WEBVTT

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[sil.]

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The following program is made possible by
financial support from the Nature Company

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dedicated to improving our awareness
and appreciation of the natural world.

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And from The Bullet Foundation, the W.
A Gerboge Foundation, Burt Fingerhut,

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The Seven Springs Foundation,
Marion and Allen Hunt – Badiner

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and viewers like you. A complete list of
funders is available from KCTS Seattle.

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If we\'re to protect our future,

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we need a new attitude about the environment.
But time for study alone is past

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and the time for action is now.

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[music]

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Our threatened environment, it may
well be the issue of the 1990s.

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But for one American, it\'s been
the issue of his entire life.

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It\'s my conclusion that David Brower is one
of the giants of the century in terms of

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conservation and the emergence of the environmental
movement as a major force in American life.

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Happy Birthday to you.

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Happy birthday, dear David.

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Happy birthday to you.

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On July 1st, 1987, David
Ross Brower turned 75.

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Hundreds of long time friends and associates
gathered in San Francisco to honor him.

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To David Brower on his 75th birthday
who has just begun to fight.

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David Brower is often compared
to thorough in John Muir.

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He\'s been called a visionary
ahead of his time.

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He was a leader in establishing several of
America\'s most spectacular national parks.

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Brower\'s efforts kept dams
out of the Grand Canyon.

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He directed two of the world\'s
strongest environmental organizations.

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He\'s often made enemies but even his
critics agree that no one in this century

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has fought harder for the sake of the
earth and no one has been more effective.

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I just would like to hope that

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everybody would like the earth
as much as I learned to like it

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after my 75 year quite.

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[music]

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David Brower grew up in Berkeley,
California where he still lives.

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His mother lost her sight when
he was eight and his father

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often had trouble making ends meet. My
dad was a fighter. He had to fight,

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it was a struggle to keep four
children and have blind wife going

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with very limited income. Still the family
always tried to put a little money aside

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for a summer camping trip. I got interested
in wilderness through my family,

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my parents that took all of those
children out in wild places.

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Back then it took three days on rough and
dusty roads to reach their favorite spots,

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Yosemite and Lake Tahoe. But
the children never complained.

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We got out in the wild, we camped out, we stepped out
doors, looked at the stars and got a feeling for it

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and I never got over it. Most fun of all
where the scrambles with his father

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to the tops of high sierra peaks.

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David\'s passion for climbing began
at the age of six on this rock

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near the University of California. Later,

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he attended the University.

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He spent his spare time at Berkeley\'s cragmont rock where a young
man named Dick Leonard was revolutionizing climbing techniques.

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He came up and joined us

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in this kind of study you
might say, scientific

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exploration of how to climb safely. I
learned quite a bit new about climbing.

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We learned about dynamics ways, we
learned things that the up climbers

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had never got around to. They\'d
use very unsafe today techniques,

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they had gone under the theory that the leader has
something must not fall, Leonard didn\'t accept that

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and developed a… a very good
rock climbing curriculum.

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So we started learning how to do it safely

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and finally got to a point
where we could hold a fall

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pretty aware that occurred.

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Brower enjoyed the Berkeley rocks
but his real love was the Sierra.

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He worked for three
summers here at Echo Lake

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near Tahoe as a wilderness guide. I heard the
avenue like, July was like at home in Berkeley.

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I would love it in a while somewhere.
Back in 1933, I took my first big

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seven week backpack trip and we liked that so well that
I started out next summer for a longer than 10 weeks

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and for the first month in that trip and I
was here, we saw nobody else but each other.

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That\'s how occupied the Sierra was then.

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Along the way, the mountains beckoned.
Drawn to the call of summit and sky,

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Brower became a master climber
and made more than 31st essence

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of major Sierra peaks. One, two, three.

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Yosemite, ever since this
all inspiring valley

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and its surrounding mountains were
declared a national park a century ago,

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tourists have flocked here.

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Yosemite made David Brower a firm
believer in protecting scenic splendour.

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As a child, he came here many times.
As an adult,

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he returned to stay a while.
In the summer of 1935,

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I took leave from the candy company I was working
at and went on the next petition about Washington

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in British Columbia was a major
challenge, we didn\'t make it.

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I came back and the candy company had lost interest in me.
So I applied for work these avenue parking curriculum

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and I lucked out, I got a
job within about a week.

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Okay, $5 please. There you go. Show the
green receipt when you leave the park.

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That\'s going for seven days to come in and
out… The crowds then were about a third

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of what they are now and I
thought it was crowded then

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and the thing that amazes me is the number of
people that can come to this valley and enjoy it

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and still leave it essentially the way it was
when I know it\'s then. That\'s the idea still,

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that\'s the National Park idea, leave it as it is.
Come and look at it. Don\'t leave anything there.

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Don\'t take anything away with
you except memories of beauty.

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David worked for the Yosemite Park
and Curry company for three years

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as publicity director. I had a chance to
get very well acquainted with Ansel Adams.

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And that changed my life. His knowledge of
photography and what could be done with it

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just shaped everything I was
going to do ever after it.

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Brower made silent films promoting
the park\'s back country.

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His assignments were more fun than work

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filming hikers in summer and Yosemite\'s
Badger pass ski area in winter.

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My duty then in winter was to go up almost
every day to photograph whoever was skiing.

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And to ski with them.

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[music]

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Yosemite also offered the chance

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to perfect skills he\'d learned at cragmont
rock. Brower and friends began scaling cliffs

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once thought unclimbable. It was
just the preparation he needed

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for his most famous ascent.

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Shiprock in the Mexico was
one of the real challenges.

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There have been many, many attempts on it and it all
ended up in failure. Some of the world\'s best climbers

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had tried to conquer Shiprock. There were those
who said the peak would never be climbed.

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But in 1939, David Brower and three
companions proved them wrong.

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[music]

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For three days, they worked their way up
crumbling walls and overhangs. On the fourth,

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Brower lead the final pitch.

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[music]

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[sil.]

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When America entered World War II, expert climbers
were needed to train a division of mountain troops.

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The army made Brower an officer and
sent him to campaign in Colorado.

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These are the United States mountain
troops. Many are world\'s famous skiers

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and mountain climbers. Men from
the skies slopes of New England

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and men from the icy arrows of California, men from…
Lieutenant Brower wrote rock climbing and skiing manuals

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for the mountain troops. In the
Army, he dreamed of Ann Hass.

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They\'d met before the war when both were editors
for the University of California Press.

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We shared a very small office. She was
interested in somebody else but I was,

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I thought I would forgive and I\'m interested
in her. While Brower was in boot camp,

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Ann broke up with her boyfriend.
She let David know.

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I sent him a postcard that simply had a, it had a stop
signal on it, wrote on it with a green light on it.

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After only a short
correspondence, David proposed.

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And since I had never kissed him, it seemed
to me a little abrupt. But she consented.

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On May 1st, 1943, they were married.
We went to our first movie

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when we were to marry in two weeks and then
that was our first date so we really didn\'t,

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I married a total stranger actually.

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Then I went up to West Virginia to the West Virginia
not manuaver(ph) where we had the Seneca assault

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climbing school and there and we
trained elements of five divisions.

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[music]

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We gave them two weeks of training. They would
come in frightened with rocks, they would say,

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and that frightened me up there and about the second day of
training, they were frightening the instructors by their braveness.

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[music]

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That training was quite exciting

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.[0]shift us overseas.

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America\'s mountain troops
saw action on Reba Ridge

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in the Italian apennines

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scaling a sheer lock face, they took
its German defenders by surprise.

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The Germans thought no one could climb the
ridge that way. Brower and his fellow soldiers

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drove north through enemy lines.
As the war ended,

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the commanding general of the army group told us
all, we\'ve been through the victory in Europe.

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[music]

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The end of the war brought an abrupt
transition from military to family life,

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from combat to kitchen duty.

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Okay, waffles are ready.
They\'re getting cold.

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His recipe has changed over the years but
David\'s waffles have been a family tradition

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since he and Ann bought this house in 1946.

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[music]

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The Brower settled down in Berkeley

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and began raising children. Three boys
and a girl. But Ann sometimes felt

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David\'s real family was the Sierra Club.

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Founded by John Muir in
1892, the Sierra Club,

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a half century later was still a tiny
society of wilderness enthusiasts.

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Yet, small as it was the club
ran extensive outings programs

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encouraging people to explore
and preserve beautiful places.

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Even before the war, David Brower
was one of its most active members.

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He helped write and edit the club bulletin, organized,
lead and often filmed its wilderness high trips.

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And he shared the Sierra Club
commitment to conservation.

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I went on a high trips in California

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and at these high trips, they would
get up and give some talks on

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the country we were going through
and how beautiful it was,

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but he said that is not all,
when you enjoy something

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you take on an obligation to attempt to

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do what you can as an individual
to help protect that country.

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Following military service, David eagerly
returned to the mountains of California

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plunging even more deeply into
the work of the Sierra Club.

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If you like wilderness and the turnabout is fair play now
and then you just go to work to try to save something

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so there\'ll be some more left
for the next generation.

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The next generation of Browers learned early
to like wilderness as his parents had done

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David often took the family on camping
trips. He introduced his children to hiking,

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fishing, and, a strong dose
of Sierra Club philosophy.

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Money wasn\'t important, what was
important was contribution to the earth.

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We grew up in a house where there was no formal
religion. There was, but there was environmental ethic

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and that\'s what the talk around a table was always
environment. That\'s all my father wanted to talk about.

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In 1952, the Sierra Club began paying
Brower for his efforts. He left his job

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at the University of California Press to
become the club\'s first executive director.

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And I was delighted because he spent so
much of our evenings and our weekends

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on Sierra Club matters that I thought now he is
an employee with a, with a nine to five job.

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He certainly is going to want to do this in his
evenings, in his weekends but I was quite mistaken.

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As director, David Brower
summoned the Sierra Club

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back to the passions of its founder. John
Muir was an outspoken environmental crusader.

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He died in 1914 and without
him, the Sierra Club changed.

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Its new leaders worked
quietly behind the scenes.

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For many members, the organization became little
more than a hiking club but not for Brower.

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He was almost a fanatical
promoter of partisan,

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uh… deadly partisan, you know, a good
man in a fight to have on your side.

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His first fight came immediately.
In the early \'50s

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the Bureau of Reclamation planned
to build two power dams here

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in Utah as Dinosaur National Monument.

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Though they feared the project would ruin
a beautiful area, most conservationists

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believe the games could not be stopped.

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Brower disagreed, so did Martin Litton,
then a writer for The Los Angeles Times.

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When Dave read a column by Martin attacking
the Dinosaur Project, he picked up the phone.

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I got a call from Dave Brower

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and he wanted me to become active in
the Sierra Club which I had not joined

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and I told him that I didn\'t see
the Sierra Club was doing anything

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for… for nature wilderness environment
and I would rather be by myself.

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But he said, the club was going to change.

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Their discussions about saving dinosaur
mark the beginning of a long collaboration

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and a deep friendship. David
found another ally in this man,

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Wilderness Society
director, Howard Zahniser.

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Together, they waged a propaganda war
against the Bureau of Reclamation.

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Shall we let man and do this miracle or shall
we leave for your children and theirs?

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This friendly canyon country and
its seen wilderness rivers.

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Circulating widely, the Sierra Club film
brought volunteers and organizations aplenty

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to the anti-dam campaign. Protest
letters flooded Congress.

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Still House and Senate
subcommittees approved the dams.

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So Brower made his own film telling
the story of Hetch Hetchy,

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a once magnificent valley drowned by a dam
and warning what might happen to dinosaur.

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What you see here is what you see
in most fluctuating reservoirs

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and what no one should see in a park.
So we well do remember Hetch Hetchy

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for once it was too often.

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In Congress, reclamation fought back with
cost benefit figures supporting the project.

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But David distrusted experts quickly
before his turn to testify,

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he did some calculating of his own. He
said, those figures are completely wrong

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and I\'m going to tell them. So tomorrow, I\'m gonna
prove it to them. I said, oh, David, please don\'t.

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Those men have side rules. They know what they\'re doing.
Please, they\'ll just embarrass you. But they didn\'t.

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He confounded the pure
reclamation statistics

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and what he called his ninth grade
arithmetic, he proved them wrong.

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There are still no dams in
Dinosaur National Monument.

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Brower and Zahniser had assembled

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a powerful coalition and won a
victory few thought possible.

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Suddenly, the American conservation
movement was a force to be reckoned with.

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And yet, victory soon proved bittersweet.

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Today, in northern Arizona,

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there\'s a big dam on the Colorado River and
even now David Brower cannot look at this dam

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without feeling guilty. When
Canyon Dam was produced

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in effect through the inaction of
one man, when one person\'s actions

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that have to still win mind could have saved
it. Now never get over the feeling of loss

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because I didn\'t move.

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In 1996, the same year

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dinosaur was speared, construction began. Glen
Canyon was part of the reclamation project

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that included the dinosaur dams.

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Had Brower fought this dam, he and his powerful
allies might well have stopped it too.

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But they hadn\'t seen Glen
Canyon and unlike dinosaur,

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it wasn\'t part of the National Park System. The
Sierra Club decided not to oppose the dam.

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Shortly before this dam was
finished, David did see the place

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he hadn\'t tried to save. He saw a deep
multi-colored canyons of unequalled beauty.

00:20:20.000 --> 00:20:24.999
All of them soon to be
underwater and gone forever.

00:20:25.000 --> 00:20:29.999
Glen Canyon Dam ruined 186
miles of the Colorado River

00:20:30.000 --> 00:20:34.999
and perhaps 2,000 miles of beautiful
side canyons that can never be replaced.

00:20:35.000 --> 00:20:39.999
That is the great, greatest scenic disaster I think
of my lifetime and probably of several lifetimes.

00:20:40.000 --> 00:20:44.999
Early in his career, David Brower
understood the power of publicity.

00:20:45.000 --> 00:20:49.999
In 1960, he found a new way to
further the conservation cause.

00:20:50.000 --> 00:20:54.999
He published, \"This is the American
Earth.\" The first in a series of

00:20:55.000 --> 00:20:59.999
more than 30 exhibit format books combining
the photographs of masters like Ansel Adams

00:21:00.000 --> 00:21:04.999
and Elliot Porter with fine
literature and poetry.

00:21:05.000 --> 00:21:09.999
We wanted to get people to fall in
love with the given place or idea

00:21:10.000 --> 00:21:14.999
to then were threatening it then what they could do
about it. Brower supervised every production detail

00:21:15.000 --> 00:21:19.999
on the big books. Publishers said
such expensive books wouldn\'t sell

00:21:20.000 --> 00:21:24.999
but they did and they attracted powerful people
like Justice William O. Douglas to the Sierra Club.

00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:29.999
They were very effective books and
they had a great impact on… on people

00:21:30.000 --> 00:21:34.999
and most… most of us still have
them very proudly in our libraries.

00:21:35.000 --> 00:21:39.999
That series brought more people\'s attention

00:21:40.000 --> 00:21:44.999
to conservation to the
protection of resources

00:21:45.000 --> 00:21:49.999
and specifically to the Sierra
Club than any other single thing.

00:21:50.000 --> 00:21:54.999
[music]

00:21:55.000 --> 00:21:59.999
With the 1960s came a rising tide of support
for conservation and compared to the \'50s

00:22:00.000 --> 00:22:04.999
a quantum leap in the number of scenic
places given government protection

00:22:05.000 --> 00:22:09.999
but none were saved without a struggle.

00:22:10.000 --> 00:22:14.999
These long beaches, delicate marshes,
and rugged cliffs lie little more

00:22:15.000 --> 00:22:19.999
than an hour from San Francisco. Today,
they are part of a national seashore.

00:22:20.000 --> 00:22:24.999
Thousands of visitors come here
to view birds and wildlife

00:22:25.000 --> 00:22:29.999
or amuse themselves in the surf.
Yet, in 1960,

00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:34.999
it seemed this area might soon be
a suburb of the city by the bay.

00:22:35.000 --> 00:22:41.480
There were real estate projects growing in right along the ocean. By now, 20 years
later, more than 20 years later, I\'m sure it would have been totally developed.

00:22:50.000 --> 00:22:54.999
The Sierra Club fought hard

00:22:55.000 --> 00:22:59.999
with words and pictures
to save Point Reyes.

00:23:00.000 --> 00:23:04.999
We too must move fast. Unless we want
rubberstamp houses, row after row

00:23:05.000 --> 00:23:09.999
in our Island in time. In response,
developers lobbied furiously

00:23:10.000 --> 00:23:14.999
and continued selling real estate.
But in 1962,

00:23:15.000 --> 00:23:19.999
they had to stop. As Brower
watched, President Kennedy

00:23:20.000 --> 00:23:24.999
signed the bill creating Point Reyes
national seashore spearing its treasures

00:23:25.000 --> 00:23:29.999
for the enjoyment of all people.

00:23:30.000 --> 00:23:38.000
[sil.]

00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:44.999
On a midsummer morning, Anna and David
Brower visit the Hoover Wilderness area

00:23:45.000 --> 00:23:49.999
just east of Yosemite National Park.

00:23:50.000 --> 00:23:54.999
It used to be said of David that if you put him
down at night anywhere in these mountains,

00:23:55.000 --> 00:23:59.999
in the morning he\'d know
exactly where he was.

00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:04.999
Here we have north peak which is not named after
Oliver North. He\'s just fun to be with outdoors.

00:24:05.000 --> 00:24:09.999
I\'d much rather be out among real mountains
and surrounded by mountains of paper.

00:24:10.000 --> 00:24:14.999
And the smallest little
thing just to confess me,

00:24:15.000 --> 00:24:19.999
you think about things newly. The way you would
with a small child. These are known as very circles

00:24:20.000 --> 00:24:24.999
long before human beings began to cut and burn
philosophy of going through the environment

00:24:25.000 --> 00:24:29.999
and moving on beyond what they spoiled, the grass
is redoing it and the area behind this circle

00:24:30.000 --> 00:24:34.999
is where the grass has been and is fairly much exhausted.
The nutrients there as well as moving on from war

00:24:35.000 --> 00:24:39.999
to just experience the wildness at the
ages have made perfect, this new alike.

00:24:40.000 --> 00:24:44.999
[music]

00:24:45.000 --> 00:24:49.999
Everything we have, if we use in our everyday
life, our vision, our ears, our ability to taste,

00:24:50.000 --> 00:24:58.000
to move, to think, to love, it was
all built not in civilization

00:25:00.000 --> 00:25:04.999
but all those elements came together in wilderness in a
period when there wasn\'t anything but wilderness on earth.

00:25:05.000 --> 00:25:09.999
On September 3rd, 1964,
President Johnson signed

00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:14.999
the National Wilderness Preservation Act setting
aside nine million acres of pristine country.

00:25:15.000 --> 00:25:19.999
It was the culmination of a long
campaign in which David again

00:25:20.000 --> 00:25:24.999
played a major role. Howard
Zahniser was the leader in that

00:25:25.000 --> 00:25:29.999
and I think possibly I was
one of his chief assistance.

00:25:30.000 --> 00:25:34.999
We were talking about a wilderness bill back in the \'30s
and finally presented the first draft of a wilderness bill

00:25:35.000 --> 00:25:39.999
in the mid \'50s, nine
years later we got it.

00:25:40.000 --> 00:25:44.999
[music]

00:25:45.000 --> 00:25:49.999
Presently, 90 million acres, most of them in
Alaska are officially classified as wilderness.

00:25:50.000 --> 00:25:54.999
These are the last sanctuaries
where all generations to come

00:25:55.000 --> 00:25:59.999
can discover the American Earth
essentially as it was before Columbus.

00:26:00.000 --> 00:26:04.999
No one should be deprived of what
goes on here of a chance to see

00:26:05.000 --> 00:26:09.999
what makes it work to see the
beauty of it all hours of the day.

00:26:10.000 --> 00:26:14.999
Wilderness made us. You can\'t make it,
and we\'re gonna live here and spare it.

00:26:15.000 --> 00:26:19.999
[music]

00:26:20.000 --> 00:26:24.999
This is Stehekin landing, gateway to one
of the most magnificent wilderness areas

00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:29.999
in the United States. Here,
on a summer weekend in 1988,

00:26:30.000 --> 00:26:34.999
backpackers come by boat on route to the
rugged trails of North Cascades National Park.

00:26:35.000 --> 00:26:39.999
Dave Brower arrives here too for a reunion

00:26:40.000 --> 00:26:44.999
with some of the people who worked hard
to create the park 20 years earlier.

00:26:45.000 --> 00:26:49.999
It was a long effort. You bring bad weather.
I don\'t know why you have to do this.

00:26:50.000 --> 00:26:54.999
In a life time you came here, you rained all over
it. …good weather. I don\'t like it dry and hot.

00:26:55.000 --> 00:26:59.999
Back in 1956, Grant McConnell
was a college professor

00:27:00.000 --> 00:27:04.999
who spent summers in Stehekin. Alarmed by the
effects of mining and logging in the area,

00:27:05.000 --> 00:27:09.999
he took his concerns to David Brower.

00:27:10.000 --> 00:27:14.999
It was not a difficult matter to persuade
him that this place needed help.

00:27:15.000 --> 00:27:19.999
Fresh from his dinosaur triumph, Brower suggested
a film to show people what should be preserved.

00:27:20.000 --> 00:27:24.999
Then he brought his camera
and his oldest sons

00:27:25.000 --> 00:27:29.999
to the North Cascades.

00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:34.999
We used to always complain

00:27:35.000 --> 00:27:39.999
my brother and I because we were sort of pressing the service as
models in these movies. We\'d have to do this, the same routine

00:27:40.000 --> 00:27:44.999
three or four times to get it right.
Brower\'s boys and Grant McConnel\'s daughter

00:27:45.000 --> 00:27:49.999
stared as every child who might
someday enjoy these mountains.

00:27:50.000 --> 00:27:54.999
Up above the tree, reaches high
up the clouds where the flowers

00:27:55.000 --> 00:27:59.999
takes its summer winds and beauty

00:28:00.000 --> 00:28:04.999
and the summer rain too.

00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:09.999
They will want to discover themselves, the
wildness of the ages that made perfect.

00:28:10.000 --> 00:28:14.999
I myself show that film

00:28:15.000 --> 00:28:19.999
at least 100 times and always had large
audiences that were just enthralled with it

00:28:20.000 --> 00:28:24.999
and I was always convinced that they were
going right home to write their congressman.

00:28:25.000 --> 00:28:29.999
The battle continued into the \'60s.

00:28:30.000 --> 00:28:34.999
Timber and mining companies
proved powerful adversaries.

00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:39.999
As government hearings on approached, Brower looked
for yet another way to persuade a reluctant Congress.

00:28:40.000 --> 00:28:44.999
He wanted a book desperately

00:28:45.000 --> 00:28:49.999
so he called me on the phone one day and said, \"Harvey,
you\'re gonna write a book and I got to have it in 30 days.\"

00:28:50.000 --> 00:28:54.999
\"The Wild Cascades\" was given to every
member of Congress to show the Congress

00:28:55.000 --> 00:28:59.999
when exactly what was at stake in the North Cascades
and I can\'t help but think that had a major impact.

00:29:00.000 --> 00:29:04.999
One of the principle savior
of this country. All right.

00:29:05.000 --> 00:29:09.999
Yes. (inaudible). After 12 years of effort

00:29:10.000 --> 00:29:14.999
Congress created North
Cascades National Park.

00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:19.999
Without Dave, it wouldn\'t be a park. He knew the
national organization. He knew all, he knew everybody

00:29:20.000 --> 00:29:24.999
and if he decided that there were, what\'s
to be done, he knew what buttons to push

00:29:25.000 --> 00:29:29.999
and how to push them in
and… and get things going.

00:29:30.000 --> 00:29:34.999
At the same time as the Sierra Club was defending the
North Cascades, there was a stretch of the Colorado River

00:29:35.000 --> 00:29:39.999
that was still wild but there was also a man in
a powerful position who wanted to change that.

00:29:40.000 --> 00:29:44.999
I would develop every
possible hydroelectric cycle

00:29:45.000 --> 00:29:49.999
all over the United States. In
1963, the year Glen Canyon Dam

00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:54.999
was completed, commissioner
of Reclamation Floyd Dominy

00:29:55.000 --> 00:29:59.999
announced plans to build two more power
dams on the Colorado. This time,

00:30:00.000 --> 00:30:04.999
in the Grand Canyon itself.
Horrified Brower attacked.

00:30:05.000 --> 00:30:09.999
His first weapon was a book
of stunning photographs

00:30:10.000 --> 00:30:14.999
lamenting the death of Glen Canyon and warning
that Grand Canyon dams would do irreparable damage

00:30:15.000 --> 00:30:19.999
to one of the wonders of the world. He
sent a copy to interior secretary Udall,

00:30:20.000 --> 00:30:24.999
Floyd Dominy superior. I was
working for Stewart Udall

00:30:25.000 --> 00:30:29.999
when the book place nobody knew arrived a lot over
the pictures of what was in Glen Canyon such as had

00:30:30.000 --> 00:30:34.999
in the almost wept and he said, you know, I was in Congress
when we voted for the staff. We had no idea what was there.

00:30:35.000 --> 00:30:39.999
But Floyd Dominy countered

00:30:40.000 --> 00:30:44.999
with the film celebrating the
reservoir that replaced Glen Canyon.

00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:49.999
Most noted of all, Lake Powell has to offer

00:30:50.000 --> 00:30:54.999
of a strange and haunting side canyons
where light, shadow and colors

00:30:55.000 --> 00:30:59.999
dance about winding ribbons of blue water.
Almost never seen

00:31:00.000 --> 00:31:04.999
before Lake Powell was born. The side canyons
are now open to voters and explorers.

00:31:05.000 --> 00:31:09.999
Recreation for the many

00:31:10.000 --> 00:31:14.999
Dominy told Stewart Udall more than
compensated for the loss of the wilderness

00:31:15.000 --> 00:31:19.999
accessible only to the few. Dave Brower days
of bar talks about the land nobody knew.

00:31:20.000 --> 00:31:24.999
And that\'s right, nobody knew it and
nobody would ever know it, really.

00:31:25.000 --> 00:31:29.999
Now we get two million
visitors up there every year.

00:31:30.000 --> 00:31:34.999
It\'s a, it\'s a marvelous lake. At first,
you\'d all endorse the Grand Canyon dams

00:31:35.000 --> 00:31:39.999
so did President Johnson and the congressional
delegations of every western state

00:31:40.000 --> 00:31:44.999
never had the Sierra Club
face so powerful a foe.

00:31:45.000 --> 00:31:49.999
One of the posters this year the club
would have is a poster of Mount Everest.

00:31:50.000 --> 00:31:54.999
In the bottom of that poster up at the
lines from Gerda(ph). Whatever you can do

00:31:55.000 --> 00:31:59.999
or dream you can, begin it.
Boldness has genius power

00:32:00.000 --> 00:32:04.999
and magic in it. Boldly with
full page newspaper ads,

00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:09.999
Brower charged that one of the proposed dams
would inundate Grand Canyon National Park.

00:32:10.000 --> 00:32:14.999
There is no other Grand Canyon

00:32:15.000 --> 00:32:19.999
and the Grand Canyon\'s highest purpose
is for it all to be protected

00:32:20.000 --> 00:32:24.999
for all people forever. Dave Brower
deliberately has let the talk.

00:32:25.000 --> 00:32:29.999
He had people believe in we\'re going to have a
lake at Grand Canyon National Park after the brim

00:32:30.000 --> 00:32:34.999
but he knew that and he did it.
Technically, Dominy was correct.

00:32:35.000 --> 00:32:39.999
Most of the flooding would have occurred in areas
of the Grand Canyon outside the National Park

00:32:40.000 --> 00:32:44.999
but the living Colorado, the
wild river that dug this chasm

00:32:45.000 --> 00:32:49.999
would be silenced forever.

00:32:50.000 --> 00:32:54.999
Public opposition to the Grand Canyon dams mounted
and when proponents argued that a reservoir

00:32:55.000 --> 00:32:59.999
in the canyon would offer an easier access to
its glories, Brower responded with a vengeance.

00:33:00.000 --> 00:33:04.999
He ran more newspaper ads
ridiculing the plan.

00:33:05.000 --> 00:33:09.999
The resulting torrent of public protests
swamped the Bureau of Reclamation.

00:33:10.000 --> 00:33:14.999
It did stampede a lot of people.

00:33:15.000 --> 00:33:19.999
I\'m sure it made many members of Congress reluctant
to go against the tons of mail overflowing

00:33:20.000 --> 00:33:24.999
and even though they knew, yeah, that was
inspired mail from a fault point of view.

00:33:25.000 --> 00:33:29.999
In the end, you\'d all declared
his opposition to the dams

00:33:30.000 --> 00:33:34.999
and in the Grand Canyon, the
Colorado River still runs free.

00:33:35.000 --> 00:33:39.999
One of the most important things for any
public official is to be open minded

00:33:40.000 --> 00:33:44.999
and Brower helped me see things in a
different light. And in that sense

00:33:45.000 --> 00:33:49.999
I mean is that no question about it.
The Grand Canyon, saved.

00:33:50.000 --> 00:33:54.999
The North Cascades, saved. Concurrently

00:33:55.000 --> 00:33:59.999
the Sierra Club lead a third epic campaign.

00:34:00.000 --> 00:34:04.999
These are redwoods, the tallest
living things in the world

00:34:05.000 --> 00:34:09.999
towering more than 300
feet when fully mature.

00:34:10.000 --> 00:34:14.999
In the mid \'60s,

00:34:15.000 --> 00:34:19.999
when Martin Litton was travel editor of Sunset
Magazine, the largest surviving redwood grows

00:34:20.000 --> 00:34:24.999
remain vulnerable to logging. You
couldn\'t visit the redwood country

00:34:25.000 --> 00:34:29.999
without being just destroyed
by what was going on there.

00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:38.000
[music]

00:34:40.000 --> 00:34:44.999
The redwoods were being pulled down as if a giant
lawnmower was going over the entire region.

00:34:45.000 --> 00:34:49.999
The chainsaws were ripping through the remaining forests and we knew
there would soon be nothing left worthy of the readwood forests name.

00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:54.999
Throughout the \'60s, the Sierra
Club fought to wind protection

00:34:55.000 --> 00:34:59.999
for remaining redwood forests. We
uh… finally got various congressmen

00:35:00.000 --> 00:35:04.999
to introduce bills to create
a Redwood National Park

00:35:05.000 --> 00:35:09.999
but always somewhat smaller because they were listening
to the longer is who knew that the park was coming.

00:35:10.000 --> 00:35:14.999
Meanwhile the world\'s
tallest trees were falling.

00:35:15.000 --> 00:35:19.999
Frantically, the Sierra Club
lobbied to save Redwood Creek,

00:35:20.000 --> 00:35:24.999
the largest uncut stand of giant trees.

00:35:25.000 --> 00:35:29.999
So Dave would set up meetings with the secretary of
interior and we would make these flights back to Washington

00:35:30.000 --> 00:35:34.999
uh… over and over again, it seems
that we went every… every or so

00:35:35.000 --> 00:35:39.999
during the heat of the battle to
impose our feelings on the secretary

00:35:40.000 --> 00:35:44.999
and have him move to our side.
For a week at least in 1968,

00:35:45.000 --> 00:35:49.999
David Brower must have felt
like he was on top of the world

00:35:50.000 --> 00:35:54.999
that fall President Johnson signed a
giant Southwest water and power bill

00:35:55.000 --> 00:35:59.999
excluding the Grand Canyon dams. Two
days later, Johnson gave his approval

00:36:00.000 --> 00:36:04.999
to read boards and North Cascades
National Parks. Redwoods will stand…

00:36:05.000 --> 00:36:09.999
Each conservation victory came
in some measure as a result of

00:36:10.000 --> 00:36:14.999
David Brower\'s tenacity. There
had to be a uh… leadership

00:36:15.000 --> 00:36:19.999
that was essentially very hard nosed and
very uncompromising uh… in order to achieve

00:36:20.000 --> 00:36:24.999
the results that were achieved.
And if Brower hadn\'t have done it

00:36:25.000 --> 00:36:29.999
uh… there might have been
some very serious failures.

00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:34.999
Yet, David enjoyed but a brief moment in
the sun, the uncompromising qualities

00:36:35.000 --> 00:36:39.999
in all out campaigns that produced
victories in Washington brought a backlash

00:36:40.000 --> 00:36:44.999
in the Sierra Club itself. I disagreed
with him at the time because I thought

00:36:45.000 --> 00:36:49.999
his tactics were getting a little bit

00:36:50.000 --> 00:36:54.999
uh… shrill and confrontationist.

00:36:55.000 --> 00:36:59.999
By the late 1960s, Brower in a majority
of the Sierra Club\'s board of directors

00:37:00.000 --> 00:37:04.999
were going in opposite directions.

00:37:05.000 --> 00:37:09.999
But principle problem was that Dave
found so strongly that you had to save

00:37:10.000 --> 00:37:14.999
everything on earth, you have to…

00:37:15.000 --> 00:37:19.999
it didn\'t matter how much
money you\'ve spent on it.

00:37:20.000 --> 00:37:24.999
Sierra Club membership and prestige
mushroomed under Brower\'s tenure but its debt

00:37:25.000 --> 00:37:29.999
was expanding too dangerously so in the
minds of some of his closest friends.

00:37:30.000 --> 00:37:34.999
At the time that we have first
proposed that he be fired, Ansel Adams

00:37:35.000 --> 00:37:39.999
and I went to him and told him, we
said, Dave we admire you immensely

00:37:40.000 --> 00:37:44.999
what you\'re trying to do. But
you just can\'t do it that way.

00:37:45.000 --> 00:37:49.999
The board put a repeated restrictions
on Dave and Dave just forgot them.

00:37:50.000 --> 00:37:54.999
He decided to launch a great new campaign
for what he called Earth National Park.

00:37:55.000 --> 00:37:59.999
Extend the national park idea to
the whole earth. Unfortunately,

00:38:00.000 --> 00:38:04.999
he neglected to tell the board. Without
permission, Brower spent $15,000

00:38:05.000 --> 00:38:09.999
to run this ad in The New York Times.

00:38:10.000 --> 00:38:14.999
I should have told that (inaudible) whose names
are attached to the ad that it was coming out

00:38:15.000 --> 00:38:19.999
so that they would not hear
about it first from reporters.

00:38:20.000 --> 00:38:24.999
I sent Dave Brower a
telegram suspending him from

00:38:25.000 --> 00:38:29.999
any physical authority for the Sierra Club.
Brower and the board

00:38:30.000 --> 00:38:34.999
fought over issues as well as money.
These are the Nipomo sand dunes

00:38:35.000 --> 00:38:39.999
near San Luis Obispo, California.
During the \'60s

00:38:40.000 --> 00:38:44.999
that the civic Gas and Electric Company
wanted to build a nuclear power plant here.

00:38:45.000 --> 00:38:49.999
To save the dunes, the Sierra Club or proposed
an alternative site called Diablo Canyon.

00:38:50.000 --> 00:38:54.999
The Sierra Club and PG and E

00:38:55.000 --> 00:38:59.999
did agree that if they move from the dunes
to this other site at Diablo Canyon,

00:39:00.000 --> 00:39:04.999
the Sierra Club would approve of it.

00:39:05.000 --> 00:39:09.999
But Brower objected because Diablo Canyon was one of the
last remaining wild stretches of California coastline.

00:39:10.000 --> 00:39:14.999
Dave ended up defying the board. He stayed,

00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:19.999
even though, he was the board\'s employee as executive
director, he stayed on the side of saving the coast

00:39:20.000 --> 00:39:24.999
from the Diablo Canyon power plant.
A majority of board members felt

00:39:25.000 --> 00:39:29.999
the club should honor its agreement with PG and E
right or wrong. So Dave ran for the board himself

00:39:30.000 --> 00:39:34.999
as part of a slate of candidates who
oppose the Diablo Canyon nuclear site.

00:39:35.000 --> 00:39:39.999
And if we had one, we were to
change the Sierra Club\'s position.

00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:44.999
He and his entire slate lost
and he even resigned from

00:39:45.000 --> 00:39:49.999
his job as executive director.
On May 3rd, 1969,

00:39:50.000 --> 00:39:54.999
the sierra club directors voted ten
to five to accept his resignation.

00:39:55.000 --> 00:39:59.999
I put everything I could into the Sierra Club
and I… I was quite upset about it actually.

00:40:00.000 --> 00:40:04.999
There are a lot of tears in the audience
that day. Grown men were crying.

00:40:05.000 --> 00:40:09.999
Brower himself wasted no time on tears.
In the fall of 1969,

00:40:10.000 --> 00:40:14.999
he announced the formation of a new environmental
organization called Friends of the Earth.

00:40:15.000 --> 00:40:19.999
In his final years as its executive
director, Brower had become convinced

00:40:20.000 --> 00:40:24.999
that the Sierra Club\'s
aims were too limited.

00:40:25.000 --> 00:40:29.999
His emphases changed from preservation
of wild places to broader issues

00:40:30.000 --> 00:40:34.999
like overpopulation and pollution. His
idea was that friends of the Earth

00:40:35.000 --> 00:40:39.999
should confront these global
threats to the environment.

00:40:40.000 --> 00:40:44.999
It was an idea whose time soon came.

00:40:45.000 --> 00:40:49.999
A quarter century into the great
post World War II industrial boom,

00:40:50.000 --> 00:40:54.999
Americans were awakening to
its unwelcome side effects.

00:40:55.000 --> 00:40:59.999
Smog filled cities, traffic clogged
freeways, contaminated waters.

00:41:00.000 --> 00:41:04.999
Pristine beaches blackened by oil

00:41:05.000 --> 00:41:09.999
shockingly symbolized an
emerging ecological crisis.

00:41:10.000 --> 00:41:14.999
[music]

00:41:15.000 --> 00:41:19.999
The first Earth day in 1970

00:41:20.000 --> 00:41:24.999
brought teachings and
demonstrations across the country.

00:41:25.000 --> 00:41:29.999
The early \'70s were very exciting
period as the public began to catch on.

00:41:30.000 --> 00:41:34.999
[sil.]

00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:39.999
Under Brower\'s leadership, Friends of
the Earth took on dozens of issues,

00:41:40.000 --> 00:41:44.999
grew to include thousands of members and
more than 20 countries and with Greenpeace

00:41:45.000 --> 00:41:49.999
formed the cutting edge of a
new environmental activism.

00:41:50.000 --> 00:41:54.999
Friends of the Earth led the way into areas where the, where the
environmental movement as it\'s now called conservation movement

00:41:55.000 --> 00:41:59.999
whatever had never been before. The
Alaska pipeline caused us to run head on

00:42:00.000 --> 00:42:04.999
into the automobile industry and petroleum industry
which was new. Fighting nuclear power plants

00:42:05.000 --> 00:42:09.999
was something that conservation groups
had not done that until that time.

00:42:10.000 --> 00:42:14.999
Things like that over and over again started
with Dave. Brower continued to lobby Congress.

00:42:15.000 --> 00:42:19.999
His efforts were instrumental in defeating
projects he considered environmentally unsound.

00:42:20.000 --> 00:42:24.999
[music]

00:42:25.000 --> 00:42:29.999
As he had in the Sierra Club, he once again
used publishing to get the word out.

00:42:30.000 --> 00:42:34.999
He looked for energetic young people with
creative ideas turning them into authors.

00:42:35.000 --> 00:42:39.999
Nowadays, Mark Terry directs an
alternative school in Seattle.

00:42:40.000 --> 00:42:44.999
Back while Terry was still a student
teacher, he suggested at a conference

00:42:45.000 --> 00:42:49.999
that environmental principles should be taught in schools.
Dave Brower heard Terry suggestion and approached him.

00:42:50.000 --> 00:42:54.999
And Brower\'s idea was that
I should write a text

00:42:55.000 --> 00:42:59.999
on environmental education and before
I knew it I had a literary agent

00:43:00.000 --> 00:43:04.999
and a publisher and a book contract, I\'m sure I would not
have written the book if it hadn\'t been for Dave Brower.

00:43:05.000 --> 00:43:09.999
Surrounded by activists half
his age, Brower felt refuel.

00:43:10.000 --> 00:43:14.999
He planned a track in the high
Himalayas and began preparing for it

00:43:15.000 --> 00:43:19.999
instead of driving to work, he walked two miles to the
Berkeley BART station and took the train across the bay.

00:43:20.000 --> 00:43:24.999
[music]

00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:29.999
In San Francisco, he walked to his office

00:43:30.000 --> 00:43:34.999
reversing the process in the evening.
What I did was decided

00:43:35.000 --> 00:43:39.999
to… to put more miles on our boots
and fewer on my welding tires

00:43:40.000 --> 00:43:44.999
and in the course of 10 months getting in shape, I\'d
lost 25 pounds. I\'d save $3,000 in parking fees,

00:43:45.000 --> 00:43:49.999
bridge fees and gas, wear and tear on
the car and I was feeling very good,

00:43:50.000 --> 00:43:54.999
I could go uphill and keep a mile in. It\'s
a very good mass transportation device,

00:43:55.000 --> 00:43:59.999
the human foot, we should use it more.
For a month in the summer of 1976,

00:44:00.000 --> 00:44:04.999
He shouldered his pack across
17,000 foot passes in Nepal.

00:44:05.000 --> 00:44:09.999
As leader of Friends of the Earth, Brower often
found himself working with former associates

00:44:10.000 --> 00:44:14.999
from the Sierra Club. Their differences
soon seemed less important

00:44:15.000 --> 00:44:19.999
than the common concerns they shared.
In 1972,

00:44:20.000 --> 00:44:24.999
they elected me an honorary vice president which was
a… a very flattering thing for them to have done,

00:44:25.000 --> 00:44:29.999
flattering to me and then in 1977,

00:44:30.000 --> 00:44:34.999
they gave me the a John Muir award which is
the highest award the Sierra Club gives.

00:44:35.000 --> 00:44:39.999
As the \'70s drew to a close, Brower\'s environmental
achievements were widely recognized.

00:44:40.000 --> 00:44:44.999
His congressman, Ron Dellums nominated
him for the Nobel Peace Prize.

00:44:45.000 --> 00:44:49.999
He received honorary degrees
and other commendations.

00:44:50.000 --> 00:44:54.999
The purity of the vision and the clarity of
the voice is something that we deeply need.

00:44:55.000 --> 00:44:59.999
And with the \'80s, he found
a new goliath to confront.

00:45:00.000 --> 00:45:04.999
[music]

00:45:05.000 --> 00:45:09.999
Superpowers and smaller nations were
racing to expand their atomic arsenals.

00:45:10.000 --> 00:45:14.999
Convinced that the proliferation
of nuclear weapons

00:45:15.000 --> 00:45:19.999
pose the most immediate and
serious threat to the earth,

00:45:20.000 --> 00:45:24.999
Brower urged fellow environmentalists
to join forces with the peace movement.

00:45:25.000 --> 00:45:29.999
His new message was not
universally applauded,

00:45:30.000 --> 00:45:34.999
elected to the Sierra Club Board in
1983, he moved that the club make

00:45:35.000 --> 00:45:39.999
the arms race a priority for action. He was badly out voted and
he was running into resistance at Friends of the Earth as well.

00:45:40.000 --> 00:45:44.999
He always seemed to be
fighting with the board

00:45:45.000 --> 00:45:49.999
over one thing or another. A lot of times it was about
money. Friends of the Earth seem like it was always broke.

00:45:50.000 --> 00:45:54.999
By 1985, Friends of the
Earth with a large staff

00:45:55.000 --> 00:45:59.999
but a small and dwindling membership
was half a million dollars in debt.

00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:04.999
Dave\'s answer was always to add
more, do more, spend more money.

00:46:05.000 --> 00:46:09.999
More important than being in a black is having the
earth that you\'re supposed to protect in the green.

00:46:10.000 --> 00:46:14.999
Eventual uh… there came a point when the board said
we\'ve gotta stop. We\'re running up too much debt,

00:46:15.000 --> 00:46:19.999
we\'ve got to cut back on expenses,
we\'ve got to cut back on staff

00:46:20.000 --> 00:46:24.999
and Dave was adamant against that and
he was adamant against any cuts at all.

00:46:25.000 --> 00:46:29.999
Bitter deep divisions followed. The
board desperate to reduce the debt

00:46:30.000 --> 00:46:34.999
voted two close Friends of the
Earth\'s large San Francisco office,

00:46:35.000 --> 00:46:39.999
terminate many staff positions and move all
administrative operations to Washington D.C.

00:46:40.000 --> 00:46:44.999
Furious Brower urged the
membership to recall the board.

00:46:45.000 --> 00:46:49.999
It was a close election, Dave\'s
side didn\'t prevail and…

00:46:50.000 --> 00:46:54.999
he felt the need to… to move
on after that and to not stay

00:46:55.000 --> 00:46:59.999
with Friends of the Earth. Brower had led
the Sierra Club to national prominence

00:47:00.000 --> 00:47:04.999
and been rejected by it. He had founded
Friends of the Earth and been rejected by it.

00:47:05.000 --> 00:47:09.999
But afterwards, the Sierra
Club welcomed him back

00:47:10.000 --> 00:47:14.999
while at Friends of the Earth, time is erasing the
anger. Dave\'s contributions have been immense.

00:47:15.000 --> 00:47:19.999
All of us have been inspired by him and the
fact that Friends of the Earth is still here

00:47:20.000 --> 00:47:24.999
is testament to his work and his vision.
And I\'ll have a tank rare martini

00:47:25.000 --> 00:47:29.999
straight up with nothing it. Through with Friends
of the Earth, Brower still wasn\'t ready to retire.

00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:34.999
Today, he leads yet another organization,

00:47:35.000 --> 00:47:39.999
Earth Island Institute in San Francisco, an
umbrella for dozens of environmental projects.

00:47:40.000 --> 00:47:44.999
Earth Island Institute was formed with

00:47:45.000 --> 00:47:49.999
the general idea of being an international conservation
action organization. Take a look at some of the more

00:47:50.000 --> 00:47:54.999
pressing world conservation files
providing ideas of what people could do

00:47:55.000 --> 00:47:59.999
so that people could see that
their consumption of fast food,

00:48:00.000 --> 00:48:04.999
hamburgers, affects tropical rain
forests or their purchases of styrofoam

00:48:05.000 --> 00:48:09.999
affect world climate and Dave Brower\'s
strength has always been to see the connection

00:48:10.000 --> 00:48:14.999
between issues, reaching ahead to find a
new area, to identify the new problems.

00:48:15.000 --> 00:48:19.999
And reaching out wherever
he is to convince others.

00:48:20.000 --> 00:48:24.999
Are there any of our political leaders who are…
are really concerned about environmental issues?

00:48:25.000 --> 00:48:29.999
The big problem is that the environmental movement has an organized well enough to
make it possible for the people in political life to be strong environmentalist.

00:48:30.000 --> 00:48:34.999
That\'s our opportunity. We
have to make a major change,

00:48:35.000 --> 00:48:39.999
environmental organizations would be right at the front
of it and so as those interested in social justice

00:48:40.000 --> 00:48:44.999
and in ending the arms race which is of course
the greatest environmental threat of all.

00:48:45.000 --> 00:48:49.999
I\'m a biased advocate, I\'m
making the nuclear arms race

00:48:50.000 --> 00:48:54.999
a… a priority at the Sierra Club. so if I\'m not
voted but I… I\'ve have been outvoted before

00:48:55.000 --> 00:48:59.999
and I feel so normal that I don\'t
know what would happen if I run.

00:49:00.000 --> 00:49:04.999
I just thought when we did those
terrible things after World War II

00:49:05.000 --> 00:49:09.999
that we would never again see
that kind of all impact us.

00:49:10.000 --> 00:49:14.999
In 1987, David underwent cancer surgery.

00:49:15.000 --> 00:49:19.999
He recuperated by launching still
another environmental crusade.

00:49:20.000 --> 00:49:24.999
For the rest of my days, I\'m going to be working very
hard and looking for security in restoring the earth

00:49:25.000 --> 00:49:29.999
and passing on to the next generation something that\'s
resembles a little bit like but the inheritance.

00:49:30.000 --> 00:49:34.999
Restoring the earth, that\'s what these
volunteers in Los Angeles are attempting.

00:49:35.000 --> 00:49:39.999
LA\'s Tree People have planted
millions of seedlings.

00:49:40.000 --> 00:49:44.999
Tree people is one of dozens
of organizations that reforest

00:49:45.000 --> 00:49:49.999
cities and health sides, revitalize wildlife
habitat, clean up rivers and lakes.

00:49:50.000 --> 00:49:54.999
We need to restore a lot
of the places that our

00:49:55.000 --> 00:49:59.999
civilization has impaired or destroyed in the last two
and a half centuries of the Industrial Revolution.

00:50:00.000 --> 00:50:04.999
It\'s been a big party
but our growth has been

00:50:05.000 --> 00:50:09.999
based primarily on environmental impairment and it seems to
me that we shouldn\'t base our growth for the next century

00:50:10.000 --> 00:50:14.999
based that on earth\'s duration.
Brower applauds local efforts

00:50:15.000 --> 00:50:19.999
like those of tree people but here it is a
national commitment to environmental restoration

00:50:20.000 --> 00:50:24.999
fully funded and made possible
by cuts in the defense budget.

00:50:25.000 --> 00:50:29.999
They have a big investment, very
costly but not nearly so costly

00:50:30.000 --> 00:50:34.999
as our feeling to do that. We have
been borrowing from our children,

00:50:35.000 --> 00:50:39.999
we\'ve been stealing from our children and
this is the way to start paying back.

00:50:40.000 --> 00:50:44.999
One place he still hopes to see restored
to its former glory is Hatch Hatchy.

00:50:45.000 --> 00:50:49.999
This Yosemite like valley was flooded by a
dam. Hatch Hatchy provides water and power

00:50:50.000 --> 00:50:54.999
to San Francisco but Brower believes
the city can tap alternative sources.

00:50:55.000 --> 00:50:59.999
And it probably be two or three centuries
before you could lose all signs

00:51:00.000 --> 00:51:04.999
of the fact there\'s been a dam and reservoir
here but you\'d get a very satisfactory

00:51:05.000 --> 00:51:09.999
draws within 25 to 50 years and you
could certainly begin to use it

00:51:10.000 --> 00:51:14.999
and enjoy it without having to crowd
it the way Yosemity\'s crowed.

00:51:15.000 --> 00:51:19.999
Just east of Yosemite,

00:51:20.000 --> 00:51:24.999
there\'s a place called Mono Lake.
It\'s a strange place,

00:51:25.000 --> 00:51:29.999
a sheet of blue in the middle of a desert.
In the fight to save this lake

00:51:30.000 --> 00:51:34.999
lies perhaps the meaning
of David Brower\'s life.

00:51:35.000 --> 00:51:39.999
[sil.]

00:51:40.000 --> 00:51:44.999
Mono was a salt lake, far
saltier than the ocean.

00:51:45.000 --> 00:51:49.999
Only tiny Brian shrimp harvested
and sold as tropical fish food

00:51:50.000 --> 00:51:54.999
can survive in these waters.

00:51:55.000 --> 00:51:59.999
[sil.]

00:52:00.000 --> 00:52:04.999
But the shrimp and the brine flies that live
on shore provide food for millions of birds

00:52:05.000 --> 00:52:09.999
during their annual migrations.

00:52:10.000 --> 00:52:14.999
Mono Lake has always been one of David
Brower\'s favorite places. Ansel Adama like it,

00:52:15.000 --> 00:52:19.999
I liked it, we all liked it.
And then we suddenly decided

00:52:20.000 --> 00:52:24.999
that we had to give it up. In
1941, a thirsty Los Angeles

00:52:25.000 --> 00:52:29.999
began diverting the streams that flow into
Mono Lake and the lake started drying up.

00:52:30.000 --> 00:52:34.999
By the mid \'70s, Mono was dying.

00:52:35.000 --> 00:52:39.999
As the lake fell, it grew saltier.
Ecologists feared it would soon be too salty

00:52:40.000 --> 00:52:44.999
even for brine shrimp and the
birds deprived of their food

00:52:45.000 --> 00:52:49.999
would return here only to starve. They\'re seemed
hopeless that didn\'t seen beyond anything we could do

00:52:50.000 --> 00:52:54.999
about fighting the power of that great city.
But a few young activists felt differently.

00:52:55.000 --> 00:52:59.999
My name is George and I represent
the Mono Lake committee.

00:53:00.000 --> 00:53:04.999
We are an environmental organization
dedicated slowly to saving this lake.

00:53:05.000 --> 00:53:09.999
Ten years ago, a handful of people began a campaign
to stop Los Angeles from taking MONO\'s water.

00:53:10.000 --> 00:53:14.999
Dave Brower was one of the few who said,

00:53:15.000 --> 00:53:19.999
\"You\'re up against a very tough
fight, you\'re up against a goliath

00:53:20.000 --> 00:53:24.999
but you can do it.\" He was
also an important player

00:53:25.000 --> 00:53:29.999
and getting us started in ligation.
Brower was eager to help.

00:53:30.000 --> 00:53:34.999
For him, Mono Lake was the earthen microcosm, an
ecosystem threatened by human values gone awry.

00:53:35.000 --> 00:53:39.999
We lose Mono Lakes, we\'ll lose lots of
other beautiful places unless we decide

00:53:40.000 --> 00:53:44.999
somewhere along the line, we don\'t have
to overload the earth with people,

00:53:45.000 --> 00:53:49.999
not with those people who are here
after to have more and more things.

00:53:50.000 --> 00:53:54.999
They go through life and what they would call progress.
And if you like a bumper sticker, these are free.

00:53:55.000 --> 00:53:59.999
You can drive all over the country,
tell the people about Mono Lake.

00:54:00.000 --> 00:54:04.999
The Mono Lake committee now has 12,000
members, their message is a simple one.

00:54:05.000 --> 00:54:09.999
If Los Angeles conserves
water, Mono Lake need not die.

00:54:10.000 --> 00:54:14.999
Water conservation is the most
obvious, it\'s the most cost effective

00:54:15.000 --> 00:54:19.999
solution for Mono lake and
for the city of Los Angeles.

00:54:20.000 --> 00:54:24.999
I think that your training period
here at the Mono Lake visitor center

00:54:25.000 --> 00:54:29.999
is going to be just one of the best things that
could ever happen in modifying whatever you thought

00:54:30.000 --> 00:54:34.999
you were going to do to make a lot of money and this is something
else that makes a lot of difference for the next generation.

00:54:35.000 --> 00:54:39.999
I think, that\'s the
terribly important thing…

00:54:40.000 --> 00:54:44.999
These volunteers are winning support
and changing public policy.

00:54:45.000 --> 00:54:49.999
Los Angeles still takes water from Mono\'s
inlet streams but recent court rulings

00:54:50.000 --> 00:54:54.999
have forced the city to
reduce its diversions.

00:54:55.000 --> 00:54:59.999
When all the court rulings are finally resolved we\'re
quite aware that we will probably lose some water

00:55:00.000 --> 00:55:04.999
to Mono Lake and out of the aqueduct
system from the Mono Basin.

00:55:05.000 --> 00:55:09.999
I\'m optimistic about the future of Mono Lake for various
reasons that the young people I\'ve seen working for,

00:55:10.000 --> 00:55:14.999
the older people I\'ve seen working for. The Los Angeles
itself is beginning to question the virtue of growth.

00:55:15.000 --> 00:55:19.999
It\'s something that is
absolutely not sustainable.

00:55:20.000 --> 00:55:24.999
So we\'re getting a greenhouse effect, we\'re losing
ozone layer, we have acid rain, we\'re losing species.

00:55:25.000 --> 00:55:29.999
Each of us with our taste, our
demands, our appetites resources

00:55:30.000 --> 00:55:34.999
multiplied by five billion at this point
is something the earth cannot stand.

00:55:35.000 --> 00:55:39.999
For David Brower, the work continues.

00:55:40.000 --> 00:55:44.999
Human beings have come a long way but they got
a long way to go and we should leave them

00:55:45.000 --> 00:55:49.999
enough to sustain the generations still to come
and not preclude them and not take any steps

00:55:50.000 --> 00:55:54.999
to spoil a magnificent, we
have a life on this planet,

00:55:55.000 --> 00:55:59.999
alone of all the planets we know.
We should respect that.

00:56:00.000 --> 00:56:04.999
Take care of it, leave it go on
doing the magnificent things

00:56:05.000 --> 00:56:09.999
that its done already and to pile new beauty
on old beauty (inaudible) used to say.

00:56:10.000 --> 00:56:15.000
[music]

00:57:15.000 --> 00:57:19.999
The preceding program was made
possible by financial support

00:57:20.000 --> 00:57:24.999
from the nature company dedicated to improving our
awareness and appreciation of the natural world

00:57:25.000 --> 00:57:29.999
and from the Bullet Foundation,
the WA Gerbode Foundation,

00:57:30.000 --> 00:57:34.999
Bert Fingerhut, the Seven Springs
Foundation, Marion and Allen Hunt Badiner

00:57:35.000 --> 00:57:39.999
and viewers like you. A complete list of
funders is available from KCTS Seattle.

00:57:40.000 --> 00:57:44.999
[music]

00:57:45.000 --> 00:57:49.999
This is PBS.

00:57:50.000 --> 00:57:54.999
For more information on this
subject, write Brower, KCTS,

00:57:55.000 --> 00:57:59.999
401 Mercer Street, Seattle
Washington, 98109.

00:58:00.000 --> 00:58:05.000
[sil.]