today’s world.  Primates include four major groups—monkeys themselves, along with the great apes, lemurs and tarseirs.  According to the IUCN Primate Special Group, about 500 species exist today, distributed across Asia, Africa and the Neo-tropics (Central and South America).  But the total number of known primate species continues to rise—91 new species have been discovered since 2000!  At the same time, taxonomists are constantly revising primate taxonomy, often splitting or lumping species.

These species are imperiled across their range.  Again according to IUCN, approximately 70% of Asian species are endangered (IUCN categories of critically endangered, endangered and near endangered), as are about 50% of African species and 40% of neo-tropical species.  Two dozen species in Asai are critically endangered, meaning that the species will probably disappear from the earth.  The biggest issue for primates is habitat loss, as their forest habitats are cleared for human use (logging, agriculture and other developments).  However, poaching and hunting for bush meat are constant threats as well.

The humane treatment of primates is also a universal issue.  The large primates—monkeys and great apes—have fascinated people in zoos and circuses and on street corners for hundreds of years.  Their evolutionary ties to humans have made them useful for research of many kinds (from science to space travel).  According to the Animal Welfare Institute, more than 70,000 primates are being held captive in research facilities.  Today, however, with increasing knowledge about the complex social communities of primates, calls for eliminating use of non-human primates are continuous and widespread, particularly in Europe.

Along with global feelings about the exploitation of elephants and marine mammals, it is clear that the capture, breeding and use of primates in research and for entertainment is destined to disappear.  Let’s hope that wild species don’t do the same.

References:

Animal Welfare Institute.  Non-human Primates.  Available at:  https://awionline.org/content/non-human-primates.  Accessed November 30, 2018.

IUCN Primate Specialist Group.  An Assessment of Endangered Primates.  Available at:  http://www.primate-sg.org/red_list_threat_status/.  Accessed November 30, 2018.

Klein, Sarah.  2003.  Monkeying around with the holidays.  Detroit Metro Times, December 10, 2003.  Available at:  https://www.metrotimes.com/detroit/monkeying-around-with-the-holidays/Content?oid=2177616.  Accessed November 30, 2018.

Marshall, Lindsay.  2017.  It’s time to stop monkeying around with harmful primate experiments.  Humane Society International.  Available at:  https://humanesociety.scienceblog.com/97/its-time-to-stop-monkeying-around-with-harmful-primate-experiments/.  Accessed November 30, 2018.

Monkeyday.com.  Happy Monkey Day 2017!  Available at:  https://monkeyday.com/.  Accessed November 30, 2018.

She was first at many things—first woman admitted to MIT, founder and first president of the American Home Economics Association, first water quality chemist for the state of Massachusetts.  She also was the first person to introduce the word “ecology” and its central concept into the scientific establishment of the United States.

Ellen Henrietta Swallow was born in Massachusetts on December 3, 1842 (died 1911).  Her family was poor, and so Swallow did not attend school as a girl.  Eventually she attended a teaching academy for two years and became a school teacher.  But science and research intrigued her, and she entered Vassar College in 1868, at the age of 26.  She received a degree in two years and then started breaking barriers.

She sought admission to what we call today the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), then an all-male school.  They admitted her on her birthday, 1870, with the understanding that this was not the start of a new policy, but as an experiment to see if women could succeed at a scientific school.  She was, thus, the first female student to attend MIT and the first to attend a science-based university in the U.S.

She handled it just fine, graduating in two years with another bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree from Vassar (MIT refused to issue advanced degrees to women for several more years).  She immediately went to work as an unpaid instructor in chemistry—again the first (or perhaps the second) female chemistry teacher in the land.  Within a few years, she raised the funds and the backing to open the Women’s Laboratory at MIT, a mechanism to allow women to study science without being fully admitted into the school, bypassing the men-only admission policy.

During the 1880s she began working on water pollution issues in Massachusetts, again among the early leaders of sanitary chemistry.  Now under her married name of Ellen Richards, she implemented a comprehensive survey of water quality across the state, testing water samples from more than 20,000 sites (some sources say 30,000 or even 40,000)—a first in both scope and organization.  She established a natural baseline for chlorine in water, graduated from coastal to inland locations, to use as a standard for judging the amount of local water contamination.  Her work led to the first Massachusetts statewide water quality standards and the state’s first modern water treatment plant (and, of course, the first of both in the nation).

Richards was committed to the idea that science was useful—essential, really—in organizing normal life so that it was healthy and efficient.  The concept was based in the ideas of ecology, then being developed in Germany.  She introduced both the concept of ecology and the term into English (she first spelled it “oekology”), the first in the country to do so.  Hence, it is appropriate to consider her as one of the founders of the science of ecology.  Her viewpoint that a healthy environment created healthy people and a healthy economy is an early representation of the modern concept of sustainability.

Richards is remembered today mostly as the founder of the science of home economics, which she termed “euthenics.”  Although her term never caught on (it was too easily confused with eugenics), her principles have remained and grown into the science, teaching and extension of food safety, nutrition, and sanitary practices to the general public.  She co-founded the American Home Economics Association and served as its first president until her death in 1911.

She was always, by example and leadership, an advocate for women in science.  In the year she died, she addressed her fellow alumnae of Vassar, saying:

“We have won our standing, an acknowledged place. Now that we have influence how shall we use it? Woman’s outlook will be different ten years from now. Is she still to be behind in the race? Or from her new standpoint shall she lead? The question is not woman, but ability and women.”

References:

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Ellen Swallow Richards, American chemist.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Ellen-Swallow-Richards.  Accessed November 28, 2018.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  Ellen Swallow Richards:  Biography.  Available at:  https://libraries.mit.edu/archives/exhibits/esr/esr-biography.html.  Accessed November 28, 2018.

Science History Institute.  Ellen H. Swallow Richards.  Available at:  https://www.sciencehistory.org/historical-profile/ellen-h-swallow-richards.  Accessed November 28, 2018.

Vassar Encyclopedia.  Ellen Swallow Richards.  Available at:  http://vcencyclopedia.vassar.edu/alumni/ellen-swallow-richards.html.  Accessed November 28, 2018.

When John Muir embarked on his one-thousand-mile walk from Indiana to Florida in 1867, most of the space in his pack was taken up by a single book—Manual of the Botany of the Northern United States, from New England to Wisconsin and South to Ohio and Pennsylvania inclusive.  That manual generally goes by a shorter title, Gray’s Manual, written by Asa Gray.  Through eight editions and to the present day, Gray’s Manual continues to be an essential resource for American botanists, well earning Asa Gray recognition as the “Father of American Botany.”

Asa Gray was born on November 18, 1810 (died in 1888), in Oneida County, New York.  With seven younger siblings, Gray grew up working on the family’s farm and becoming an avid naturalist, especially interested in minerals. His interest in botany began while at school, causing his father to enroll him in a local medical school.  He graduated in 1831 and opened a medical office—but that was the beginning and end of his medical career.

While in medical school, he had spent his spare time exploring the countryside and collecting plants, developing a sizable herbarium.  He became acquainted with John Torrey, a chemistry professor and botanist at Columbia University.  Shunning medical practice, he joined Torrey as his chemistry assistant—but they both pursued botany as their true avocations.  When Torrey’s funds ran out, Gray drifted among various teaching positions over the next 15 years, but never stopped exploring the northeastern United States, gathering plant specimens, developing his herbarium, classifying new species and publishing papers on his findings.

In 1848, Gray was appointed to Harvard University as the first full-time professor of botany in the nation.  He virtually created a botanical presence at Harvard, building a herbarium (now named for him), accumulating a botanical library and planting botanical gardens.  He traveled widely throughout the United States and Europe (there he investigated specimens of American plants in European collections).  In 1848, he published the monumental work mentioned above, the 800-page Gray’s Manual.  That book was accompanied by many more, both fundamental science and more popularized works for the educated public.

His Manual became instantly popular (and remains so) for the clarity of its presentation, the accuracy of its taxonomic organization and the completeness of the treatment.  As his 1889 obituary in the National Academy of Sciences read in part:

“Botanists themselves needed some one who could bring together the scattered materials of the early explorers and harmonize the writings of earlier botanists into a compact and comprehensive whole; one who could settle authoritatively doubtful points of nomenclature; who could describe species tersely and clearly so that there might be a good general account of the flora of North America comparable with similar floras of Europe. The public needed some one to tell them what botany itself was and what botanists were doing…. Combining the power of original research with a talent for popular exposition, he was just the man for the time.”

Gray became so popular and authoritative that he wielded substantial influence in philosophy, politics and religion.  This became important when Charles Darwin’s work on natural selection and evolution started a scientific and cultural revolution (learn more about Darwin’s work here).  Gray and Darwin were constant correspondents during this time, exchanging more than 300 letters.  Darwin shared with Gray more than with any other scientists or friends.  Gray was a devout Christian, but he held the belief that Darwin’s discoveries were wonderful and instructive—they showed the mechanisms that his Creator had put into place to organize the world.  Gray had much to do with the eventual acceptance of Darwin’s ideas in the United States.

And Gray has had much to do with the development of botany and biodiversity coonservation in the country.  He discovered and named hundreds of species.  He published the first comprehensive treatment of the distribution of plants, establishing an understanding of how habitat conditions affect an area’s flora.  He explored California with John Muir (learn more about Muir here).  He bequeathed all his materials—herbarium and library—and all his royalties to Harvard University; today Harvard’s botanical collections remain one of the world’s largest and best.  He was an original member of the National Academy of Sciences and other prominent scientific organizations.  His nickname as Father of American Botany is well earned, but wouldn’t it be simpler to just call him “The Stamen”?

References:

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Asa Gray, American Botanist.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Asa-Gray.  Accessed October 30, 2018.

Farlow, W. G.  1889.  Memoir of Asa Gray.  National Academy of Sciences, April 17, 1889.  Available at:  http://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/gray-asa.pdf.  Accessed October 30, 2018.

NNDB.  Asa Gray.  Available at:  http://www.nndb.com/people/269/000102960/.  Accessed October 30, 2018.

Sierra Club.  Asa Gray.  Available at:  https://vault.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/people/gray.aspx.  Accessed October 30, 2018.

University of Cambridge.  Asa Gray.  Darwin Correspondence Project.  Available at:  https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/asa-gray.  Accessed October 30, 2018.

If people remember David Livingstone at all, it is as the intrepid African explorer made famous by his meeting with journalist Henry Stanley, at which Mr. Stanley presumably just said, “Dr. Livingston, I presume?”  Livingstone had been exploring Africa for three decades, penetrating farther into the African interior than any other European.  And on November 17, 1855, he became the first non-African to observe Mosi-oa-Tunya, the amazing waterfall on the Zambezi River.

Livingstone was born in 1813 (died in 1873) to a poor Scottish family.  Growing up with six siblings in a one-room attic apartment, he started work at age 10.  Hard work, intelligence and devout Christianity gave him the physical, mental and spiritual strength to answer the call to become a medical missionary in Africa.  After several years of study, he arrived in Cape Town in 1841, at the age of 28.

He explored throughout southern Africa for 15 years, traveling across the continent from west to east and back again and venturing farther north into what we now call the Congo than any previous European explorer.  He provided medical care and taught Christianity, while also fighting against slavery and poor treatment of native Africans.  He especially sought a river route across the continent, hoping that it would open legitimate commercial trade on the Atlantic coast to replace slave trading.

Consequently, he explored the Zambezi River, from its mid-continent source to its Indian Ocean mouth in Mozambique.  His explorations took him to the area native Africans called Mosi-oa-Tunya, which means “the smoke that thunders.”  The smoke was mist and the thunder was the sound of one of the world’s most unique landscapes—what we now call Victoria Falls and its surrounding ecosystem.

Victoria Falls lies on the Zambezi River, which forms a border between Zambia and Zimbabwe.  The river is 1.2 miles wide at the falls.  A precipice forms a narrow gash in the landscape perpendicular to the water flow.  Nine cascades flow over the basaltic lip, extending almost as wide as the river and crashing on the rocks 350 feet below.  By both length and height, Victoria Falls is much larger than Niagara Falls.  The large flow and long drop create massive spouts of mist that can be viewed from a dozen miles away.  The mist also creates a local rainforest-like ecosystem that supports a number of rare and endangered species including several raptors that nest on the cliffs.

When Livingstone arrived at the falls (either on November 16 or 17—accounts vary, but we’ll use the latter), he was awed by the splendor around him.  He approached the falls on an island perched on the lip of the gorge:

“In looking down into the fissure on the right of the island, one sees nothing but a dense white cloud, which, at the time we visited the spot, had two bright rainbows on it. From this cloud rushed up a great jet of vapour exactly like steam, and it mounted 200 or 300 feet high; there condensing, it changed its hue to that of dark smoke, and came back in a constant shower, which soon wetted us to the skin….”

            Long considered one of the natural wonders of the world, Victoria Falls is among Africa’s biggest tourist attractions.  Nearly 500,000 people visited during 2016, and visitation took big jumps in both 2017 and 2018.  A new airport, capable of accommodating large jets, and modern hotels are making travel more convenient and affordable.

The falls are protected through two national parks that contain the falls and the lands above and below them.  One is in Zambia (Mosi-oa-Tunya National Park) and one in Zimbabwe (Victoria Falls National Park).  UNESCO placed the Victoria Falls region on its World Heritage List in 1989, noting that the Victoria Falls is  “the world’s greatest sheet of falling water and significant worldwide for its exceptional geological and geomorphological features and active land formations processes with outstanding beauty attributed to the falls i.e. the spray, mist and rainbows.”

The world today agrees with Livingston’s appraisal, when he called the falls “the most wonderful sight I had seen in Africa” and named them in honor of Queen Victoria.  Or call it Mosi-oa-Tunya, your choice.

References:

Africa Albida Tourism.  2017.  A tourism survey of the Victoria Falls region.  Available at:  https://gallery.mailchimp.com/44d89d6770f14113ea889729c/files/040c7db8-4834-44c0-9de4-7a6b786341ff/Africa_s_Living_Soul_2016_low_res_.pdf.  Accessed October 28, 2018.

Roberts, Peter.  To The Victoria Falls.  Available at:  https://www.tothevictoriafalls.com/vfpages/discovery/discfalls.html.  Accessed October 28, 2018.

Shepperson, George Albert.  David Livingstone, Scottish Explorer and Missionary.  Encyclopedia Britannica.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/David-Livingstone.  Accessed October 28, 2018.

UNESCO.  Mosi-oa-Tunya/Victoria Falls.  World Heritage Centre List.  Available at:  https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/509.  Accessed October 28, 2018.

The vast majority of the world’s governments and people now understand that the world’s climate is changing and that the changes are largely caused by human-based emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases into the environment.  Getting to this point of understanding, however, has required a major global—and national—commitment to scientific research and education.  That research was assured when the United States passed the Global Climate Change Research Act in 1990.

Rancor about the extent and causes of climate change was bitter in the late 1980s.  The U.S. Congress and the agencies of the executive branch debated the state of change as well as who should be developing both knowledge and policy.  During 1989, President George H. W. Bush advanced progress by asking for a report on the status of climate change in the U.S.  Congress chose to go farther, passing a law that made a climate change research program permanent and mandating a regular report on climate change to be produced at least every four years.  The Senate passed the bill 100-0 and the House of Representatives passed it by voice vote (meaning no record of the actual votes took place, recognizing overwhelming support for the bill).  President Bush signed the bill into law on November 16, 1990.  The law has not been amended since it first passed.

The bill requires that the relevant government agencies work together, along with universities, states, industry and other groups, under the direction of a Committee on Earth and Environmental Sciences.  The Committee is required to develop a national plan for climate change research, assess the state of the climate, represent the United States in international forums and collaborations on climate change, and report regularly to Congress and the American people.

The most recently available report is from 2014 (which means a new report is required in 2018, some of which is available now and some not).  As the report notes, it is “the result of a three-year analytical effort by a team of over 300 experts, overseen by a broadly constituted Federal Advisory Committee of 60 members.”  The report highlights 12 findings, which I have paraphrased here:

1. Global climate change is real and caused by humans, predominantly by burning fossil fuels.
2. Extreme weather events have become more common and are linked to climate change.
3. More climate change will occur, especially if we keep burning fossil fuels at today’s rates.
4. Impacts of climate change are occurring now and will get more disruptive.
5. Climate change threatens human health and well-being in many ways.
6. Infrastructure is being damaged now by climate change and the damage will get worse.
7. Water quality and quantity are especially affected by climate change.
8. Agriculture is suffering from climate change and the damage will get worse.
9. Climate change disproportionately impacts Indigenous Peoples.
10. Ecosystem services are damaged by climate change.
11. Ocean waters are changing in a variety of ways due to climate change.
12. We’re starting to adapt to climate change, but our efforts are broadly insufficient.

One of the benefits of passing a law is that it cannot be changed by a member of the executive branch, be it the president or cabinet secretary.  Consequently, the government’s work to assess climate change, provide scientific information to the public, and advise the government on policy will continue, regardless of what the climate might be like in Washington!

References:

GlobalChange.gov.  Legal Mandate.  U.S. Global Change Research Program.  Available at:  https://www.globalchange.gov/about/legal-mandate#Short%20Title%20Main.  Accessed October 27, 2018.

Govtrack.  S. 169(101^st):  Global Change Research Act of 1990.  Available at:  https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/101/s169.  Accessed October 27, 2018.

Melillo, Jerry M., Terese (T.C.) Richmond, and Gary W. Yohe, Eds., 2014: Highlights of Climate Change Impacts in the United States: The Third National Climate Assessment. U.S. Global Change Research Program.  Available at:  http://s3.amazonaws.com/nca2014/low/NCA3_Highlights_LowRes.pdf?download=1.  Accessed October 27, 2018.

Pielke, Roger A. Jr.  2000.  Policy history of the US Global Change Research Program:  Part II.  Legislative process.  Global Environmental Change 10 (2000):133-144.  Available at:  http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.529.8677&rep=rep1&type=pdf.  Accessed October 27, 2018.

Every year, the United States recycles a great celebration—America Recycles Day!  Since 1997, the country has celebrated America Recycles Day to educate citizens about the benefits of recycling and how to recycle.

America Recycles Day is an outgrowth of a similar day created by Texas in 1994.  Kevin Tuerff and Valerie Davis, working for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, chose November 15 as Texas Recycles Day because it was about six months after Earth Day and lodged between the news-stealing periods around elections and the annual Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.  They passed the idea along to the National Recycling Coalition, which organized the first national event in 1997, featuring Vice President Al Gore as the Honorary Chair.  Eventually, the program moved to Keep America Beautiful, one of 16 initiates of that organization.

Each year, the U.S. president proclaims America Recycles Day. In 2017, President Trump included these comments in his statement:

Today, on the 20th anniversary of America Recycles Day, we celebrate Americans whose recycling habits help maintain our global leadership and competitiveness. The rate of recycling in the United States has grown from less than 7 percent in 1960 to more than 34 percent in 2014. Still, materials worth $9 billion are thrown away each year. Rather than throwing away valuable resources, we should return them back into our economy, to rebuild our Nation’s infrastructure and create innovative new products…. In 2007, recycling and reuse activities accounted for 757,000 American jobs and produced $36.6 billion in wages. By reusing and recycling, individuals and communities across our country can do their part to keep our lands beautiful, while also growing American jobs and strengthening our economy.

Although the proclamation is national, the day’s events are largely grass roots.  In 2017, 1.5 million people participated in about 2000 registered local events, and 73,800 individuals signed the annual pledge to recycle.

Americans take recycling seriously.  Since 1960, the rate at which we recycle municipal waste has increased 18-fold.  According to the EPA, in 2015 the country recycled 68 million tons and composted 23 million tons of municipal solid waste that otherwise would have gone to landfills.  That amounts to about 34% of all municipal solid waste generated, so we still have more progress to make.

For example, many countries recycle a much higher proportion of their waste than the U.S.  Germany leads the world, recycling 56%, with Austria, South Korea and Wales also above half.  The U.S. actually ranks 25^th among countries in waste recycling, coming in behind most of Western Europe, Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong.

A global group, the Bureau of International Recycling (BIR), has taken to calling recycled materials the “seventh resource.”  They claim that the world’s six major natural resources are water, air, oil, natural gas, coal and minerals (needless to say, anyone interested in “renewable” natural resources would object to leaving out soil, plants, animals and all forms of biodiversity, but let’s not worry about that now).  Naming recycled materials as the seventh resource reinforces the idea that we can conserve other resources as substitutes for extracting new resources from the earth, destroying wild lands and consuming energy.  According to BIR, the seventh resource provides 40% of the world’s raw material needs today—and could supply much more.

So, on America Recycles day—and every other day of the year—make sure you do your part to enlarge our seventh resource (or whatever number it is!).

References:

Bureau of International Recycling. Recycling:  The Seventh Resource Manifesto.  Available at:   https://www.globalrecyclingday.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/ManifestoFINAL.pdf.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

Environmental Protection Agency.  National Overview:  Facts and Figures on Materials, Wastes and Recycling.  Available at:  https://www.epa.gov/facts-and-figures-about-materials-waste-and-recycling/national-overview-facts-and-figures-materials#Recycling/Composting.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

Gray, Alex.  2017.  Germany recycles more than any other country.  World Economic Forum, 18 Dec 2017.  Available at:  https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/12/germany-recycles-more-than-any-other-country/.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

Heyn, Beth.  2017.  America Recycles Day 2017:  5 Fast Facts You Need to Know.  Heavy, Nov. 15, 2017.  Available at:  https://heavy.com/news/2017/11/america-recycles-day-2017-facts-ideas-participate/.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

Keep America Beautiful.  America Recycles Day.  Available at:  https://americarecyclesday.org/.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

Watson, Rob.  2017.  The 20^th Anniversary and History of America Recycles Day.  SWEEP, November 16, 2017.  Available at:   https://nrra.net/sweep/the-20th-anniversary-and-history-of-america-recycles-day/.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

White House.  2017.  America Recycles Day.  The White House, November 15, 2017.  Available at:  https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/america-recycles-day/.  Accessed October 26, 2018.

On October 29, 1889,Charles Stanley, the Governor General of British Columbia, formally christened a new park in Vancouver, dedicating it “to the use and enjoyment of peoples of all colours, creeds, and customs, for all time.  I name thee, Stanley Park.”  Little did he know that the use and reputation of the park would grow to the extent that Stanley Park was named the world’s best park in 2014 by the users of TripAdvisor!

The park actually opened one year earlier, in September, 1888 (but Stanley himself was ill and could not attend what we would today call the “soft opening”).  At the time, Vancouver had just over 6,000 residents—choosing to set aside a park of this size was a dramatic undertaking for this frontier town.  Today the park is the equivalent of New York’s Central Park or Nairobi’s Uhuru Park.  At nearly 900 acres in area, Stanley Park is the third largest urban park in the world.  Annually, it has more than 8 million recreation visits.

Stanley Park has the typical rich history of use for a western land area.  It was home to three First Nations groups—the Squamish, Burrard Band and Musqueam peoples—who used the land for centuries as hunting and gathering grounds.  During the 1800s, the area was increasingly occupied by European settlers who logged the dense forest for lumber and established small farms.  Vancouver was incorporated as a city in 1888, and the first action taken by the new far-sighted City Council was to begin the steps to create a park.

The park itself is a peninsula that juts northward from downtown Vancouver, separating Vancouver Harbor from the Strait of Georgia.  More than half of the park area remains in forest, dominated by western red cedar, Douglas fir and bigleaf maple.  Although the area was extensively logged during the late 19^th Century, many “monument trees” remain, some centuries old.  The forests have also been subject to severe blow-downs by fierce wind storms, the most recent in 2006.  The city planted 15,000 trees after the 2006 wind storm to restore damaged areas.

Along with forested areas and their associated hiking and biking trails, the park contains numerous areas developed for outdoor recreation.  Original and modern totem poles and other First Nations’ artwork grace the property.  Three beaches attract thousands daily during the summer months.  Forest trails cover nearly 17 miles.  A seawall winds around the park, providing accessible walking and biking paths; combined with other paths adjoining the park, the 13.7-mile trail is the longest uninterrupted waterfront path in the world.  A botanical garden and aquarium are located in the park, but a historic zoo was closed recently when the last remaining animal, a polar bear named Tuk, died in 1994. The presence of the park helps earn Vancouver’s reputation as one of the greenest cities in the world.

References:

City of Vancouver.  Stanley Park.  Available at:  https://vancouver.ca/parks-recreation-culture/stanley-park.aspx.  Accessed October 24, 2018.

Kheraj, Sean.  Historical Overview of Stanley Park.  Stanley Park Ecology Society.  Available at:  http://stanleyparkecology.ca/wp-content/uploads/downloads/2012/02/SOPEI-Historical-Overview-of-Stanley-Park.pdf.  Accessed October 24, 2018.

Today in Canadian History.  1889 – October 29.  Available at:  http://canadachannel.ca/todayincanadianhistory/index.php/October_29.  Accessed October 24, 2018.

It’s one of those days.  A day when no great conservationist was born and no noteworthy conservation event occurred (if you know of one, tell me).  But something interesting did happen—the first of the huge purposefully littering events known as “Ticker Tape Parades.”

October 28, 1886, was a big day in New York City.  President Grover Cleveland was present to dedicate the Statue of Liberty.  The 151-foot-tall copper statue was a gift from the people of France, erected on a 154-foot base on an island in New York Harbor.  Lady Liberty has remained a dominant icon of freedom and democracy; Emma Lazausus’s poem “The New Colossus” is engraved on a plaque on the statue’s base, and the final lines ring true to the American personality:

“Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

            When the parade following the statue’s dedication wound its way through New York’s financial district on Manhattan Island, observers from offices high above the street began a spontaneous response—they threw ticker-tape from their windows.  Ticker tape was the one-inch wide strip of paper that clicked continuously out of a ticker-tape machine, showing the instantaneous value of stocks being traded on the stock market.  The tape fed out of the machines and gathered in piles on the floor.  Onlookers decided that showering the parade with the paper strips would make a fitting tribute (no, I don’t know why).

It seemed like such a good idea that New York City decided to institutionalize the practice.  Ticker-tape parades occur along Broadway, from the Battery at the southern tip of Manhattan up to City Hall.  That section of Broadway is also called the “Canyon of Heroes” for the honorees that have traveled the parade route.  Since 1886, a total of 206 ticker-tape parades have occurred, honoring the visits of dignitaries, from presidents to popes, and important events, from moon landings to sports championships.

And each has been accompanied by a littering of tons of paper.  Ticker tape itself was used until 1991, when electronic reporting of stock prices made the paper strips obsolete.  Since then, commercial confetti companies have provided the needed natural resource of mountains of tiny bits of paper.

Just how much litter occurs from a parade?  A recent estimate is that a typical parade drops about 120 cubic yards of paper on the street, about the volume of the Statue of Liberty and its base combined.  Since a cubic yard of paper weighs about a ton, that’s also about 120 tons of paper.  And since it takes about 12 trees to make a ton of paper, the average parade requires about 1500 trees.  The record, however, during the heyday of ticker-tape parades, occurred during the parade celebrating the end of World War II in 1945—that day more than 5,000 tons of paper floated down on Manhattan!

The clean-up is just as massive.  More than 100 sanitation workers spend about three weeks cleaning up the mess, which continues to rain down from residue stuck on balconies and building ledges.  The parade honoring the U.S. Women’s Soccer Team after their 2015 World Cup win (and the only parade ever to honor a women’s sports team) cost about $2 million, about two-thirds paid from public funds.

So now, when you read the slogan that “every litter bit hurts,” you know how much!

References:

Elsinger, Dale W.  2012.  Super Bowl Parade 2012:  What’s the Environmental Impact of Ticker Tape?  International Business Times, 2/07/12.  Available at:  https://www.ibtimes.com/super-bowl-parade-2012-whats-environmental-impact-ticker-tape-214007.  Accessed October 23, 2018.

Glass, Andrew.  2008.  Statue of Liberty Dedicated Oct. 28, 1886.  Politico, 10/28/2008.  Available at:  https://www.politico.com/story/2008/10/statue-of-liberty-dedicated-oct-28-1886-014989.  Accessed October 23, 2018.

Hunter, Walt.  2018.  The Story Behind the Poem on the Statue of Liberty.  The Atlantic, Jan 16, 2018.  Available at:  https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2018/01/the-story-behind-the-poem-on-the-statue-of-liberty/550553/.  Accessed October 23, 2018.

Smith, Emily and Evelyn Andrews.  2015.  By the number:  Ticker tape parades.  CNN, July 9, 2015.  Available at:  https://www.cnn.com/2015/07/09/us/ticker-tape-parades-by-the-numbers/index.html.  Accessed October 23, 2018.

In its fourth year of operation, UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) declared 26 additional properties to the World Heritage List at its annual meeting, ending on October 30, 1981.  The World Heritage Committee met in Sydney, Australia during October 26-30.  Among the 26 new properties were 17 in the cultural category and 9 in the natural category.  The new additions raised the total list to 112 properties.

The 9 new natural properties included the following:

• Darien National Park (Panama)
• Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary (Senegal)
• Great Barrier Reef (Australia)
• Los Glaciares National Park (Argentina)
• Mammoth Cave National Park (United States)
• Mount Nimba Strict Nature Reserve (Cote d’Ivoire)
• Niokolo-Koba National Park (Senegal)
• Olympic National Park (United States)
• Serengeti National Park (Tanzania)

 

While all these properties are exceptional, now is an appropriate time to highlight Serengeti National Park in Tanzania.  According to UNESCO, “The Serengeti plains harbour the largest remaining unaltered animal migration in the world where over one million wildebeest plus hundreds of thousands of other ungulates engage in a 1,000 km long annual circular trek spanning the two adjacent countries of Kenya and Tanzania.”

And it is at this time of year—September and October—that the annual migration of mammals reaches the northernmost areas of the park, resulting in a concentration of animals unknown anywhere else in the world.  Wildebeest, zebras and Thompson’s gazelles migrate in a clockwise rotation that takes them from southern areas of the Serengeti region during the wet season to the north, along the Tanzania-Kenya border, during the dry season.  The northern area, bisected by the permanently flowing Mara River, provides a refuge of nutritious grasses and plentiful water.  Daily, herds of wildebeest cross back and forth across the Mara River in spectacular masses that attract wildlife observers from around the globe.  The crossing provide opportunities for crocodiles to prey on wildebeest and other predators and scavengers to  pick up the leftovers.

Serengeti National Park and adjacent protected areas (like Maasai Mara National Reserve in Kenya and Ngorongoro Crater Conservation Area, both also on the UNESCO Heritage List) provide an intact ecosystem supporting the huge mammal populations and the stunning migration.  Altogether, the ecosystem covers about 3.4 million acres, about the size of Yosemite and Yellowstone National Parks combined.

UNESCO states that “volcanic soils combined with the ecological impact of the migration results in one of the most productive ecosystems on earth, sustaining the largest number of ungulates and the highest concentration of large predators in the world.”  The region is home to 2 million wildebeest (about 1.2 million are migratory), nearly 1 million Thompson’s gazelles and 300,000 zebras.  The predator population includes 4,000 lions, 1,000 leopards, 225 cheetahs, 3,500 spotted hyenas and 300 wild dogs.

 A male lion, one of thousands in the Serengeti (photo by Larry Nielsen)

Although most of the Serengeti region, including the Serengeti National Park, is protected, threats to the integrity of the area and the world-famous migration continue.  A recent plan to build a road across Serengeti National Park would have divided the northern zone of the park in two, effectively stopping the migration as we know it.  The road has been placed on hold, but population pressures around the park and economic needs to move people and cargo between Lake Victoria and the Indian Ocean will only increase in the future.

The recognition and protection provided by UNESCO designation on the World Heritage List, therefore, are powerful forces in the battle to preserve the ecosystem and its migration.  UNESCO designation provides evidence that the entire world considers a piece of land, water or human structure part of its heritage and not in the sole jurisdiction of a particular country.

References:

UNESCO.  Serengeti National Park.  Available at:    https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/156.  Accessed October 22, 2018.

UNESCO.  1981.  5^th session of the Committee.  Available at:  https://whc.unesco.org/en/sessions/05COM.  Accessed October 22, 2018.

One of the joys of writing this calendar is shining a light on people and events that have lived more in the shadows than in the spotlight.  Today is the birthday of one such man, called by those who knew him the “20^th Century John Muir.”  He is Dr. Edgar Wayburn.

Wayburn was born on September 17, 1906 (died at age 103 in 2010) in Georgia.  His genial Georgian accent and nature served him well throughout his life.  He graduated from the University of Georgia at age 19 and the Harvard Medical School at age 23.  He practiced (and taught) medicine for 50 years.

As a boy, he took summer trips annually to San Francisco to visit an uncle.  After finishing medical school and a four-year Army tour in Europe during World War II, he moved to there permanently.  Two observations determined Wayburn’s avocation for the rest of his life.  First, he observed the rapid development of the country after the war and despaired that nature was being pushed beyond the experience of most people.  Second, he marveled that Marin County, just north of San Francisco and dominated by scenic hills and valleys, had not yet been developed.  He later said, “It seemed incredible to me that there were no cities or suburbs built on those Marin hills so close to San Francisco.  I wondered how long that miracle would last.”

Wayburn determined that he would make it last.  He had joined the Sierra Club in 1939 so he could take a burro excursion, and he never left.  He served on the executive board for 34 years and was president five terms during the 1960s.  Wayburn helped convert a California outing club to a national and global conservation powerhouse.  He spent a lifetime in quiet, behind-the-scenes advocacy for preserving wild lands.  He wrote letters, raised money, participated in public meetings, submitted comments on government proposals and lobbied elected officials.

He was effective without marches, protests or media campaigns.  Pat Joseph, writing for the Sierra club, called Wayburn “a born facilitator and diplomat, someone who exuded the kind of authority and integrity that gets people—even powerful people—to listen.  Rogers Morton, Secretary of Interior under Richard Nixon and not overly enthusiastic about locking up lands, told a congressional hearing about a park’s borders that “The Park Service wants me to support their plan, but I went out there to the site with my friend Dr. Wayburn, and he convinced me otherwise.”

He convinced a lot of people “otherwise” over the last half of the century.  In 1958, he successfully lobbied the state of California to expand Mount Tamalpais State Park near San Francisco from 870 acres to more than 6,000 acres, a seven-fold increase.  Next came his successful drives to create Point Reyes National Seashore, just north of San Francisco, and then Golden Gate National Recreation Area, the nation’s (and probably the world’s) largest national park in and adjacent to a major city.  He then spurred the establishment of Redwood National Park.

He and his wife, Peggy Elliott, a former Vogue magazine editor, hiked throughout the region—and then into Alaska in the late 1960s.  They were once again mesmerized, as he had been by the Marin Headlands, by the grandeur of the place and the opportunity for preservation.  Now with a fully developed sense of what was needed, Wayburn had realized that “It wasn’t enough simply to add a few acres here and there; nature doesn’t divide herself into measured plots.  A watershed encompasses the chain of life; if any part is developed, the integrity of the whole ecosystem is threatened.”

He went really big this time, proposing a massive set of preserved lands for Alaska.  In 1980, his vision came to pass through the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act (ANILCA, for short).  ANILCA set aside more than 100 million acres of federal lands as national parks, wildlife refuges and other protected sites.  With those additions, the area administered by the National Park Service doubled.

Never a household name, Wayburn did earn recognition as perhaps the most effective conservationist of the last 75 years.  Among other awards, President Clinton presented him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1999.  When proclaiming the award, Clinton noted that Wayburn had “saved more of our wilderness than any person alive.”

Like Gro Harlem Brundtland, another physician and conservationist, Edgar Wayburn understood that human health and sustainability were not two things, but one.  In an interview for the San Francisco Medical Society, he summed up his philosophy:

“I have loved medicine and conservation.  In one sense, my involvement with both might be summed up in a single word: survival. Medicine is concerned with the short-term survival of the human species, conservation with the long-term survival of the human and other species as well. We are all related.”

References:

Brown, Emma.  2010.  Edgar Wayburn, 103, dies; No 1 protector of U.S. wilderness.  Washington Post, March 9, 2010.  Available at:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/08/AR2010030805247.html?noredirect=on.  Accessed August 2, 2018.

Joseph, Pat.  2010.  Dr. Edgar Wayburn, M.D.:  1906-2010.  Sierra Club.  Available at:  http://vault.sierraclub.org/history/wayburn/.  Accessed August 2, 2018.

Martin, Douglas.  2010.  Edgar Wayburn, a Leader in Saving the Wilderness, Dies at 103.  The New York Times, March 10, 2010.  Available at:  https://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/10/us/10wayburn.html.  Accessed August 2, 2018.