Category: Uncategorized

The National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty was incorporated on January 12, 1895.  It has become the largest and most influential preservation organization in England, in a sense the British equivalent of the U.S. National Park Service.  According to the Trust’s 2020-21 annual report, the trust protects 780 miles of coastline, 250,000 hectares of land (1.5% of the entire land surface of England), more than 500 properties (structures and nature preserves), and nearly 1 million catalogued historical artifacts.  The Trust’s properties hosted more than 20 million visits during the year.

The National Trust owes its existence to the efforts of Octavia Hill, a pioneering social reformer of the late Nineteenth Century.  Hill came from a family of advocates for the poor, and she followed in their footsteps.  On behalf of fellow reformer John Ruskin, she managed a set of broken-down tenements in what is now the Marylebone section of London, where she rented to poor women and also provided them with job training, actual jobs and cultural exposure.  By the 1870s, she housed and watched over the social development of 3,000 tenants.

But she also realized that the poor needed parks and open spaces.  Actually, she understood that everyone needed such spaces, and that they were fast disappearing as London developed.  She reasoned that “a few acres where the hill top enables the Londoner to rise above the smoke, to feel a refreshing air for a little time and to see the sun setting in coloured glory which abounds so in the Earth God made” was a tonic for the harried life of the salesperson as well as the foundry or textile worker.  And she particularly abhorred the reality that city parks were becoming increasingly gated, available only to those who could afford to live around their perimeters.  One of her first projects was to stop a portion of Hampstead Heath, the renowned London park, from being developed.

So, together with colleagues Sir Robert Hunter and Hardwicke Rawnsley, she organized the National Trust as a public charity.  The trust’s purpose was to “promote the permanent preservation for the benefit of the Nation of lands and tenements (including buildings) of beauty or historic interest.”  Anyone who has visited a park or country estate in England owes much to the passion and persistence of Olivia Hill.

References:

National Trust.  2021.  National Trust annual report 2020/2021.  Available at:  http://www.nationaltrustannualreport.org.uk/. Accessed January 9, 2023.

YMCA George Williams College.  Octavia Hill, housing and social reform.  Available at:  http://infed.org/mobi/octavia-hill-housing-and-social-reform/.  Accessed January 11, 2017.

Rand Aldo Leopold was born on January 11, 1887.  Before the end of his much-too-short life (he died at 61, in 1948), he would write the book, A Sand County Almanac, that has become the philosophical bible for conservationists.

Leopold was a child of the field and forest.  He and his brother accompanied their father into the woods as often as possible, first to observe nature and later to hunt its products for the table.  But he was equally at home in the library or music room, learning the ways of books and ideas from his mother.  The combination served him well as he grew to be known as the father of wildlife management.

He trained as a forester and took his first professional job with the U.S. Forest Service in New Mexico.  He led timber surveying crews, measuring the forest for its production of wood.  He loved the grandeur of the environment, as well as the grandeur of the task—toting up billions of board-feet of lumber available for utilization.  Like all foresters in the early decades of the 20^th Century, he believed that forests were for logging—a utilitarian approach to nature.

But when a serious illness required that he give up the physically challenging job of a field forester, his outlook began to expand and mature.  With a supervisory job in the Forest Service’s regional office in Albuquerque, he had the opportunity to visit many national forests and see the damage that uncontrolled grazing and logging inflicted on the environment.  Soils eroded, productivity declined, wildlife disappeared.  What was needed was a new profession, one that combined the laws of nature with the needs of people.

He eventually took a promotion to the Forest Service’s Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, Wisconsin.  The job didn’t suit him, however, and after a few years, at the brink of the Great Depression, he resigned from the government to do something else.  But what to do?  He had lots of ideas, but no one to pay him for them.

After a period of unemployment, he secured a temporary job.  He was hired by a sporting organization to survey the status of wildlife populations around the country, report on the conditions and make recommendations for improvement.  Within a short time, the task was narrowed to a survey of just the Midwestern states.  In two years, he visited hundreds of field locations and talked to even more landowners, hunters and government officials.  His final report, published in 1931, became the first comprehensive assessment of the deplorable state of wildlife populations in the United States.  It established Leopold as the “father of wildlife management.”

Now, Leopold knew where his future lay.  He was immediately hired by the University of Wisconsin as the nation’s first professor of wildlife—a position he held until his death.  He trained hundreds of students, oversaw the restoration of thousands of acres of degraded farm and forestland, and wrote the first wildlife textbook.

Along the way, he bought a little farm outside of Madison.  The farm had been badly abused, but together with his wife and daughters, Leopold restored it.  They converted the only building on the farm, an old chicken barn, into a barely habitable cabin.  That cabin gradually acquired the name of “The Shack,” and is now a rough-hewn mecca for conservationists the world around.

As Leopold restored the land, he wrote essays about the experience, chronicling the events on a month-by-month basis.  He also wrote essays about his earlier years in the West and an evolving perspective on how to manage the earth sustainably.  After years of writing and rewriting and rejections by publishers, he finally secured a contract for the publication of A Sand County Almanac.

Regrettably, he did not live to see the book printed.  While helping fight a grass fire at a neighboring farm in 1948, he suffered a fatal heart attack at the age of 61.

But his family carried through on the editing process, and A Sand County Almanac was published posthumously the next year.  Although it wasn’t a popular book at the time, its re-issue as a paperback in 1970 made it the popular treatise we know today.  Without doubt, A Sand County Almanac is the most widely read environmental narrative of all time.

References:

Nielsen, Larry A.  2017.  Nature’s Allies.  Island Press, Washington DC.

Which American presidents did the most for the environment?  The gold goes to Teddy Roosevelt and the silver—remarkably—to Richard Nixon.  But the bronze medal for environmental presidents should go to the 39^th President of the United States, Jimmy Carter.

            James Early Carter Jr. was inaugurated as the U.S. President on January 20, 1977.  Just four months later, on May 23, he addressed the Congress with a major policy agenda on the environment.  Following the flurry of legislative activity during the late 1960s and early 1970s, Carter committed the executive branch to join the effort:

“Intelligent stewardship of the environment on behalf of all Americans is a prime responsibility of government. Congress has in the past carried out its share of this duty well–so well, in fact, that the primary need today is not for new comprehensive statutes but for sensitive administration and energetic enforcement of the ones we have. Environmental protection is no longer just a legislative job, but one that requires–and will now receive-firm and unsparing support from the Executive Branch.”

In his address, Carter outlined a seven-point agenda for his administration.  He spoke to the need to control pollution and protect health; assure environmentally sound energy development; improve the urban environment; protect natural resources; preserve natural heritage (including wildlife); address the global environment; and improve implementation of environmental laws.  The address is stunning in its detail, for example, listing 1303 miles of river to be added to the Wild and Scenic Rivers System and proposing an additional 20 for study. 

            Carter came to his environmental mission honestly.  He grew up in Plains, Georgia, in a rural Baptist family that taught the Bible message of stewardship of the earth.  As a farmer, he learned to understand that if you helped nature, nature helped you.  He went off to the Naval Academy and became a nuclear engineer.  During his active duty working on atomic submarines, Carter was sent to Canada to help when a nuclear power plant on the Chalk River near Ottawa had an accidental partial meltdown.  He realized then how close modern society could come to nuclear disaster, a lesson that stayed with him in his approach to energy security—and nuclear weapons—as president.

            By the end of his presidency, Carter had accomplished much of his agenda.  He grew the EPA budget, despite a weak economy, and aggressively dealt with the Love Canal and Three Mile Island disasters.  Carter combined a group of energy programs into the Department of Energy, and he established the first gas mileage standards for vehicles.  In the closing months of his presidency, he worked with the lame-duck congress to pass and sign several important laws, including establishment of the Superfund idea, which has helped restore nearly 400 of the nation’s most toxic locations.  He also signed the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, which provided 157 million acres of Alaskan lands protection as national parks and monuments, wildlife refuges and national forests.

            Carter believed in renewable energy.  His environmental message to congress, he said:

 “The transition to renewable energy sources, particularly solar energy, must be made. But it will take time. Meanwhile we should satisfy our energy needs from existing sources, both fossil and nuclear, in a safe and environmentally acceptable way….. The decisions we make about energy in the next few years will influence the environment of our country for generations.”

To walk the talk, he installed solar panels on the roof of the White House. He turned down the thermostats in the building and told his staff to wear sweaters.  In the midst of the energy crisis, he turned off the Christmas lights on the White House grounds.

            Carter’s legacy as an environmental president is enormous, and even the ideas that he started and were abandoned later have come back strongly.  For examples, almost as soon as Reagan moved into the White House, he had the solar panels taken down.  They are back now, the work of George W. Bush and Barack Obama, and solar energy today across the country produces as much electricity as would 50 nuclear power plants.

References:

Carter, Jimmy.  1977.  The Environmental Message to the Congress, Ma 23, 1977.  The American Presidency Project.  Available at:  http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=7561.  Accessed May 22, 2018.

Milnes, Arthur.  2011.  Jimmy Carter’s exposure to nuclear danger.  CNN, April 5, 2011.  Available at:  http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/04/05/milnes.carter.nuclear/index.html.  Accessed May 22, 2018. 

Peak, Chris.  2015.  Which presidents are the greenest in U.S. history?  Nation Swell, September 16, 2015.  Available at:  http://nationswell.com/greenest-u-s-presidents/.  Accessed May 22, 2018.

I’m sure you think the date of 1965 is a typo.  Surely the site where two railroads met to create a transcontinental route, on May 10, 1869, didn’t wait nearly a century before being made into a park.  It is not a typo.

            The Golden Spike was the last stake driven into a railroad tie linking the United States from East to West with a fast, comfortable and safe transportation system (at least in mid-19^th Century terms).  Instead of taking months to cross the continent, now the trip took a week.  The Central Pacific Railroad built eastward from Sacramento, while the Union Pacific Railroad built westward from Council Bluffs, Iowa.  The two lines met at Promontory Summit, not far from present day Ogden, Utah.  Leland Stanford, President of the Central Pacific, drove the spike into the ground at 2:47 PM on May 10, 1869.  An inscription on the spike read, “May God continue the unity of our Country as this Railroad unites the two great Oceans of the world.”  The unity of the country referred to healing the wounds from the Civil War.

            The golden spike was replaced by an iron spike, the railroad began operating, and the place was forgotten—especially after a 1903 bypass made that section of track obsolete.  The tracks were dug up and recycled during World War II, and ranchers reused the ties. One woman, Bernice Gibbs Anderson, however, did not forget.  A poet, historian and newspaper journalist, Anderson argued for decades that the spot deserved more than a single lonely stone pillar.  Eventually, a private park was established, and, on July 30, 1965, the federal government took over, declaring it a national historical site (later renamed as a “park”).  The National Park Service has re-built a section of track, and two replicas steam engines meet there, reprising the famous photo of 1869.  More than 100,000 visitors trek to the location annually.

            The park is wonderful, but the event is the real big deal.  When the railroads met, the North American frontier closed.  Horace Greeley’s admonition to “go West, young man,” didn’t work any longer—because people from the West were coming East to greet you.  No longer did an unknown, unexplored, unexploited wilderness lie beyond the sunset.  Now the West was no longer inexhaustible, but it had limits.

            In a way, the driving of the Golden Spike could be called the beginning of conservation in the United States.  People began to take notice of the condition of natural resources.  The U.S. Fisheries Commission formed in 1871, to look into the decline of commercial fisheries.  Yosemite was made a state park in 1864, and the first national park was created at Yellowstone in 1872..  The ideas of evolution took hold (remember, Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species in 1859), a first step in the foundation of ecological science.  John Muir roamed around California, noting the over-exploitation of the landscape.  In Europe, similar rumblings were beginning in fisheries, forestry and land use.

            The driving of the Golden Spike, therefore, meant two different things.  First, this symbolized the end of the trail for a frontier that seemed endless in expanse and natural resources.  But second is the beginning of the trail leading to conservation.  And, as Bernice Gibbs Anderson expressed in her poem, Lure, the second is more interesting:  “The end of the trail, its mystery gone, is featured so often in story and song; But as long as the lure of the unknown will be, it’s the beginnings of trails that appeal to me.”

References:

Barry, Keith.  2012.  May 10, 1869:  Golden Spike Links Nation by Rail.  Wired, October 10, 2012.  Available at:  https://www.wired.com/2010/05/0510transcontinental-railroad-completed/. Accessed April 7, 2020.

Klein, Maury.  2012.  The significance of Golden Spike Day.  Oxford University Blog, May 10, 2012.  Available at:  https://blog.oup.com/2012/05/the-significance-of-golden-spike-day/. Accessed April 7, 2020.

National Park Service.  Bernice Gibbs Anderson, Mother of the Golden Spike.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/gosp/learn/historyculture/bernice-gibbs-anderson.htm. Accessed April 7, 2020.

National Park Service.  The Last Spike:  History at a Glance.  Available at:  https://www.nps.gov/gosp/learn/historyculture/the-last-spike-history-at-a-glance.htm.  Accessed April 7, 2020.

Curt Gowdy, renowned sports broadcaster and host of the outdoor show, The American Sportsman, was born on July 31, 1919 (died 2006).  In the age before specialization in sports reporting, Gowdy sat behind the microphone for professional baseball, football and basketball games and championships, along with many college contests.

            Gowdy, however, was first and foremost an outdoorsman.  He grew up in rural Wyoming, son of the man he called the best fly-fisherman in the state.  “We had free access to primetime fishing and hunting.  The outdoors was a way of life for me.”

            He developed the idea for and hosted the long-running television sports show, ABC’s Wide World of Sports, that showcased a variety of sports during its Saturday afternoon airing.  In 1964, Gowdy filmed a segment for the show of him and famous fisherman Joe Brooks angling for brook trout in the Argentine mountains.  The segment was a hit, and almost immediately ABC created a new show built around outdoor recreation—The American Sportsman, hosted by Curt Gowdy.

            The show ran for twenty years, airing more than 200 episodes during the winter months on Sunday afternoons.  It is the most successful outdoor recreation show of all time, earning a creel full of industry awards, including four Emmys.  The show focused on fishing and hunting experiences involving Curt Gowdy and celebrities from entertainment, politics and sports.  As Gowdy remembered, people often stopped him on the street to tell him that he “started me fishing or hunting when I was a boy.”  For millions of Americans, The American Sportsman was their window on the natural world.

            Gowdy, who was called “The Cowboy” by his colleagues, was a committed conservationist. He is a member of the Conservation Hall of Fame International.  He served on the boards of directors for Trout Unlimited and the International Game Fish Association.  Convinced that the popularity of fishing was too great to sustain fish populations, he advocated for catch-and-release fishing that kept captured fish alive.

            To honor his work and memory, the State of Wyoming established the Curt Gowdy State Park in 1972.  The 11,000-acre park lies above 6450 feet in elevation.  Gowdy loved it, saying “It has two beautiful lakes, hiking trails, camping boating, fishing and beauty.  It has everything I love.  What greater honor can a man receive?”

References:

FamPeople.com.  Curt Gowdy:  biography.  Available at:  http://www.fampeople.com/cat-curt-gowdy_4.  Accessed July 31, 2017.

Michigan Sportsman.  2006.  Farewell to an American Sportsman.  Available at:  https://www.michigan-sportsman.com/forum/threads/farewell-to-an-american-sportsman.128923/page-2#post-1087518.  Accessed July 31, 2017.

Moran, Ken.  2002.  At 80, Gowdy Still The American Sportsman.  New York Post, February 3, 2002.  Available at:  http://nypost.com/2002/02/03/at-80-gowdy-still-the-american-sportsman/.  Accessed July 31, 2017.

Beatrix Potter, author of the classic children’s story, The Tale of Peter Rabbit, was born July 28, 1866.  Although she is famous for her many children’s books, which she both wrote and illustrated, she also became a leading British conservationist of the Lake District landscape.

            Potter was born and raised in London, the daughter of wealthy and socially traditional parents.  She was educated at home, raised to become a wife, mother and keeper of the household.  But Potter had other plans.  When her family vacationed during summers, first in Scotland and later in the English Lake District, she fell in love with the country.  She and he brother reveled in the rolling hills and dramatic waters of the Lake District and delighted in keeping pets of all kinds, from domestic animals to frogs and insects. 

            She was a keen observer of the animals’ appearance and habits and the landscapes in which they lived.  She wrote stories about them and drew their images in watercolor.  Her creativity was matched by the accuracy of her work.  So realistic were her drawings that she eventually produced scientific illustrations of plants and, especially, of her favorite organisms—fungi.

            Potter was also an entrepreneur.  She began writing stories and when her original story—The Tale of Peter Rabbit—was turned down by several publishers, she had 250 copies printed herself.  An insightful editor realized the quality of her work—charming, but not overly cute—and published the book in 1902 (since then, more than 5 million copies have been sold, and loved and cherished by children everywhere).  She developed and sold a doll of Peter Rabbit—the first character doll ever produced.  She also licensed and sold pottery, clothing, calendars and other book-related merchandise.  Potter wrote and illustrated 33 books in her lifetime, making her both famous and wealthy.

            She used her wealth not for luxury—her country homes never had electricity or indoor plumbing—but to conserve the countryside she loved so much.  The Lake District had always attracted tourism, but after World War I, the attention grew exponentially.  Potter knew that large-scale development of the land would destroy the fragile hillside ecosystems, a quaint combination of natural and cultivated habitats.  So, she began buying farms.  First smaller properties, including her beloved Hill Top Farm (now a museum), then larger properties that would allow a unified landscape to survive and thrive.

            Her entrepreneurial spirit spilled over into her farming.  She learned how to farm, restored the productive capacity of her lands and became an expert breeder of sheep.  Her farms and fortune prospered, even as her ability to write and publish books waned.  She was particularly dedicated to preserving the traditional Herdwick sheep, the breed that was best adapted to the cold environment and varied forage of the Lake District.

            She became a close confidant of the founders of the National Trust, the English non-profit organization that owns and manages historic properties and natural areas.  She donated all her property—15 farms totaling 4000 acres—to the National Trust, an estate valued at about $20 million at her death in 1943 ($300 millon today).   Her proviso:  that the properties remain exactly as she left them, down to the furniture and wall covering she left.  Most importantly, that proviso assured that the Lake District landscape would remain the same charming landscape that generations have loved for its natural beauty and cultural significance. 

References:

Beatrix Potter Society.  About Peatrix Potter.  Available at:  https://beatrixpottersociety.org.uk/about-beatrix/.  Accessed July 28, 2017.

Lear, Linda.  2017.  Beatrix Potter:  A Life in Nature.  Available at:  http://www.bpotter.com/Default.aspx. Accessed July 28, 2017.

National Trust.  Beatrix Potter’s early life and books.  Available at:  https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/beatrix-potter-gallery-and-hawkshead/features/beatrix-potters-early-life-and-books. Accessed July 28, 2017.

Thomson, Keith Stewart.  2007.  Marginalia:  Beatrix Potter, Conservationist.  American Scientist 95(3):210-212.  Available at:  http://www.jstor.org.prox.lib.ncsu.edu/stable/pdf/27858956.pdf?refreqid=excelsior%3Aa434bf2c67f89b4a712b13db0f7f46da. Accessed July 28, 2017.

Victoria and Albert Museum.  Biography of Beatrix Potter.  Available at:  http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/b/biography-beatrix-potter/. Accessed July 28, 2017.

On July 27, 2013, a mare of the endangered Przewalski’s horse bore the first foal produced by artificial insemination.  The young female was born at the Smithsonian Institution’s Conservation Biology Institute in Front Royal, Virginia.

            Przewalski’s horse (Equus ferus) is the only truly wild horse species left in the world.  It is native to the vast open steppes of Mongolia, China and Russia.  It is smaller than domestic horses, standing about 5 feet high at the withers, and weighing 400-600 pounds at maturity.  It is stockier than domestic horses, with short legs and neck.  Coloration is generally light brown, with dark brown lower legs and dark main and tail, which is sheds annually.  It has a double set of chromosomes which prevent effective hybridization with domestic horses.  Consequently, the species has remained distinct and was never domesticated.  Occasional specimens kept in captivity were considered great treasures in ancient times. 

            The species declined throughout the 19^th and early 20^th Centuries, owing to hunting, competition with domestic livestock and being forced into marginal arid habitats with insufficient water sources.  Collecting for zoos also damaged the populations, as the species became a prized zoo animal over the past century.  IUCN declared the species “extinct in the wild” up until 1996. 

            Collecting for zoos turned out to be the savior for the species.  About 1300 individuals exist in zoos around the world, with their genetics and other characteristics now carefully analyzed and monitored.  All horses in zoos share the same 14 ancestors, leading to concerns for loss of genetic diversity.  The Prague Zoo, in the Czech Republic, manages the official database on Przewalski’s horse genetics and has bred more than 200 foals since the 1950s. 

            With the success of captive breeding, populations were reintroduced into China and Mongolia started in the late 1980s.  Reintroductions have been successful, with now about 150 horses living freely in several small populations in its normal range.

            A huge new step in the recovery of the species occurred with the birth of the first foal fertilized by artificial insemination in 2013.  Artificial insemination is important because it allows pregnancies to be initiated without needing to transport adult animals across long distances.  It also allows strategic crosses between genetically dissimilar males and females, enhancing the overall genetic diversity of the captive and, eventually, wild populations. 

            Whereas artificial insemination is a standard practice for domestic horses, it required much research and practice before working for the wild Przewalski’s horse.  Females needed to be trained to allow repeated collection of urine so that both pre- and post-fertilization condition could be assessed.  Techniques also needed to be established to assure the successful collection and placement of male sperm.  The successful insemination and birth was finally achieved by horses and veterinarians at the Smithsonian’s conservation center in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. 

References:

IUCN Red List.  Equus ferus ssp. Przeswalskii.  Available at:  http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/full/7961/0.  Accessed July 28, 2017.

Prague Zoo.  Return of the Przewalski’s Horse to Mongolia.  Available at:  https://www.zoopraha.cz/en/animals/we-help-them-to-survive/projects/7678-return-of-the-przewalski-s-horse-to-mongolia, Accessed July 28, 2017.

San Diego Zoo Global.  2008.  Przewalski’s Horse, Equus ferus przewalski.  Available at:  http://library.sandiegozoo.org/factsheets/przewalski_horse/equus.htm. Accessed July 28, 2017.

Shenk, Emily.  2013.  First Przewalski’s Horse Born Via Artificial Insemination.  National Geographic, August 6, 2013.  Available at:  http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/13/130805-przewalski-horse-born-artificial-insemination-animal-science/. Accessed July 28, 2017.

Williams, Paige.  2016.  The Remarkable Comeback of Przewalski’s Horse.  Smithsonian.com, December 2016.  Available at:  http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/remarkable-comeback-przewalski-horse-180961142/. Accessed July 28, 2017.

The outside world was introduced to the ancient ruins of Machu Picchu when discovered by American historian Hiram Bingham on July 24, 1911.  Although several unsubstantiated claims of earlier discovery have been advanced, it remains clear and undebatable that Bingham was the “scientific discoverer of Machu Picchu.”

            Bingham was born in 1875 in Hawaii and spent his youth learning mountaineering from his missionary father.  He pursued history as a university student, eventually becoming a professor of Latin American History at Yale, where he served from 1907 to 1924.  Although not a trained archeologist, his historical knowledge and his rugged childhood made him a perfect jungle explorer.  Hiram Bingham, it appears, was a real life Indian Jones.

            He mounted an expedition in 1911 to find the so-called “Lost City of the Incas.”  On July 24 of that year, he and his guides emerged onto a plateau high in the Andean mountains to find an amazing discovery.  He wrote of that day, “…suddenly we found ourselves in the midst of a jungle-covered maze of small and large walls….Surprise followed surprise until there came the realization that we were in the midst of as wonderful ruins as any ever found in Peru.”

            Not only did he find the finest archeological site in Peru, but undoubtedly one of the finest in the world.  The ancient facility, constructed in the 15^th Century, sits atop a mountain at 8,000 feet in elevation.  More than 200 structures comprise the site, divided among stone terraces running along the cliff side.  However, this is not the Lost City of the Incas, but rather a religious and ceremonial sanctuary built by the then Incan king for his personal use.

            UNESCO declared it a World Heritage Site in 1983.  Their declaration notes “the massive yet refined architecture of Machu Picchu blends exceptional well with the stunning natural environment, with which it is intricately linked.”  Along with the architecture, the site preserves exceptional biodiversity in the enormous range of micro-climates and ecosystems, from high-elevation grasslands to cloud forests and low-elevation lowland forests.

            More than one million visitors visit the site annually.  The 70,000-acre site is regulated by the Peruvian National Institute of Natural Resources.  As tourism has risen in recent decades, in 2015the government has instituted limits (2500 visitors per day) to protect both the site and the quality of the experience.  . 

Machu Picchu stands as a testament to the idea that nature can sustain humans in virtually any setting, as long as we work with, rather than against, the natural constraints of the place.

References:

Eisner, Peter. 2009.  Who Discovered Machu Picchu?  Smithsonian Magazine, March 2009.  Available at:  http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/who-discovered-machu-picchu-52654657/.  Accessed July 24, 2017.

Encyclopedia Britannica.  Hiram Bingham.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/biography/Hiram-Bingham-American-archaeologist-and-United-States-senator.  Accessed July 24, 2017.

Romero, Simon.  2008.  The fights of Machu Picchu:  Who got there first?  New York Times, November 8, 2008.  Available at:  http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/08/world/americas/08iht-journal.1.18479442.html. Accessed July 24, 2017.

The Aswan High Dam on the Nile River began operation of July 21, 1970.  The dam is one of the largest in the world—and perhaps the most controversial dam in the world.  The Arabic name for the dam is Al-Sadd all-Ali.

            The Nile River is an essential resource to the peoples of the Nile River watershed, mostly in what is now Egypt.  Most Egyptians, 95%, live within 12 miles of the river and its diverse delta system.  Managing the massive flows of the river has always been an active part of the civilization of the region.

            Modern attempts to control the flow of the river began with the building of the Aswan Low Dam in 1902.  The dam, built by the British, was designed to control flooding and provide a more even flow of irrigation water for cotton farms in the delta.  Its height was raised twice to make it more effective, but it was still too small to produce the desired results

            Consequently, plans for a new dam, a few miles upstream, began in the 1950s.  During the Cold War, both the U.S. and England on one side and the Soviet Union on the other side competed to gain an alliance with Egypt by agreeing to pay for the dam.  However, both the U.S. and England backed out of the deal.  The Soviet Union stayed and became Egypt’s partner to help plan, build and finance the dam.

            Construction took from 1960-1968, but the official date of opening was July 21, 1970.  The dam is huge—111 meters high, 3830 meters long, and 980 meters wide at the base.  It is an embankment dam, constructed of rock, clay and dirt.  The amount used to build the dam is equal to the equivalent of 17 Great Pyramids of Giza.  The dam created Lake Nassar, one of the ten largest reservoirs in the world. 

            The Aswan High Dam has produced significant benefits for the people of Egypt.  By providing reliable irrigation water, it has doubled the annual food production of the country.  It supplies 50% of all the electricity of the nation.  River transportation has been improved, and the reduction in flooding has saved countless lives and resources.

            The controversy about the dam, however, relates to many negative impacts.  About 90,000 Egyptians were relocated, and with insufficient assistance, most became impoverished.  Annual flooding once spread highly fertile silt across the adjacent agricultural lands to the river; now, to replace those nutrients farmers must apply manufactured fertilizer.  The raising of the water table and heavy irrigation have combined to increase salt deposits in surface waters, reducing the overall quality of much cultivated land.  The permanent wetlands and shallow lake waters created by the dam have allowed the devastating disease, schistosomiasis, to spread to epidemic proportions.  Fisheries in the eastern Mediterranean Sea have declined due to increased salinity and reduced fertility of the water.

            The Aswan High Dam illustrates the dilemmas faced when humans modify the forces of nature. Today big dams like this one are generally looked down on by environmentalists, but the benefits—flood control, energy production, reliable water supply—are enormous.  Maybe Hamlet should have asked this:  To dam or not to dam—that is the question!”

References:

Encyclopedia Brittanica.  Aswan High Dam.  Available at:  https://www.britannica.com/topic/Aswan-High-Dam. Accessed July 21, 2017.

Furman, T. and L. Guertin.  Problems with the Aswan Dam.  Department of Geosciences, Penn State.  Available at:  https://courseware.e-education.psu.edu/courses/earth105new/content/lesson06/04.html.  Accessed July 21, 2017.

PBS.  Aswan High Dam.  Wonders of the World databank, Public Broadcasting System.  Available at:  http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/buildingbig/wonder/structure/aswan_high.htmlm  Accessed July 21, 2017.

Gregor Mendel, the father of modern genetics, was born on July 20, 1822 (died 1884).  Mendel grew on a family farm in what is now The Czech Republic.  His home was then part of Austria, so he is generally described as an “Austrian monk.”  His farm background made him familiar with plants and the way they changed over time—the basis for his experiments in heredity that have made his name an easy to answer trivia question.

            Mendel was an excellent pupil in early schooling and, therefore, was encouraged to continue on in school.  As well as studying science, he pursued the ministry, becoming a Catholic monk in his mid-20s.  He settled into a life of study and research at the St. Thomas Monastery in Brno (now also in The Czech Republic).

            At Brno, he began experimenting with the way traits were passed down from one generation to the next.  He used pea plants as his subject, because peas were grown in the monastery’s garden and because they had several traits that were easy to observe, like color of the peas, and grew to maturity rapidly, allowing his experiments to proceed rapidly.

            He grew tens of thousands of pea plants between 1856 and 1863.  From what he observed in generation after generation of traits, he deduced that plants had both dominant and recessive traits (green peas were dominant, yellow peas recessive) and that those traits were randomly passed on to the next generation.  Today we know the mechanism—genes—that Mendel could only hypothesize.

            In 1865, the Natural Science Society of Brno published papers by Mendel that described his data and ideas.  While I’d like to write that Mendel and his results “went viral,” the opposite happened.  He was ignored.  The data and ideas were too complicated, and leading scientists doubted that what he observed was universal.

            Mendel had other things to worry about.  He was appointed Abbot of the monastery just a few years later, a job that absorbed all his time.  His eyesight began to fail, preventing further scientific work.  He died in 1894, at age 61.

            Despite his work being ignored, Mendel was correct.  At the start of the 20^th Century, three other botanists duplicated his work and published the results again, eventually giving Mendel credit for the original discovery. 

            The understanding of how variations in nature are passed from generation to generation is crucial to the understanding of biodiversity and, hence, to conservation.   For example, we now know that a large pool of genetic diversity is essential for a species to remain adaptable to changing environmental conditions, whether caused naturally or by humans.  Scientists working to reproduce endangered species in captivity must track genetic diversity so that the adaptability of new individuals and populations isn’t compromised.

            As conservationists work to maintain endangered species or to re-introduce populations into the wild, the concepts of Mendelian genetics are always part of the strategies.  And for this reason, Gregor Mendel is as important to our history as are Charles Darwin, E. O. Wilson and Rachel Carson.

References:

Biography.com.  Gregor Mendel—Botanists, Scientist (1822-1884).  Available at:  https://www.biography.com/people/gregor-mendel-39282.  Accessed July 20, 2017.

Miko, I.  2008.  Gregor Mendel and the principles of inheritance.  Nature Education 1(1):134.  Available at:  https://www.nature.com/scitable/topicpage/gregor-mendel-and-the-principles-of-inheritance-593.  Accessed July 20, 2017.

National Institutes of Health, Office of History.  Gregor Mendel:  The Father of Modern Genetics.  Available at:  https://history.nih.gov/exhibits/nirenberg/hs1_mendel.htm.  Accessed July 20, 2017.