Conservatives and conservation

By Mike VanBuren
From the early April edition of The North Woods Call

    Rush Limbaugh calls me an “environmental wacko.”
    I’m one of those people who believe in saving energy, preserving wild areas, and treating the earth as a finite resource that should be handled with care.  I get alarmed when I hear about air pollution, “fracking,” food contamination, and open-pit strip mining in the Upper Peninsula.
    Rush seems to hate this. He likens me to a Nazi extremist. He says I don’t understand the world’s bounty, or the simple principles of supply and demand. Worse yet, he’s convinced I’m one of those “whining liberals” who use environmental scare-tactics to push big government.
    The funny thing is—in most areas of my life—I’m a fairly conservative guy.
     As an independent thinker, I believe that pure conservatism—based in a deep respect for the uniquely American ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and anchored in personal faith and responsibility—makes much more sense than the frequently deceptive, often ineffective and sometimes immoral policies espoused by the major political parties. Some may disagree, but I’m convinced that those organizations are populated largely by inflexible ideologues who only see the world through their own selfish ambitions and greed.
     As some Call readers have discovered, I have particular difficulty relating to modern “liberal” or so-called “progressive” thought.  It seems to run counter to how most people live their daily lives.  Nevertheless, I have often found myself walking hand-in-hand with left-leaning Democrats in battles to protect our natural heritage.
      I wonder why that is.
     Shouldn’t more conservatives be conservationists and more conservationists be conservatives?
     After all, there are few things more “conservative” than protecting resources for future generations.  And—language-wise at least—“conservatism” comes from the same root word as “conservation,” for crying out loud.
     I know there are some members of the so-called “political right”—whatever that is—who feel as I do.
     ConservAmerica, for example, is a national grassroots organization that claims to be “the environmental conscience of the Grand Old Party.” Members believe we can preserve our environment and boost our economy at the same time.  They want to resurrect the GOP’s once-strong conservation tradition and restore natural resource stewardship and sound environmental protection as part of the Republican vision for America.
     It seems like this would be something we could all support, but many Republican leaders—not to be confused with conservatives—don’t seem to be listening. They want to scrap laws that have cleaned up air and water, preserved natural areas, and prevented the extinction of native species.
    What’s that all about?
     Anybody with the smarts to get elected ought to be able to see that more—not less—needs to be done to defend the natural world that our children and grandchildren will inherit.
     While significant environmental progress has been made during the past few decades, we can still benefit from cleaner air, water, soil and food supplies. And reducing wasteful consumption today will likely bring greater benefits tomorrow, including better economic performance.
     You’d think more conservatives would be leading the way to safeguard our natural resources, rather than fighting against those liberals who are.  If ever there was a bipartisan issue, this is it.
     Few modern social concerns are as vital to our health, recreation and economic prosperity.  Human progress should not be measured solely on the basis of dollars and development, but also on what we have preserved and protected.
     Of course, there will always be disagreements as to how to best go about this work and far too often we’ve seen that professed concerns for the environment are just smokescreens for more sinister political agendas.
     In  an  ideal  world,  we  could simply educate people about environmental issues and trust them to do what’s right.  Isn’t that what personal responsibility in a free society is all about?
    Sadly, the reality is that individuals and corporations don’t always do what they should, and there’s  an ongoing need for some kind of regulation and enforcement action.
      But politicians and bureaucrats are not any more selfless and trustworthy than individuals and corporations, so there are all kinds of pitfalls on the path to good stewardship.
    Republican  Theodore  Roosevelt called conservation “a great moral issue, for it involves the patriotic duty of ensuring safety and continuance of the nation.”
     Roosevelt, of course, may have been the first “environmental wacko” to be elected President of the United States.  Maybe it’s time to put another one in the Oval Office—along with several others at all levels of government and industry.
     And  there’s  no  good  reason they couldn’t be conservative in thought and deed.

Adventures of "Tom" and "Huck"

By Mike VanBuren

From the late March edition of The North Woods Call

    The coming of spring always brings back memories of growing up in rural Michigan, when roaming the freshly awakened woods and wetlands was relatively safe and uninhibited.
    My friends and I were free to do most anything we wanted in the Great Outdoors, as long as it was legal and we were home by suppertime.

     It was a time—in our lives, at least—when it didn’t take government programs and environmental activists to make sure that “no child was left inside.”  That was the last place any self-respecting kid wanted to be.

   Richard Louv’s 2005 book, “Last Child In the Woods,” was decades away from being published and nobody in our orbit gave much thought as to where we would spend our days.  It was simply assumed that we would be outside wading streams, climbing trees and generally burning off the youthful energy that many of us wish we still had today.

    The  mother  of  one of  my friends often referred to her son and me as “Tom and Huck,” reminiscent of the adventurous Mark Twain characters, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn.  We even tried to build rafts, as I recall, to float down tiny Spring Brook after the spring rains came.

     Those were the days when parents didn’t have to worry so much about their kids being kidnapped, murdered or otherwise harmed by criminal weirdos with ill-intent, although we were routinely warned to be wary of strangers before we headed out of the house.

    Truth be told, the entire neighborhood kept watchful eyes and ears on us, and news of any misdeeds or trouble was likely to reach home before we did.

    It was a time when we didn’t lock our houses—unless the family expected to be gone for several days—ignition keys were always left in the cars and our garage door was seldom closed, day or night, from April through October.

    And  nothing  ever  came  up missing.

     In short, it was a glorious era  to be growing up before the widespread lawlessness, violence and general disrespect for the rights of others metastacized and became the cancer on our society that it is today.  No child that I knew needed to be coddled and sheltered within the walls of a protected home or day-care facility.

     So we roamed pretty much at will—camping, fishing, hunting, swimming, biking, wrestling, playing ball, building forts, catching frogs and exploring our world—from the time the morning chores were done until the skies darkened, night fell and we dragged our weary bodies up the stairs to bed.

     The benefits were obvious.  We strengthened our muscles, tested our endurance and got more exercise in one day than most children addicted to television, computers and electronic games get in a month—or more.

     Even our most inactive moments (every kid needs to rest from time-to-time) still involved much social interaction with friends and neighbors—playing croquet on the front lawn, participating in marathon front porch games of  Risk, or plotting our next outdoor adventure.

     And the related discoveries were legion.

     We might huddle beneath a trestle of the CK&S Railroad and feel the earth shake as the trains passed overhead, hike a few miles down the tracks to buy candy at the small store on Riverview Drive, dig spent lead from the sandy hillsides at nearby firearm target ranges, or search for lost arrows in the weeds behind straw-bale targets at the local rod and gun club.

     Once, “Tom” and I found a pile of unopened mail along a side road.  It had been stolen from a local seed company and we thought we had found a great treasure—especially when we ripped into the envelopes and retrieved several dollars in illegitimate cash that our parents promptly made us give back.  That was OK, because we got something even better—a coveted ride in a patrol car when a sheriff’s deputy came to investigate the incident.  

     Sleeping out at night—under the stars or in a canvas pup tent—was a special summertime treat and we did it as often as possible.  Escaping the valley where we lived to ride our bicycles five miles into the village of Richland also fueled our wanderlust and growing desire for greater freedom.

     It’s sad to think back on those times and realize what so many of today’s children are missing.

     Thanks in part to Louv’s aforementioned book, many people are now realizing this disconnect and legislative efforts are being made to amend the 2001 Elementary and Secondary Education Act (No Child Left Behind Act) to include environmental education.  Several states have already passed their own bills aimed at re-aquainting children with nature.

    Such laws were largely unnecessary in our neighborhood when I was a child, but most things now seem to involve some kind of government action.  Even so—like almost everything else—the political debate has been polarizing.  Critics claim such legislation will be ineffective and is intended to spread a political agenda to children.  Supporters insist that there are countless benefits to including environmental education in elementary and secondary schools.

     With the deceitful and corrupt nature of  modern politics, who knows what to believe?

     One thing that’s clear, however, is that children learn much and benefit greatly from being in the out-of-doors.  And the best education comes when this experience is unencumbered by too many rules and regulations.

     It’s all about freedom—to explore, learn and absorb the rhythms of nature at one’s own pace.

      Maybe  if  we  just  turned  the television off and put down our myriad electronic gadgets, our children could better see and taste  the world around them.

    Only then will their own curiosity lead them outside into the lives of fresh-air adventure that we all need for a more healthy and balanced life.

Water wars

By Mike VanBuren
From the early March edition of The North Woods Call

   When I was a boy, my grandmother sent me a postcard from Arizona. It was covered with pictures of desert plants and animals. There were cacti, jackrabbits and rattlesnakes—each well adapted to the harsh climate.
   My grandmother was well adapted, too—having lived in Phoenix for many years. But her needs were different from the coyotes and roadrunners that populated the countryside. They'd learned to get by on less. She—like the rest of us—was dependent on generous supplies of clean, fresh water.
     The Southwest, you see, is a thirsty place. The sun is bright and hot. And the land is dry. It's enough to send a Gila monster out for a tall glass of cold sarsparilla. And it has made many misguided public servants cast greedy eyes on the Great Lakes.
     The reasons are simple. Water is critical to life, and to many social and economic activities. In some areas—such as Arizona—water is in short supply.
     The Great Lakes Basin contains about twenty percent of the freshwater on the surface of the earth. Why not just redistribute it so everyone has enough?
     Some profiteers—and politicians with dry tongues—like this idea.  But I don't.
     Water is already being pumped in and out of the Great Lakes on a relatively small scale. Fortunately, no major diversions are currently planned. But some public officials and environmental leaders say it's just a matter of time.
     The population is expanding in many parts of the country where water is scarce. Recent census results show that some of the fastest-growing states—Arizona, California, Nevada and Texas—are also among those most in need of water.
    The census also shows that those states will gain seats in Congress, while the Great Lakes region loses seats. That means that it could be harder to win a congressional vote to restrict the sale of Great Lakes water.
     Siphoning lake water makes perfect sense to those who don't know—or care—about ecosystems. But scientists say such activity could harm plants and animals. It could upset the balance of nature, lower groundwater levels, reduce water quality, and even impact the climate.
     And what happens if you have to shut the spigot off for some reason? Who's going to tell the folks in Sun City that the well is dry?
     My home state of Michigan is almost entirely within the Great Lakes basin. We have everything to lose and very little to gain if water is taken. Our economy is tied to shipping, fishing, agriculture, recreation and tourism. These activities depend on the Great Lakes being healthy and vibrant.
     That's why we all need to conserve water and develop strong policies to prevent raids on the resource.
     Now, I love Arizona and I'm pleased my grandmother could live there. But if she had wanted to drink from the Great Lakes, she probably should have moved back to Michigan.

           *           *           *

    This column originally appeared as a commentary on National Public Radio’s Living on Earth program and on Michigan Public Radio.

Big Elk: Indian herbalist

By Mike VanBuren
From the late February edition of The North Woods Call

    When Herbert Gleason Mingo was born on February 22, 1851, Millard Fillmore was president of the United States and Abraham Lincoln was still a prairie lawyer nine years from the White House.
     It was the year that Yosemite Valley was discovered in California, Herman Melville published his classic novel “Moby Dick” and abolitionist Sojourner Truth addressed the first Black Women’s Rights Convention in Akron, Ohio.
     By the time Mingo died on February 25, 1957—at the enviable age of 106—automobiles and airplanes were in widespread use, America was rushing headlong into the space age, and the mighty  Mackinac Bridge would soon make Michigan’s Upper Peninsula more easily accessible to hunters, fishermen and tourists.
    Better known as Big Elk, Mingo was a Native American medicine man—a skilled herbalist whose extensive knowledge  was based in years of hand-me-down mentoring from tribal elders, and an expert eye for wild plants and potions that were proven cures for human ailments.
     I have vague memories of Big Elk—perhaps because I may have seen him once as a small child, but more likely from family stories about his legendary powers as a traditional healer.
     I have clearer memories of visiting his home south of Stanwood with my parents and sister in the years following his death, and talking to Mrs. Arnold—Big Elk’s longtime assistant, understudy and housekeeper—who at the time was still dispensing herbs to legions of loyal customers who came to her door.
     On one such occasion, Mrs. Arnold was angry with the medicine man because, she said, he had appeared to her when she visited his grave at the White Cloud Cemetery and told her there was no reason for her to do so.
     “I’ll never go back,” she said.
     Our family became acquainted with Big Elk when my great-grandfather, Phillip Spalla—a Sicilian immigrant with asthma who used to spend the annual pollen season picking fruit on farms in the Traverse City area—learned of the herbal healer and sought help with his breathing problems.  Spalla was so satisfied with the results that he began referring friends and relatives to Big Elk.
   According to my father, my grandmother was once so deathly ill with an unknown malady that  medical doctors had given up on fixing the problem.  Spalla and other family members wrapped her in a blanket, put her in the back seat of a Model A Ford and hauled her to northern Michigan.  There Big Elk brewed a concoction of herbs and had her drink the aromatic liquid as hot as she could stand it.  A few hours later—after napping and sweating out the illness—she was feeling well enough to drive part-way home.
     Big Elk liked my great-grandfather and other family members, and sometimes would cook up several of the large catfish that he raised in a small pond behind his house on Mecosta County’s 177th Avenue along the old Pennsylvania Railroad tracks.
     He was reportedly a soft-spoken and friendly man of relatively few words, who stood tall and straight, even as an old man.  I remember an over-sized wooden chair at his home that seemed—to a small child, at least—to have been built for a giant.
     Even as he neared his 101st birthday, Big Elk was “surprisingly agile, hears remarkably well, reads without glasses and retains his own teeth,” according to a February 20, 1952, story in the Big Rapids Pioneer newspaper.
     He told the reporter that he expected to live significantly longer, thanks to “the strength, faith and trust sent to him from his friends in various parts of the world, consumption of his own herbs and faith in the Great Spirit God.”
    Big Elk knew the land on which he lived and the medicinal quality of the plants he found there. He gathered them in the woods and fields surrounding his house, then dried, milled and packaged them in another small building next door.  His office was usually closed on Mondays while he searched for the herbs.
     Today, the beginnings of a residential housing development have appeared in the nearby woodland  where the medicine man found his plants.  And Morley-Stanwood High School and football stadium occupy the property just across the railroad tracks from the two-story clapboard house where Big Elk lived for the last 27 years of his long and storied life.
     Born in Mashpee, Massachusetts—the son of a Pequot chief—Big Elk was already nearly 80-years-old when he settled in Mecosta County.  Prior to that, he had reportedly traveled over most of the American continent, as well as portions of Siberia, Australia, China, Japan, Africa and the South Pacific islands.
  As a young man, he was a courier from Fort Simcoe, Washington, traveling to Wanatchee, the Powder River basin, Okanagan in British Columbia, and Penderilla—a route of about 700 miles.  It was a six-week trip that he usually made on horseback over Indian trails through wild and hostile country, requiring significant physical strength, endurance and courage.
     There is little else I know about Big Elk—or his life and times—except that his house still sits at the dead-end of 177th Avenue between Morley and Stanwood, along what is now the White Pine Trail Linear State Park.  Another family lives there now and I wonder whether they are aware of the rich legacy of herbal medicine that their home represents.
     It’s a fine history of a memorable man—connected in a small way to my own family’s story.
    I think there’s still much to be learned from Herbert Mingo, as we journey through life and seek to heal our own bodies and souls.

Early March edition

Hot off the press!  The early March issue (Vol. 60, No. 7) of The North Woods Call goes in the mail March 6, 2013.  (electronic subscribers have already received their copies).  See stories about Great Lakes water levels and dredging, the continuing wolf-hunting debate in Michigan, "Cops in the North Woods" (conservation officers), and much more.  Subscribe now and don't miss a single issue!

Late February edition

     Look for your late-February edition of The North Woods Call later this week
     Read about the governor's proposed hikes to hunting/fishing license fees and fuel taxes, as well as the "biodiversity bill" currently making its way through the state Legislature, a multi-disciplinary "fracking" study guided by the University of Michigan, the continued battle over wolf hunting and much more.
     Also, a look at Stanwood's Native American herbalist Herbert Mingo, known widely as "Big Elk" while he gathered and sold medicinal herbs in Mecosta County from the late 1920s to the late 1950s.

The ghosts of Deward

By Mike VanBuren
From the early February edition of The North Woods Call

     Ongoing debates over open pit mining and hydraulic fracturing in drilling operations have made me think of earlier times when Michigan’s resources were under assault—particularly during the late 19th and early 20th century logging of the Deward tract in the state’s upper Lower Peninsula.
     I first visited the site near the intersection of Antrim, Kalkaska, Crawford and Otsego counties in 1978 with the late Ford Kellum, a retired Department of Natural Resources wildlife biologist and somewhat of a legend among Michigan’s conservationists.
     Kellum was irritated at developers and oil companies that day, which he said were continuing the abusive practices that turned the fragile land surrounding Deward into a case study of mismanagement.
     As one of the last remaining stands of virgin white pine near the end of Michigan’s fabled lumbering era, the majestic forest offered tremendous potential for a hungry industry.  By the late 1970s, however, it could only be described as God-forsaken brush country, punctured by oil & gas wells and scarred by various other development activities.
     What we saw that day was a virtual wasteland of weathered and decaying stumps on soil so delicate that bruises left by horse-drawn wagon wheels more than 60 years earlier could still be seen.
     We walked through the old town site, over long-abandoned railroad grades and past the huge concrete foundations of a sawmill that once ran without stopping day and night, producing as many as 52 million board feet of lumber in a single year.
     The town began to die, of course, as soon as the last giant pine completed its run through the mill.  In March 1912, as suddenly as the town was created, the mill was dismantled and moved away.  The local population gradually diminished until the last resident deserted the site in August 1932.
     Deward had become the last of Michigan’s lumbering ghost towns, leaving behind a prairie-type land mass marked only by the huge white pine stumps.
     Repeated fires and soil too poor to bring the forests back kept much of the land from recovering.
     During the 1920s and 1930s, huge flocks of prairie chickens could be flushed from almost anywhere on the tract, but—due to the fires, natural growth and development—they eventually disappeared.  Sharp-tailed grouse were introduced south of Deward in 1933 and did well for a short time  until they, too, became the victims of growth and development to the point where—at the time of our visit—there were only a few remaining in the area.
     For more than a generation, there was little activity on the Deward tract.  Then a pipeline construction crew moved through the area, uprooting stumps and leaving a large scar on the land.  Later, a large development firm took over 12 square miles of the tract surrounding Lake Harold in Antrim County.  Roads were cut and paved, recreational facilities and an airport were built, and lots were surveyed and sold.
     Elsewhere on the tract, drilling operations continue today.
     Several years ago, I returned to Deward with my then nine-year-old son and a former college roommate.  We camped for two days at the old town site, hiked along the Manistee River and searched for memorabilia.
     Natural growth and a 25-year-old pine plantation were beginning to reclaim some of the land, although large areas remained sparsely covered—sporting nothing more than a few scrub trees and a thin layer of soil and grass.
     The nights were dark and relatively quiet, save for the occasional yip of a coyote and the rhythmic pounding of nearby oil wells.
     On our last morning in camp, while we were packing tents and preparing oatmeal for breakfast, a large explosion shattered the Sunday morning calm.  Each of us jumped a bit—startled by the loud boom and resulting percussion that we felt forcing its way through the trees.
     Then the quiet returned, with only the lingering odor of natural gas to remind us of the disturbing noise we had heard.  We saw no smoke or flames and heard no emergency vehicles responding to whatever had caused the blast—only a gentle breeze rustling through the leaves.
     Just another day in Deward.
    We finished breaking camp a short time later and drove away, never having figured out what had exploded, or how far away it was.  Not much to get excited about, I guess, because we never heard or read anything about it after that.
     I returned home haunted by the strange experience and by memories of my first visit to Deward many years earlier with Ford Kellum—who was a tireless advocate for better resource management right up until his death in October 1991.
   It seems like there is so much that he left unfinished.