Posted on 12/05/2005 7:13:21 AM PST by Dane
Rachel Carson, a driving force behind the modern environmental movement, grew up in a modest homestead in Springdale Borough near the Allegheny River. For the budding marine biologist, the river's waters were an early inspiration.
Now, more than four decades after Ms. Carson's death, her presence may return to those waters.
Allegheny County Council tomorrow will consider renaming the Ninth Street Bridge in her honor. If the resolution is approved, Ms. Carson would join Roberto Clemente and Andy Warhol as namesakes for the three Downtown "Sister Bridges" that cross the Allegheny.
"This is long overdue," said Esther L. Barazzone, president of Chatham College, Ms. Carson's alma mater and home of the Rachel Carson Institute. "People realize that Rachel Carson is truly world class. We need to strengthen our connection to her."
Ms. Carson's 1962 book, "Silent Spring," criticized the harmful effects of pesticides, sparking a prolonged battle with the chemical industry. In 1970, six years after Ms. Carson's death, the federal government founded the Environmental Protection Agency. Two years later, the government banned the use of the pesticide DDT in the United States.
"We should name more structures after hacks."
Thank you.
Hack
We can't even give her that. I wholeheartedly share your enthusiasm for eagles and ospreys, but they started to come back in the 1950s, before Silent B.S. even appeared. (Don't have the link to the population chart, sorry.)
My guess is that the comeback was due to the same factor that started the more recent deer and turkey explosion, which is habitat expansion. There has been a demographic revolution in the U.S. since 1900, and especially since WWII, which is that people have left farming by the millions, and millions of acres of formerly cultivated land has gone fallow. That transitional scrub that grows up on the land is full of seeds, berries and nice cover, and predators' prey animals (like mice and rabbits) go wild for it. The predators get a new lease on life when that happens. It no doubt helps that the farmers are no longer there to trap and shoot them.
I've also seen quite convincing documentation that the research that supposedly showed DDT damaging eggs, didn't.
I love good statistics. That why I lurk FR.
Maybe Evergreen State College in WA can name a bulldozer after Rachel Corrie.
That article you liniked in your reply #22, is the epitomie of modern liberal thought, all feelings and no thought. Not surprised it was put on the web by the Post-Gazette.
Perfect!!
That's what I was thinking.
I tried to submit "Saint Pancake" as a good name for a local HS that wanted to rid itself of the horror of being named after George Washington (/sarc) -- never made it to the final list of possibilities.
Darn.
Wah! We have no women statues...wah!
On the bright side, it's not as if anybody's going to actually call it that...
Heck, with three bridges that all looked alike, I used to go over 'em all the time and couldn't keep their names straight anyway.
It didn't much matter which one you crossed, just pick the one that was easiest to get to in traffic.
BTW... which one was the one that was closest to where the Gulf Station used to be downtown?
And which was the one the sniper climbed in the '60's?
I don't remember anything about that.
But I graduated HS in '70, so perhaps I'm a little too young to recall the incident.
We can ask Ditto, I think he's a couple years older and might remember.
It would have been '66 or '67. There was a barber shop in Squirrel Hill in the old Goldwater headquarters that I stopped in for a haircut and there was a guy named Raymond Minichiello or something like that on one of the bridges shooting at people downtown. Bill Burns covered it live, since it was right near the KDKA studios. I don't remember how it ended, either.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.