Book Review: A River Ran Wild

A River Ran Wild: An Environmental History by Lynne Cherry, Hampton-Brown Books, Carmel, CA, 1992.
This is a history of a Nashua River and the valley that carries the same name.  It starts with Native American times, when the river was home to many wild animals, and Native Americans built a village along its banks and used the river for fishing and transportation.  The river supplied all they needed.  Next came a mountain man, who was welcomed.  Then came farmers, who cut down the towering forest and raised crops and animals.  They built saw mills along the river and used the power from the river.  They trees were cut into lumber to make houses and buildings.  Native American fishing rights vanished, as did the forests for hunting. 
This was followed by an industrial age.  Paper factories dumped leftover pulp and dye into the river.  Then came plastics.  Chemicals and plastic waste were also dumped.  The river became more and more clogged.  It also became smelly.
Oweana, a Native American descendant of those early Native Americans, and his friend Marion, both dreamed of the pebbled bottom of the river, which was long gone, and decided something must be done.  They began talking to others who imagined a clean river with a pebbled bottom.  First the convinces the paper mills to build a waste plant and no longer dump in the river.  They also persuaded factories to stop dumping.  New laws were enacted and factories stopped polluting.  Slowly the river's current began cleaning the river.  Today it is a river restored. 

Book Review: Native American Prophecies

Native American Prophecies: Examining the History, Wisdom and Starling Predictions of Visionary Native Americans by Scott Peterson, Paragon House, New York, 1990.

The author of this book has an agenda, and at lease he admits this agenda upfront in the preface.  “I have also been keenly aware that many important trends that have been building for generations appear to be coming to a head during my lifetime.  None of these are so critical to our future than what we human beings are doing to the earth.”  The author is hoping to write about environmentalism, and put that inside a book of Native American Prophecies.  He further writes in the chapter about the Mayans, “The most compelling evidence of Mayan influence, however, is the shared belief among all Native Americans of the sacredness of creation itself.  NO other culture that ever existed on earth has surpassed the native American reverence for nature.”  Some pretty bold statements.  First the influence of the Mayan may not  be so prevalent, and the common beliefs could come from some other party; perhaps predating the Mayan.  And then to say no other culture.  I am sure he is not familiar with every culture that has ever lived. 

The book leads eventually to his talking about Sun Bear, and environmental Native American prophet who has established a group of like minded individuals, Native Americans and others, and fostered in it a religion to “save the earth.”  The author quotes one critic, Professor Ward Churchill (wasn’t he cheering on the terrorists on 9-11) who said of Sun Bear, “selling of ersatz sweat lodge and medicine wheel ceremonies to anyone who wants to play Indian for a day and can afford the price of admission.”

In the end, my thoughts, are that this issue of environmentalism may be over blown.  I consider myself a conservationist.  We must do our best to conserve the planet, while also making way for people to live and prosper.  The author makes sure people’s opinions about President Reagan and George Bush (1^st) are known, in terms of environmental issues.  Al Gore and his mold have taken over this movement with the purpose of making money off of the sacrifice of others.  I am for clean-up days and dong our best to making our planet habitable for all, while at the same time making decisions to prosper us all as well.  I think we have gone a bit over the top at times.