Early Settlers Drained Marshy US Landscape

New Scientist ^ | 1-17-2008 | Catherine Brahic

[Robert A Cook PE]

All of south central Philadelphia (from Duck St and south towards the river) is filled swamp and tidal flats.

Dock Street itself is named for small RIVER that was used to float boats past the “dock” at it’s head. Then, as Philly got larger, and the tanneries and sewage got worse, they covered over the creek.

And that happened between 1680 and 1710. Enviro’s have no idea of the changes that happened before they fell in love with the “pristine” dirt they worship.

[Vigilanteman]

In a former life, I worked at a museum and was tutored by some grizzled old Dakota (Sioux).

Buffalo were so plentiful during certain cycles that they were driven over cliffs en masse. The elders condemned this practice because they feared such waste would come back to haunt the tribe when the cycle was down. But the young bucks could see no reason to isolate and kill the handful of buffalo needed for the winter when it was so much easier to drive an entire herd over a cliff and take what was needed, leaving the rest.

Some of these kills were so wasteful they made Buffalo Bill look like a raving PETA lunatic by comparison. The noble savage at perfect harmony with nature is largely a modern PC myth. Native American had some ferocious differences within as well as between tribes.

[Mears]

“Enviro’s have no idea of the changes that happened before they fell in love with the “pristine” dirt they worship.”

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Truer words were never spoken-—most of those folks can’t see beyond the tip of their very elite noses.