CA Wild and Scenic Rivers Memo: Looking to the Past, Seeing a Difficult Future
A stretch of the federal Wild and Scenic Merced River. 2013. Photo courtesy of Mike Osborne.
The history of Friends of the River stretches back 51 years. That’s the same history timeline as the California Wild & Scenic Rivers Act.
Important histories deserve historians — and a written history. So, as we face a dark and challenging next four years, it’s perhaps important that our website now contains an 89-page referenced sketch (linked below) (we call it “the memo,” but perhaps it’s better called “the compendium”) of the history of wild & scenic rivers in California(1).
After discussing the California Wild & Scenic Rivers Act, the memo’s long and rich chronology section starts in 1911 providing a year-by-year retelling of key events in the protection of rivers in California.
And check out the endnotes, which, while providing references and some additional information, also provides some eyewitness accounts of how people and chance have shaped our successes (brownie points should be given to those who can find the role that mustard played in our wild & scenic river history).
The memo is an often inspirational read for dark times since it looks back at how the Congress and the California legislature (and involved citizens) played their roles in saving portions of California rivers from dams and honoring California’s river heritage.
At the same time, the memo documents the failed attempts of (and reversals against) the river protectors. Our chores are not always easy. And the progress we make is not always durable. So, the memo also documents some of the noteworthy attempts to roll back the protections afforded by the wild & scenic river acts.
Reading the narrative, it is inescapable that our labor was needed in the past — using the tools of the American experiment in democracy — and will be needed in the future.
The McCloud River. FOR Photo Contest Archives.
This is not just a dusty history of long-ago completed campaigns. The entries describe the attempts (1) to remove a portion of the Merced River from the National Wild & Scenic Rivers Act and (2) to federally preempt the protections afforded the McCloud River in the California Wild & Scenic Rivers Act. I expect that both these attempts will be on the Congressional agenda next year and with the McCloud even in the lame duck Congress over the next few weeks. But (3) even the American River that flows through the state capital is at risk. The stalled progress of the four wild & scenic river bills (three in California and one on the Oregon section of the Smith River) is also there for all to see.
The memo, is a work in progress, carrying a “draft” watermark on all its pages. That’s because there remains more of the tapestry of our history yet to add to the memo — and more importantly, the stories of the future have yet to unfold.
Some of you with a history or library-science interest should volunteer to help with this memo project. For the latest memo draft, check out the wild & scenic river pages on our website(2).
To affect our wild & scenic river future, we need resources and the skills and talents of many of you. Democracy is not just a spectator sport; it is up to us, the living and able, to determine our future. And “us” does not always mean someone else. It could mean you and your friends.
