august 2008 appalachian voice newsletter

8/9/2019 August 2008 Appalachian Voice Newsletter

1/13

The future of

Americas Best

Whitewater

Plus:

How Gee is you Campus?

Cougas Aboud! O Do They? The Cost of Wid vs. Coal Powe

Summer 2008


2/13

AppAlAchiAn Voice pAge 3

Summer, 2008

Appalachian Voices Staff

Appalachian Voices Board of Directors

APPALACHIAN VOICES191 Howard Street

Boone, NC 28607

1-877-APP-VOICE

www.AppalachianVoices.org

InSIDe ThIS ISSue

A publication of

Appalachian Voices brings people together to solve theenvironmental problems having the greatest impact on the

central and southern Appalachian Mountains. Our mission

is to empower people to defend our regions rich natural andcultural heritage by providing them with tools and strategies

for successful grassroots campaigns. Appalachian Voices

sponsors the Upper Watauga Riverkeeper and is also a

Member of the Waterkeeper Alliance.

Editor Bill KovarikAssociAtE Editor Matt WassonAssociAtE Editor Mary Ann HittEditoriAl BoArd chAir Harvard Ayers

ExEcutivE dirEctor Mary Anne HittconsErvAtion dirEctor Matt WassoncAmpAign dirEctor Lenny KohmopErAtions mAnAgEr Susan Congelosiin-housE counsEl Scott GollwitzerAssociAtE dirEctor Shelly ConnortEchnologist Benji BurrelllEgislAtivE AssociAtE J.W. Randolph

nAtionAl FiEld coordinAtor Sandra DiazvA cAmpAign coordinAtor Tom CormonsvA FiEld orgAnizEr Mike McCoyit spEciAlist Jeff DealuppEr WAtAugA rivErkEEpEr Donna Lisenby

Chair Lamar MarshallViCeChair Brenda HugginsTreasurer Harvard Ayers

At Large: Leigh Dunston, Steve Novak, Andy Brown,Janice Nease, Dean Whitworth, Jim Webb, Sarah Wootton,Heidi Binko, Brenda Boozer, Kathy Selvage, Pat Watkins,Bunk Spann, Matthew Anderson-Stembridge, Steve Ferguson

AppALAchiAn Voices VoLUnTeeRs: Allen Johnson, April Crowe, Avi Askey, Bent Mountain Branch Library, Beth Davies, Elizabeth Vines, Beth Dixon, BillWasserman, Blue Ridge Mountain Sports, Bonnie Aker, Brenda Huggins, Larry Huggins, Carol Rollman, Catherine Murray, Charlie Bowles, Chris Chanlett, Mount RogersOuttters, Dave Gilliam, Dave Muhley, Donna Muhley, Dean Whitworth, Deez Beez Books, Dennis Murphy, Detta Davis, Diamond Brand Sports, Dr. Emanuel Mornings,

Dr. Richard Roth, Ed Clark, Frances Lamberts, Garielle Zeiger, Gail Marney, General Lewis Inn, Gerry Scardo, Joe Scardo, Great Smoky Mountains Institute, HarvardAyers, Helen Clark, Jim Shumate, Highland Hiker, Jane Branham, Jennifer Honeycutt, Jim Dentinger, Jennifer Stertzer, Jere Bidwell, Jeremy Stout, John Wrestler, JulianMartin, Kathleen Colburn, Kathy Selvage, Ken Schaal, Kim Greene McClure, Kirsty Zahnke, Lewisburg Library, Linda Milt, Lowell Dodge, Margaret Roy, Mike Boone,Mike McKinney, New River RHA, Annette Watson, New River State Park, Ray Vaughan, Ruth Gutierrez, Shay Clanton, Steve Brooks, Steve Moeller, Tom Cook, TonyBrown, Williamsburg Post Ofce, Ray Zimmerman, Loy Lilley, Brad Wood, Margaret Elsea, Jennif er Hebner, Gerald Gibbons, Blue S moke Coffee Roasting Co.

Trampling the Promised Land .................................................p.6

Across Appalachia .....................................................................p. 9

A High Water Year on the New & Gauley Rivers ..................p.16

The Long Term Cost of Coal vs. Wind Power .......................p.18

Editorials and letters ..................................................................p. 19For Our Members - Appalachian Voices ...................................p. 20Launches Upper Watauga Riverkeeer

Naturalists Notebook - Cougars .............................................p. 23

APPALACHIANVOICE

Hawks Nest TunnelThe First Disaster on the Gauley

..............................................See story on p.15

There are many ways to nd out how green yourschool is. The US EPA has a green power challenge forcolleges, and Princeton Review has a rating system.

There are also a dozen ways to make your schoolgreener. And there are new funding initiativesthrough the Dept. of Education for nancing greeninitiatives at the college and K-12 school level.

Going green? orgaz Find groups on campus at www.climatechallenge.org

crat a ymbl For example, Appalachian StateUniversitys solar Christmas tree.

presidents climate commitment Ask your uni-

versity president to sign the Climate Commitment.

ittut Gr f A green fee of $5 to $20is part of the student activities fees in hundredsof colleges, funding recycling bins, buildingconservation, biodiesel fueling and manyother programs.

hld e-olym Duke university holdsone every year for energy, waste and waterreduction www.duke.edu/web/env_alli-ance/games

sg u fr ur rwabl rgy andsustainability.

Ak yur uvrty t j t Aat frt Advamt f sutaablty hgreduat (AASHE).

crat a ff f utaablty This hasbecome standard on campuses. The AASHE hasstandards and guildelines.

Buy gr wr Its possible now to buy powerfrom renewable sources.

Buy gr rdut Everything from recycledpaper to regionally grown food.

Buld gr buldg The Leadership in Energyand Environmental Design (LEED) Green BuildingRating System is a national standard. Green build-ings on campus save money and also serve as aneducational example.

ResourcesPesidets Climate Commitmet

www.presidentsclimatecommitment.org

Associatio fo the Advacemet of

Sustaiability i Highe Educatiowww.aashe.org

US Gee Buildig Coucilwww.usgbc.org

EPA Gee Powe Challege

www.epa.gov/greenpower/partners/hi_ed_challenge.htm

exrt frm The Book of the DeadApoem about the Gauley disasterBy Muriel Rukeyser, 1938

These roads will take you into your own country

All these men cry their doom across the world,Meeting avoidable death, ght against madness,

Find every war.

Are known as strikers, soldier, pioneers,Fight on all new frontiers, are set in solid

Lines of defense

Fanatic cruel legend at our back andSpeeding ahead the red and open west,

And this our region,

Desire, eld, beginning. Name and road,Communication to these many men,As epilogue, seeds of unending love.

Covr poto:Martin Talbot of Quebec, Canada enjoys Pillow Rock Rapid on the Upper GauleyRiver on the afternoon of September 22, 2007, during last years Gauley River Fes-tival. The little dragon on the top of his helmet is typical of the humor that whitewa-ter enthusiasts bring to their sport. Will whitewater enthusiasts continue to ock tothe Gauley and New Rivers in the future? Communities that thrive on eco-tourisimin the region are worried about the expansion of mountaintop removal mining,which many people believe poses a threat. Photo by Michael Sawyer

Bg Trubl t Gauly Rvr

.............................................See story on p.12

Photo Submitted

PhotobyMichaelSawyer

By Margaret V. Williams

Seen from high above, the new school might re-mind you of the outline of the Big Dipper -- a shorthandle with two circles at the end. Zoom in, andyou see the circles are two-story buildingsringing huge, one-acre courtyards, and thehandle holds a stadium and athletic eld.The rooines slope, curve and swell like thesurrounding mountains; landscaped walk-ways wind between stone-trimmed build-ings; windows soar skyward at entrances.

When nished, the K-12 campus willbe one of the largest green schools east ofthe Mississippi.

The Eastern Band of Cherokee Indi -ans are stewards of the land. We alwayshave been. We all are, says Dr. CarmaletaMonteith, school design coordinator forthe tribes Central Schools Board. A nativeand a semi-retired school administrator,Monteith has helped the board negotiatethe challenges of building a much-needed

new school -- from its design to its culturaland environmental curriculum. One of themost exciting parts, for me, is not just to saveresources and protect the environment, but

to teach the students about [green issues] while theyreexperiencing it.

The school features natural daylight -- whether fromits expansive use of windows or its use of solar tunnelsthat bring light to interior rooms and gymnasiums.

Certain public toilets will ush with water stored intwo 30,000-gallon cisterns that will harvest rainwater offthe roof. Lights will have sensors, so that if the naturallight is sufcient, they turn off or dim correspondingly.Heating and cooling will come from a geothermal sys-

tem of almost 300 wells that transfers theearths temperatures from the depths. In-terior woodwork will feature the walnut,cherry, sycamore, white oak and othertrees harvested onsite that totaled about96,000 board feet. Landscaping will featurenative plants, especially those importantto Cherokee culture, such as river cane for basket-making, and traditional herbs andplants used for dye.

The overall curriculum from elemen-tary to high-school grades also featuresissues, traditions and activities importantto the Cherokee, whether its stickball orthe native language, Monteith emphasizes.Educating children about environmentalissues and preparing them for the high-tech needs of the 21st century also gure

large, she explains. We want to train themfor leadership roles, Monteith says.

HowGREEN is your Campus?

The greening of a Cherokee school THE EASTErn BAnDS nEW K-12 CAmPUS

Continued on next page

UNC Chapel Hill .................................96

Warren Wilson (NC) ...........................95

Elon (NC) ............................................94

U.Memphis (TN) .................................94

James Madison (VA) ..........................93

Duke (NC)...........................................93

UVA.....................................................92

NC State .............................................90

VA Tech ...............................................90

Berea (KY) ..........................................89

Top 10 Green Colleges

* From ratings by Princeton Review for NC, VA, TN and KY.


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pAge 4 AppAlAchiAn Voice

Summer, 2008


Summer, 2008

Hiking the Highlands

All of a sudden, we saw a snake,lounging in the cool, rockywaters of a creek in the KanawhaState Forest.

It was a little snake, about a footlong. Yet I couldnt tell what kind itwas. Neither could my hiking buddy,

Justin.Was this a fake snake?Did somebody plant this here?Sure. Maybe. And, hey - what a

great place for one!The CCC Snipe Trail, after all,

is named for the Civilian Conser-vation Corps, which set the courseof a water line in the woods in1939. That line served CCC CampKanawha and, later, the KanawhaState Forest.

Today, this trail follows the waterline.

Now here comes the legend: Newarrivals at Camp Kanawha were often initiatedby being sent on a Snipe Hunt at night alongthis trail, hunting for birds. Such a funny prac-tice ultimately ended, how ever, when severalrookies got lost in the early 1940s.

TODAY, IT IS AMAZING that the remotewilderness of the Kanawha State Forest lies

just 15 minutes from the urban landscape ofCharleston, the West Virginia capital.

Prior to being established as a state forestwith facilities for the public, this was a miningand timbering area.

Hiking is very popular. Mountain biking

is very popular, said Kevin Dials, the stateforests assistant superintendent. We have alot of geo-cachers that are out here.

Dials offered a brief tour of the state forest,bouncing along dusty, gravel roads that lead tothe shooting range and overlooking the woodsycampground, carved into the rocky hills.

It takes about eight miles to get fromdowntown Charleston to the state forest.

Kanawha extends over 9,300acres.

But, Dials said, if you get out and usethe forest, youll probably see less than halfof it.

ALONG THE CCC SNIPE TRAIL, we dis-covered remains of an old coal mine that had

been sealed by the CCC in the early 1940s.Once, while working deep inside this mine,

the CCC crews discovere d 26 mash barrels thathad been abandoned by bootleggers.

A short spur from the trail leads to themine entrance, where a marker notes that themine holds 11 million gallons of water.

Beyond the mine, in just a few yards, thetrail crosses a wooden footbridge. Beyondthat, in hardly more than a couple hundredyards, the CCC Snipe Trail forms an intersec-tion with more trails in the state forest.

Names of treks across the Kanawha rangefrom Rattlesnake Trail to Spotted Salaman-der Trail, Logtown Trail, Overlook RockTrail and Alligator Rock Trail.

The Alligator Rock Trail - rated moderateto difcult - is a half-mile hike named for anoutcrop that looks like an alligator.

BUT, WAIT - LETS GET BACK TO THESNAKE.

The rst time we crossed that footbridgeon the CCC Snipe Trail, that snake lay in thewater, his head on a rock.

I think hes just trying to cool off, Justinsaid, carefully peering into the creek.

I soldiered on, not wanting to stare.Still, I couldnt take my eyes off the creek

with our return.

Turns out, that snake was no phony. Hewas gone.Did he swim downstream? Was he on

rock? Was he waiting for us?I turned tense.Never along this trail did I see a snipe.But, be careful: The West Virginia woods

are, indeed, wild and wonderful - just like thestate slogan says.

Snipe Trail one of many attractions at Kanawha State Forest

The greening of aCherokee schoolContinued from previous page

Kanawah sTaTe ForesT

HIKInG LEnGTH: Varies. The CCC Snipe Trail is 0.75

miles. The Mary Ingles Trail is 12 miles. The stateforest includes more than 25 miles of trails.

WHErE TO STArT:Kanawha State Forest, Charles-ton, W.Va.

TO GET THErE: From I-64 in Charleston, take Exit58A, drive south on U.S. 119. Turn left onto Oak-wood Road at the second stop light (following thebrown and white signs). Go 0.75 miles. Take a leftbefore George Washington High School, continuing

on Oakwood Road. Turn right onto Bridge Roadand then right onto Connell Road. At the bottom

of Connell, make a sharp left onto Kanawha ForestDrive and follow to the forest entrance.

DUrATIOn: Varies.

InFO: (304) 558-3500

WEB: www.kanawhastateforest.com

Joe Tennisis the author of

BEACH TOBLUEGRASS:Places to Brake

on VirginiasLongest Road (TheOvermountain

Press), whichprofles trails,

waterfalls, parksand landmarks

along U.S.Highway 58.

Its a culturally complimentaryproject, agrees Frank Cooper, direc-tor of the Cherokee Boys Club andfinancial advisor. The geothermalsystem will bring energy costs downin a big way, he says. The campus is50 percent bigger than the two existing[schools], but the energy costs will behalf, he says. Part of the money-sav-ing equation is SIP panels in the wallsand ceilings -- a sandwich of plywood,insulating foam, and plywood, Cooperexplains.

Were trying to do the right thing,

he continues, mentioning that one of hisfunctions in the project has been to helpnegotiate contracts for the new school.

Dcads i t makigThe Eastern Band started searching

for a building site and planning for anew school as early as the 1970s. Bythe time Joyce Dugan, a former schooladministrator, became chief in 1993, thetribe was united in the push to exchangeseveral hundred acres of land with the

Park Service.The campus, says Monteith, is about

so much more than the politics of theland swap.

For starters, she and Cooper pointout that the tribes current elementary

school is at least 50 years old and soasbestos-ridden that the children have

been [taking classes] in trailers foryears, says Monteith.

Cooper refers to Monteith as aretired schoolteacher who, like manyCherokee, gives back to her community.If you dont live here, he says, youdont realize how integrated the adultand the youth communities are here.

Retired? Monteith laughs. I dontthink I ever really retired. I did have a

going away party, she says of leavingher career in the Atlanta area and return-ing home. I never really left [Chero-kee], she continues, agreeing withCoopers point about the importance offamily and its connection to the school

project. Home was never more than afew hours away, and family and tradi-tion are so integral, that she was often

back home, Monteith adds.Monteith confesses that when tribal

leaders rst asked her to help with theschool project, she didnt immediatelyaccept the role. I reminded them I wassupposed to be retired. [But] its an op-portunity of a lifetime to be able togive back to the community and sharemy knowledge. And, of course, this ismy family, she says.

A lot has changed since she wasgrowing up in Cherokee. She laughsagain and says that she nds herselfreferring to periods of time as before-casino and after-casino. Harrahspresence and related nancial benetsin the community have given the tribethe resources to do many of the thingsthat have needed doing for years, suchas building a unied campus thats en-vironmentally sensitive and culturallyrelevant, she points out.

Construction of the Cherokee Cen-tral Schools campus was estimated atmore than $108 million, according toBE&K, the construction rm workingon the project. It encompasses almost500,000 square feet of school buildingsfor its elementary, middle- and high-school students. It offers more than 9,000square feet of dining space (separated

by school groups), a shared 4,032 SFkitchen, four gymnasiums, stickballelds for the traditional Cherokee sport,football and baseball elds, a track andgenerous open spaces.

Its a beautiful campus, says Coo-per. Even the color schemes being usedwill compliment its riverside setting atthe edge of the reservation and next to

the Smoky Mountain National Park. Hereiterates that everyone involved in theproject has strived to make it not just

green but culturally sensitive.Before clearing the site began, for

example, archaeologists explored it,retrieving evidence of human occupa-tion that dates back to 8,000 B.C., Mag-gie Carnevale pointed out in a 2006-07report in the WNC GreenbuildingGuide published by Asheville news-paper, Mountain Xpress. Carnevaleis an architect with the team that de-signed the school -- Padgett and Free-man Architects of Asheville. Wereover half-way done, Carnevale says

of the construction stage. The schoolis slated for completion by May, 2009,with students lling its halls later thatyear. There was a large compilation ofpeople [working] on the design fromthe start ... who wanted to make this asenvironmentally sensitive a project aspossible, she adds, naming the EasternBand, National Park Service, the BlueRidge Parkway, and many others.

With Monteith and other tribal lead-ers, the designers toured similar NativeAmerican facilities in the Pacic North-west, looking for ideas and inspiration.They came up with the emphasis on natu-ral lighting, recycled materials, a green-way connecting the campus to downtownCherokee, high-tech stations for students,native landscaping, walking trails, a per-vious parking lot to reduce storm runoff,and more. Even the usual waste associ-ated with any major construction site hasbeen and will be recycled -- 92 percent ofit to date, says Carnevale.

In the end, the facility hopes to earna silver-level LEED certication -- thenext-highest seal of approval from the

U.S. Green Building Councils Lead-ership in Energy and EnvironmentalDesign. Carnevale adds that part of thatcultural sensitivity Cooper refers tohas become an inherent component ofthe design: Facilities and spaces link to-gether, share space where possible, anddemonstrate respect for their naturalsurroundings in ways honoring theCherokee culture.

Were trying to do the right thing,says Cooper, mentioning such relatedefforts as getting all the school busesrunning on biodiesel.

All good. But Monteith reminds usthat the campus will educate Cherokeeyouth and prepare them for the 21stcentury. She hopes that its curriculum-- blending the basics with tribe culture,high-tech training, college-prep courses,and environmental lessons -- will teachkids how to be better stewards of the

earth than, perhaps, we older folks havebeen. We have to do the best job we can,not just for now, but for the future.

Its a beautiful campus, says Frank Cooper, director if

the Cherokee Boys Club. Even the color schemes being

used will compliment its riverside setting at the edge of

the reservation and next to the Smoky Mountain National

Park.... [and] everyone involved in the project has strived

to make it not just green but culturally sensitive.


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Summer, 2008


Summer, 2008

This Paper Is Sponsored In Part By

Delicious Deli-StyleSandwiches,

Homemade Soups,Vegetarian Fare,

and Much More!

Shadowline Drive, Boone, North Carolina(828) 262-1250

By Kathleen MarshallThe story of development in

Appalachia goes back to 1585,when Lt. Ralph Lane sent survey-ors to explore from what would,one day, be Chesapeake Baysouth to present-day North Caro-lina. In a letter back to England,the Elizabethan explorer wrote,. . . we have discovered the mainto bee the goodliest soile under thecope of heaven, so abounding withsweete trees, that bring such sundryrich and most pleasant gummes, grapesof such sweetnes, yet wild, as France,Spaine nor Italy hath no greater . . . . . it is

the goodliest territorie of the world . . . forthe soile is of a huge unknowen greatnesse. . . .

Fast forward 423 years, and Lanesunknowen greatnesse is being stran-gled by sprawl. U.S. housing growthis now ubiquitous and the sprawlonce associated primarily with urbanareas has become a dominant feature

of the rural landscape, according toHousing Growth in the U.S. from 1940 -

2030, a study released in April of thisyear. Appalachia is also experiencinggrowth; expanding metropolitan areasand a swelling number of seasonal andretirement homes in non-metropolitanareas are fueling signicant growth, inthe Carolinas and Georgia in particular,the study said.

The lands dying from a thousand

small cuts, said Jamie Ross, pro-ducer of the four-part PBS seriesAppalachia, which will air na-tionally in spring 2009. The oralhistorian and lmmaker travelledextensively documenting thevalues and physical changes ofthe cultural landscape of Ap-palachia.

We did spend at least eightyears traveling from Alabama toNew York State, Ross said, andeven just along Hwy 81 it is as-tounding to see the subdivisions

replacing silos outside of places likeAbingdon and Lexington and Bristol

just damn depressing.

DRIVInG TO QuALIFY

Between 1982 and 1997, populationin the South grew by 22.2 percent, thehighest population growth in the U.S.

by percentage. During that same period,urbanized land in the South grew by59.6 percent, according to The Brook-ings Institution. That is a nearly three

to one development to populationratio, and thats pretty much thecase across the country, said EdMcMahon, senior resident fellow ofthe Urban Land Institute in Wash-ington D.C. We call it driving toqualify, he said. You keep driv-ing away from a city until you canqualify for a mortgage.

Some regions of Appalachiahave even more intense develop-ment to population ratios. TheUpstate region of South Carolina,for example, has experienced de-velopment growth that outpacedits population increases by ve to

one, according to a report issued inFebruary by Clemson University.

Land there is being developed at a rateof 90 acres a day. Brad Wyche, executivedirector of the Upstate Forever landtrust, says his board will be promotinga one to one ratio of development topopulation growth.

PLeASe LeAVe uS ALOne

Not only are Appalachian taxpayerslosing some of their most picturesquescenery and farms that feed them locally,it may be costing them money as well.Ross calls new developments a drainon the community tax base, with roadsand schools and sewage. Opponents ofrural sprawl argue that counties region-ally and nationally are losing tax dollarsto pay for cost of community servicesfor new development water, sewer,emergency services, road maintenance

and more. Cherokee County, Georgia,reported spending $1.59 on residentialcommunity services for every tax dollarraised, and Blount County, Tennesseereported spending $1.23, according to2007 gures released by the American

Farmland Trust. The median cost forU.S. counties surveyed to build infra-structure for new housing developmentswas $1.19 for every tax dollar raised. Incontrast, working and open land cost 37cents for every tax dollar raised.

While residents who cannot affordto keep developers out nd themselvesincreasingly fenced off from old huntinggrounds and childhood haunts, there iswidespread mistrust for zoning regula-tions. Wyche tells about a couple wholled out a Greenville County planningcommission survey. At the bottom of

the form this couple wrote: We love theBlue Ridge area just as it is. We dontwant zoning. Please leave us alone.What were seeing in our area is thatpeople are realizing that they cant haveit both ways. We are going to continue togrow. There is nothing we can do aboutthat, the population is increasing, likeit or not.

One of the policies weve been pro-moting is the notion of service bound-aries, said Wyche. Its not zoning;its not regulation. Its saying, withinthis area we will be providing servicesand infrastructure: water, sewer, roads,widening roads, and schools. If youtalk to any developer, they will tell youthat if you have water, sewer, a goodroad and a good school, they are com-ing. We taxpayers are providing thoseservices and that infrastructure. Whata wonderful way to manage growth by

being smart about where we are puttingall these things.

VAnIShInG FARMLAnD

Farmland is proving particularlyvulnerable to development pressures.

America is losing two acres of farmlandevery minute. Farmland area equivalentto the size of Maryland was converted

by development between 1992 and 1997,and the rate is accelerating. North Caro-linas farmland and natural lands are

being developed at a rate of 277 acres perday. North Carolina is tied for the leadin number of farms lost in 2006, saidGerry Cohn, Southeast states directorfor the American Farmland Trust. Itsin the top three for number of acres ofprime farmland lost, your best soils. Ofstates losing the most farmland between1992 and 1997, Georgia was third, NorthCarolina was fourth, and nine of thethirteen states that comprise Appalachiawere in the top twenty.

Thats the one issue across theregion. Development is happening with-out any seeming consideration or atten-tion to the capacity of the land and howmany wells it can sustain, Ross said. Afarmer has to consider the future, whatthe land can sustain next year. A devel-

oper just has to dig a well, and who caresif it goes dry in three months?

On net, the people who are com-ing into Appalachia have less education,lower job status, and less income. Insome ways Appalachia is becoming anamenity region for the poor, said Prof.Phillip Obermiller, editor of AppalachiaCounts: the Region in the 2000 Census,a special edition of the Journal of Ap-palachian Studies compiled in 2004.If theres a loss of affordable land andhousing in the market that denies peopleshelter, Appalachia is going to be in verydire straits. If many Appalachians can nolonger afford to buy the house down thestreet or the farm next door, and as new-comers with low incomes seek refuge in

the region, its going to impact them aswell. What were talking about here is adouble whammy. The very people whocould afford to buy the farm next doorin central and northern Appalachia, hesays, are moving away, while the olderpopulations are aging in place.

Theres an aging landowner popu-lation, which makes challenges for whosgoing to farm in the next generation andhow these farms will be passed alongintact, Cohn said. Aging landownersare getting offered more money for theirland than they could ever imagine, andits a real opportunity for retirement. Iwant to put myself in their shoes. Farm-ers dont have 401(k)s and they haventaccumulated a lot of cash.

Farmers call it growing houses,said Ross. They dont want their landto go to growing houses, Ross said.Theres an old saying: you can milka cow every day but you can eat ham-

burger only once. Thats the trouble withbuilding houses.

PRICeD OuT OF TheIRCOMMunITIeS

Cassie Robinsons story is perhapsa case in point. She was unable to buyher great-grandfathers house in MarsHill, North Carolina when it becameavailable. Her father helped build thehouse; her grandmother dug out the dirt

basement with a dishpan. My aunt anduncle hit some hard times; it came up forsale, she said. A woman from Floridawas more than willing to pay more thantwice what the house was worth. The

blood and sweat and labor of my dadand my uncles that had such a valueto me. Being a young professional, Icouldnt afford to buy it.

She has since moved to HarlanCounty, Kentucky, where she is assistantdirector of Pine Mountain SettlementSchool. That was a hard lesson, she

said, on not being entitled to participatein your culture at the level that peoplemoving in could.

You see so much of that happen.You see people being priced out of theircommunities.


Trampling thePromised LandContinued from previous page

Tramplingthe

PromisedLand

Photo by Trip Huxley

Drawing by Linda Burton

Photo by Lamar Marshall

Suburban Sprawl Now Dominates The Rural Landscape of America

p 8 A V


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Summer, 2008


Summer, 2008

Appalaca Voces s proud o aouce

An EVEning with

Rober F. Keedy, Jr

tere ll also be a vao-oly eve for Appalaca

VocesMembers a 5pm. tckes for e pre-eve are lmed,

please emal [email protected] or call Appalaca Voces

a 828-262-1500 for more fo or o reserve your ckes.

Farthing AuditoriumAppalachian State University

Boone, NC

Ticket info availableat the Box Ofce

1-800-841-2787or 828-262-4046

MeMbers Only

tursday, Ocober 23, 8:00 pm

Acoss Appalachia To keep up with the latest, see www.AppalachianVoices.orgnatioal Parkstratd

By Katie Easter

Factonein three nationalparks have above standard airpollution.

Factthere are over 100 newcoal red plants across the coun-try.

Factcurrently 28 new plantsare to be developed within 186miles of ten national parks.

The Great Smoky Mountainsof Tennessee and North Carolina,Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, and theShenandoah of Virginia are three of themountains that are already affected ac-cording to the National Parks Conserva-tion Association.

The NPCA report, Dark Horizons:10 National Parks Threatened by New CoalFired Plants, presents a call to action for

all people who enjoy or hope to one dayenjoy National Parks.

The Clean Air Act is supposed toprevent major polluters like coal plantsfrom degrading park air qualityaccording to the report, regulatorychanges have been proposed to makeit easier to build new coal-red powerplants close to the national parks.

Over the past 30 years, there have been regulators monitoring spikes inemissions during times of increasedenergy demands. Regulators monitorfor both three and twenty-four hourtime increments.

According to the NPCA report,the problems are bigger than just poorvisibilitybreathing problems, acid

rain damage, smoggy skies,poisoned streams, and globalwarming are a few of the otherproblems.

The 28 prospective plantswill emit 122 million tons of car-

bon dioxide, 79 thousand tons ofsulfur dioxide, 52 thousand tonsof nitrogen oxides, and 4 thou-sand pounds of toxic mercuryinto the parks.

Polices of the Clean AirAct are not enforced, saysthe report.Changes have beenproposed that will provide thelowest possible degree of pro-tection and make it easier forcoal companies to build closer

to national parks.For individuals to reduce the need

for new power plants, the NPCA reportstates, if all Americans made a fewsmall changesreplacing old light bulbswith energy efcient onesdriving less,and recycling more.

p 10 A V AppAlAchiAn Voice pAge 11


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Summer, 2008


Summer, 2008

Acoss Appalachia To keep up with the latest, see www.AppalachianVoices.orgCla Coal Pblicity

Grats BacklasExpect to see more Clean Coal

ads on TV this fall. With the presidentialelection a few months off, the US coalindustry is entering high gear with its$35 million campaign.

The coal industry claims that coalkeeps the lights on and that new tech-

nologies let coal be carbon neutral.Environmental groups have pointed outthat carbon capture and sequestrationtechnologies are in fact decades awayand that renewable energy makes moresense when all costs are taken into ac-count.

The coal industry publicity hasgenerated a backlash, with YouTubeparodys and genuine outrage by groups

like Physicians for Social Re-sponsibility.

The doctors group was espe-cially angry that the coal indus-try used child actors in their ads.

To utilize children as a promotionaltools for a dirty energy source isreprehensible.

Pollution emitted from coal-redpower plants causes an estimated24,000 deaths each year, the PSR said.Coal plants are also the single larg-est source of mercury, which causesdevelopment disorders in children,the group said. (To see child actorsin pro-coal ads, search for Ameri-casPower.org.)

Meanwhile, a new bumper stick-er idea is making the rounds in WestVirginia: Wind Safe, clean, carbonneutral.

Mi Wars Ladr

RmmbrdFollowup to the Spring 2008 Ap-

palachian Voice story Baseball andRebellion: A state historical marker tohonor Bill Blizzard and his role in themine wars of 1921 was unveiled in April

by United Mine Workers of AmericaPresident Cecil Roberts, along with Con-gressman Nick Rahall of West Virginia

and other UMWA ofcials. Blizzard ledthe largest armed rebellion since theCivil War against the coal industry, butrefused to ght federal troops. He wasacquitted of treason charges in 1922.Blizzards son, William C. Blizzard, isseated. Some 200 people were there forthe unveiling, but no coal industry ex-ecutives were able to attend, PublisherWess Harris said.

The Jokes on clean coal: SearchYouTube for Coal is the CleanestThing Ever and Say No to LiquidCoal. The cartoons mock coalgreenwashing with a supposed attackon green solar energy which comesat a terrible price in the form ofsunburn. Also see http://www.coal-is-dirty.com/


7/13

Page 12 aPPalachian Voice aPPalachian Voice Page 13

sites have held up the construction. Tocontinue expanding, Powelton builtditches to connect the new runoff areasto the old settlement ponds above RichCreek. Whether the new technique hascontributed to heavy runoff in Rich Creekis open for debate. Theres no debate,

however, that a world class trout streamis now dead, and that the stream runscoffee brown in a rainstorm.

Yet another concern is that blastingon Gauley Mountain could blow outone of dozens of abandoned water-lledunderground coal mines nearby, creating

a sludge spill like the one that hit Inez,Kentucky in 2000.

Right behind the town of Anstedthere are many mine works, full of wa-ter, said Hoffman. Its honeycombedback in there with old mine works. Oneof those ponds where theyll be workingis on top of old works.

When they start blasting, its very, verylikely that we will have blowouts, she said.

It will shrink your hand

James Tawney, a farmer and a mem-ber of the West Virginia HighlandsConservancy, lives on 120 acres of landclose enough to the Gauley River that hecan hear it from his house. He grew upnearby and would come to the river withhis wife when he was younger, scram-

bling through breathtaking,untouched forest. Th e rockcliffs and waterfalls were likehidden jewels, he said.

His dream was to es-

tablish a business to caterto whitewater enthusiasts,possibly a resort and res-taurant. But now the dreamis on hold as he watchesmountaintop removal min-ing getting closer. Alreadya coal company has beendrilling core samples on 90of his acres where they ownmineral rights.

Tawneys land is locatednear Peters Creek and a section of theGauley that, ofcially, has experiencedonly one coal slurry spill. Tawney be-lieves the spills are constant, and thatthey are changing the river.

I do see a difference in the Gauleynow, Tawney said. I won t swim in it.Ive stuck my hands into the ponds thatrun into the Gauley. The water is red-orange. It will shrink your hand up.

Residents are in a Catch-22 situ-

ation, Tawney and others say. Wedont want to scare away the tourists,

Tawney said. I dont want to say, hey,dont come here because its getting pol-luted. But if more people knew whatthey were rafting in, it would change ina heartbeat.

Mayor questions best use

The town at the center of the contro-versy, Ansted, has never seen anythinglike current controversy.

Established in 1873, and named for aBritish geologist, Ansted became a boomtown at the center of deep mining. Butby the 1960s the unemployment rate wasaround 25% and the town shrank. Its cur-rent population is about 1,500.

Mayor Pete Hobbs remembersthe boom and bust times, and like manypeople in the 1960s, he had to leave thestate to nd work. He spent 37 yearswith AT&T, retiring as a general man-ager, and returned to an area where hiswife has relatives. By then his own hometown, Smithers, no longer existed. He is

determined that Ansted will not sufferthat fate.When you look at a map, you see a

beautiful pristine area between those tworivers, he says. And the question is,what it the best use of the property?

In my personal opinion, whateverwe decide to use that property for, it rep-resents the gateway to the future of townof Ansted and Fayette County.

(For more by the major and other arearesidents, see links at www.appvoices.org).

Tourism could be the long rangeeconomic engine for the area, Hobbs andothers hope. To promote it, they havehelped create a hiking trail from the townto Hawks Nest Park on the New River, 13miles to the South. The same trail could beextended to the Gauley whitewater areaanother 20 miles north, Hobbs hopes. Butthere wont be much point in a new trailif the mountains are attened.

Americans best whitewater is inbig trouble.

Mountaintop removalmining has arrived. Alreadyone trout stream is dead andanother is in jeopardy.

Whitewater rafters and kayakerswho ock to the region each summerand fall wont see much difference at thispoint. The Gauley River still explodesthrough an intoxicating canyon belowthe Summerville Dam, and the NewRiver still carves its way through one ofthe worlds most scenic gorges.

However, rapidly expanding moun-taintop removal mining is boosting theow of sediment and toxic wastes intothe rivers. As things now stand, mining

will keep expanding, section by section,bite by bite, until Gauley Mountain isgone. And any hope for expanding therecreation areas downstream will disap-pear with the mountain.

As a result, local political leaders areraising urgent questions about the futureof the region. R.A. Pete Hobbs, mayorof Ansted WV, warns that the new min-ing permits will be extremely negativeto the quality of life in the area.

Many others are deeply worried.What [the coal companies] are doinghere is criminal, said Kathryn Hoffman.Say your prayers for us. Its going to getugly before its done.

The controversy has become so bitterthat a religious service at the foot of Gau-ley Mountain erupted into a shoutingmatch between blue-shirted miners andpraying demonstrators last April, and thesermon was never nished.

A pending proposal to expand the

National Park boundaries could slow

or stop the min-ing. Yet, if it fails,residents fear thattheir mountaincould end up likeso many others,and the GauleyRiver itself couldtake on the redhues and power-ful smells that havehurt the shing and whitewater businessin other parts of the state.

Gauley Season

The Gauley New River region isshaped like the head of a miners shovel

pointed northwest, with the New Riveron the southwest side, the Gauley onthe northeast, Gauley Mountain in be-tween, and the town of Ansted at the base. Both rivers ow north and west,joining at Gauley Bridge to become theKanawha, owing down the slopes ofthe Allegheny Mountains into the OhioRiver Valley.

The region is surrounded to the east,north and west by mountaintop removalmining operations, but until 2007, onlya little mining has taken place nearthe Gauley and New River recreationareas.

The New River attracts more than

150,000 people for raft trips every year. It

is geologically archaic, taking an unlikely

course northward from the highlands of North

Carolina and Virginia. Its storied history

includes a 250 year old escape from captivity

by Mary Ingles Draper; skirmishes during

the Civil War; mine wars during the early

20th century; and one of the nations worst

industrial disasters. (See sidebar: the Hawks

Nest Disaster).

The Gauley River draws about 60,000

experienced rafters to its class ve rapids

every September and October when water is

released from the Summersville dam during

Gauley Season. The Gauley River Festival

on Sept. 19-21 in Summersville is one of the

largest whitewater festivals in the country.Bridge Day Oct. 18 this year -- is when

tens of thousands watch as over 400 people

parachute off New River Gorge Bridge into

the New River more than 876 feet below.

Rafting, festivals, restaurants and hos-

pitality generates an estimated $50 million a

year a year for the region.

Mining impacts

Residents are most worried aboutPowellton Coal Companys mining op-erations on Gauley Mountain. Miningstarted before the permit was approved,according to state Department of Envi-ronmental Protection documents. Sur-veys for blasting and road use were notmade before mining started, and plansfor handling drainage had not been ap-proved. All of these violations have beencorrected, state ofcials say.

Original plans called for coal trucksto run through the town of Ansted 24

hours a day, seven days a week. When

the town put up a ght, the coal companyhad to back off.

Another problem is the way Powell-ton Coal expanded its sludge impound-ments and runoff settling ponds. Courtcases involving other companies at other

on theGauley and New River

Gorge residents worry thatnew mining operations willdestroy tourism and their

hopes for the future

Story by Bill Kovarik

National Park land

Possible proposed extension to

National Park land

Past and current surface mining

Past and current surface miningon Gauley Mountain

Hawks Nest Tunnel

Hawks Nest Rail Trail

Proposed extension of HawksNest Rail Trail


Map by Appalachian Voice. May not be exact

to scale. Note that park extension boundaries

are hypothetical.

Summer, 2008Summer, 2008

Running the Gauley gauntlet:1st, 2nd, 3rd and 7th photos by Michael Sawyer.4th, 5th and 6th photos by Jeff Macklin. At left, a map of the Gauley and New River Gorgeregion.

pAge 14 AppAlAchiAn Voice AppAlAchiAn Voice pAge 15


8/13

Summer, 2008 Summer, 2008

Prayrs itrrptd

Father Roy Crist, an Episcopalpriest, supervises three churches but stillnds time to serve as president of the AnstedHistoric Preservation Council.

The most important thing to preservenow is the mountain, he says. If they minethat entire (Gauley area), were looking ata huge sore spot right in the middle of themost visited site in West Virginia, he said.God did not give us this land to destroy buthe gave us this land to take care of, and werenot doing a very god job of that.

The mining operation actually started

without a clean water permit, he said.

There was a hearing at Hawks Nest lastSeptember, and we spoke against grantingthe permit. The DEP (Department of En-vironmental Protection) paid no attentionand issued permit anyway, even though thecompany started mining without it.

One protest tactic has been to holdprayer meetings, similar to those held dur-

ing the Civil Rights movement. The rsttook place without incident in November2007.

In April 2008, fty people gathered fora second Blessing of the Mountains. Thegroup was stopped by a blockade halfwayup the mountain. As the service began at theroadside, a group of twenty or thirty minersin pickup trucks, wearing blue companyshirts came roaring down the road andstopped at the service and began yellingand screaming.

There was a lot of taunting and razzingwhen we were trying to do the service, hesaid. They kept interrupting with thingslike turn your lights off or its all about

jobs. During the sermon, one of theminers began shouting a few inches awayfrom the ministers face, yelling that he waslying, that coal companies dont mess up themountains, that they put the dirt back whenthey are through.

After service was over, a lot of ourgroup went around and talked with coalminers, Crist said. I told them I was gladthey were there to worship with us. I wasntfrightened, he said.

Hoffman said she was afraid of the

miners. Its insane I cant believe its hap-pening here, she said.

natr rclaims all

Jeff Proctor, managing director of ClassSix Whitewater, is living the dream. He andfriends from Ohio established the companyin Lansing, WV 35 years ago. Agreat dayat the ofce, he says, is (in) the LowerNew or Lower Gauley at 6 - 12,000 cubicfeet per second.

Proctor has been watching the riverevery day for decades. Theres nothing anydifferent than what we have seen in past 30years, he said. Do we see turbidity (afterrain)? You bet. I know theyve been min-ing. But a logging job can probably cause asmuch of a problem, and they are probablynot as regulated as a mining company.

Like many others who make their liv-ing taking rafters onto whitewater, Proctor

sympathizes with environmental concerns.I understand that Ansted is concernedabout coal trucks and traffic, he said.And its crazy to say theres not some sort

of impact.But will that affect the whitewater

business over the long run? This canyonhas had its fair share of abuse, he notes.If you look at photos of what this placelooked like at the turn of the century, it was

just stripped for all the timber to help propup the mines. But today it looks like a rainforest, he said.

We are fortunate. Mother Nature hasdone a phenomenal job of reclaiming theriver.

Gene Clair, a Park Service geologist,also says he is not worried about the impactof mining on the rivers. The law requiresmines to stay at least 300 feet from the park

boundaries, he notes.Although acknowledging that there

was at least one spill on Peters Creek in

2001, and a number of permit violations onRich Creek, he believes they were minorincidents. Theyve been operating prettygood in past, he said.

He also notes that Powellton is armor-ing channels to reintroduce the trout inRich Creek, below the mining operations.So far there is no word on the success of theprogram.

extdig t park

Perhaps the best hope for protectingthe New and Gauley Rivers would be tomake the National park areas bigger. Con-gressman Nick Rahall of West wants to do

just that.The legacy is not complete, Rahall

said in April 2008. I believe that seriousconsideration should be given to extendingthe park boundaries of the New and Gau -ley to their conuence with the Kanawha

River There are other areas along the Newwhere boundary adjustments are in order,so that we can maintain the integrity of thatwith which God has blessed us here in NewRiver Country.

As chairman of the powerful HouseCommittee on Natural Resources, Rahallcertainly has the clout to make it happen.He also has a history of protecting rivers:He sponsored a bill in 1978 establishing theNew River Gorge as a national park. In1988, he sponsored a bill to make the Gauleya National Recreation area. And in recentyears he has been honored with the NationalParks Conservation Association award.

The problem, as always, is with thedetails. It is possible that a semi-protectedarrangement will be proposed. But if theprotection does not slow or stop the surfacemining, thousands of acres of GauleyMountain will be leveled, and the runoffand toxic waste problems could affecttourism in the end.

That is not the future that Hobbs,Crist, and other residents are hoping for.

By Bill KovarikSeventy ve years ago, the

area where the Gauley River andthe New Rivers meet becameknown as the site of Americasworst industrial tragedy.

The same water power thattoday attracts recreational enthu-siasts from over the world was,at the time, attracting the atten-tion of hydroelectric engineers.They built a massive tunnel thatchanneled water from the Newinto the Gualey to generate over100 megawatts of electricity be-tween 1928 and 1932.

By 1933, news of some kind ofdisaster was beginning to emerge.Hundreds of men now estimatedat 476, most of them African Amer-ican -- died simply because theywere not given protective gear.Most of the victims were buriedin common, unmarked graves. Thou-sands more were permanently injured,unable to walk home to other states,giving Hawks Nest, WV, the appearanceof a town of the living dead, accordingto a 1936 magazine article.

The men were killed by silicosis, anoccupational disease that occurs whenworkers breathe ne particles of glassysand that cuts through lung tissues withsteady and predictable effect.

The deaths and injuries could havebeen prevented had the company issueddust masks and used wet drillingmethods. But wet drilling might have

diluted the value of Gauley Mountainspure silica that was in the tunnels path.Dust masks were not used because,

the company claimed, they did notknow about silicosis. Even so, whiteengineers who took rock samples inthe tunnels were using dust masks. Ap-parently, the lives of African Americanswere hardly thought to be worth the costof the masks.

The racism, arrogance and crueltywas so astonishing, even in the 1930s,that a full scale Congressional investiga-tion was set in motion.

The investigation uncovered heart- breaking stories about whole familieswiped out by silicosis, wives having to lesuits just to get their husbands bodies,and parents searching the Hawks Nestworkers camps for their missing sons.

The investigation also uncovereda horric pattern of secret cemeteries,

subversion of the law and threats towitnesses by Union Carbide and itscontractors.

It concluded that the tunnel project

had been carried outwith grave and inhu-man disregard for the health, livesand future of the employees. The com-mittee placed the blame squarely on theshoulders of the company: The negligencewas either willful or the result of inex-cusable and indefensible ignorance.

In the end, none of the company of-cials went to jail. A few families of thevictims received settlement checks for afew hundred dollars at most. But mostsignicantly, the laws regarding occu-pational disease and labor safety wererewritten during the New Deal era with

the Hawks Nest incident in mind.The incident became even more fa-

mous when poet Muriel Rukeyser wroteThe Book of the Dead in 1938 andincluded many of the documents fromthe Congressional committee.

Aside from that book, the companiessuccessfully suppressed information aboutthe incident. Even a novel called Hawks

Nest by Hubert Skidmore was pulled outof print by the publisher, and Skidmorehimself died in a mysterious re.

As late as the 1970s, historians saidthey were receiving death threats and fac-ing legal action for trying to uncover thetruth about the incident. To this day, manyof the grave sites have not been found.

Physician Martin Cherniak wasthe first historian publish a book on

the Gauley disaster. Cherniak said hestruggled to maintain his objectivitywhile writing The Hawks Nest Incident:Americas Worst Industrial Disaster.Ironically, it was published only a fewyears after Union Carbides disaster atBhopal, India, where 10,000 people diedfrom a cyanide leak at a chemical planton Dec. 3, 1984.

In 2008, historian Patricia Spanglerpublished The Hawks Nest Tunnel:An Unabridged History. Along with asummary of events, Spangler publishedhundreds of full original documentssurrounding the incident. This valuablework allows us to objectively analyzethe disaster while, at the same time,sense the outrage and horror behindthe witness testimony and committee

reports of the rst Gauley disaster 75years ago.Today, the tunnel from the New

River to the Gauley still generates 107megawatts of electricity, like it did 75years ago. Since it uses a public resource,the project was originally to revert inownership back to the state of WV in the1980s. However, the state exchanged it forland that was not worth a fraction of thevalue of the Hawks Nest electrical com-plex. And the tunnel itself, as a point offact, was never worth the lives it cost.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Fr mr frmat:Hawks Nest Tunnel: An Unabridged

History, by Patricia Spangler. Availablefor $22.95 (pluse $5 shipping) from theWest Virginia Book Co. http://www.wvbookco.com/ 125 Central Avenue,

Charleston WV 25302Martin Cherniak, The Hawks Nest

Incident, Yale University press, 1987.

Big Trouble on theGauleyContinued from previous page

Watc tm oli atiLoveMontains.org

Fomoeifomatioototakeactio,[email protected],828-262-1500

Powellton Coal Co. Violations ofEnvironmental Law On Gauley Mountain

Aug 24, 2007 Started operations without a permit

Aug. 28 2007 Failed to properly notify public of blasting operations.

Aug 28 2007 Started suface mining operations in parts of Rich Creek withoutcertifying sediment control

Aug 28, 2007 Failed to certify access before hauling coal

Sept. 12, 2007 Failed to submit surveys, waivers or afdavits for each

dwelling .... Prior to any blasting.

If they mine that entire (Gauley area), were looking at a

huge sore spot right in the middle of the most visited site

in West Virginia. God did not give us th is land to destroy

but he gave us this land to take care of, and were not

doing a very god job of that. Father Roy Christ, president of

the Ansted Historical Preservation CouncilPhotos submitted



9/13


By Tom Cormons

I made the best move of my life inthe spring of 1997. With my 84 Firebirdstuffed with most of the gear Id use tolive outside until October, I left Charlot-tesville, headed west. Id made this tripto West Virginias New River Gorge manytimes before, but always knowing that Iwould have to return to school after aweekend of rock climbing or whitewatertraining. Now Id graduated from UVAand my only commitment was to workas a whitewater raft guide and climbinginstructor at the Gorge. I would camp ina tent community of guides on the outt-ters property and be paid by the trip forguiding. That rst season, I would fall inlove with the New and Gauley Riversand with the woman who would becomemy wife.

No place could have better exempli-fied the beauty and possibility of theworld awaiting me beyond college. Myadventures there had started on the bandsof gorgeous sandstone cliffs lining the rimof the Gorge, far above the river, whereId been introduced to rock climbing incollege. I had an immediate afnity forthe rock; climbing came naturally and Iimmediately knew that, for me, it was

one of lifes greatest plea-sures. While the guideslifestyle would allow meto experience climbing inplaces all over the country,the Gorge remains one ofmy favorite climbing areas.The thousands of routes onhigh-quality rock offer alifetimes worth of climb-ing and some of the bestvariety anywhere.

I was also immedi -ately enthralled by thecontextthe continuousmountains and hollows;

the clear, steep creeks; theforests so lush that I wasreminded of Brazil or thePacic Northwest; the greatriver, viewed from the topof a climb, roaring through rapids below.Ill never forget the rst time I slept out inthe open on the rim of the Gorge. Fromthere, the ribbon of fog sitting just abovethe water at dawn looked like a whiteriver that grew as it gradually rose nearlya thousand feet to spill over the cliff top,enveloping our band of climbers as wecooked our breakfast.

When, in my last semester of college,

I spoke with an outtter and learned thatit would be possible to live at the Gorgeand support myself as a guide, I almostcouldnt believe my luck. Id been aserious student in college, and thinkingof the freedom and joy of living outsideand focusing on climbing all season wasoverwhelming. I had to do it.

I hadnt had much experience withwhitewater at that point, so I had askedthe outtter about my prospects for workas a climbing guide. The companysclimbing program was growing, so theywere happy to take me on. There was,however, one caveat: I would also haveto train to guide on the river. I agre ed,thinking vaguely that the whitewatertraining sounded like fun, but I didnt

have an inkling then of how immersedin whitewater I would become!

It was a high-water year and theriver s power was awesome. The New isfamous for its big water in the springthe gigantic waves and hydraulics thatrafts and kayaks must contend with. Idnever been in a whitewater raft beforethat spring. On my rst trip, the river

bucking, spinning, ooding, and threat-ening to capsize the 14-foot boatseemedlike chaos, but I was about to begin thenever-ending process of learning to knowthe river and intimately understand itsdynamics.

I was one of about six committed raftguide trainees that year.

At rst, an experienced guide wouldguide the boat through all the rapids.As we trainees learned more, we wouldtake turns guiding, sitting beside thetrainer whopartly in the interest of self-preservationwould always be ready totake over the steering.

The next step was running the riverin turkey boatsrafts of trainees who

would take turns guiding, withno fully trained guide aboard.Wed accompany a commercialtrip of at least several otherrafts, whose guides would beready to help if we got intoserious trouble. We did a fairamount of whitewater swim-ming that spring, but managedto avoid the very serious haz-ards of undercut rocks. I seizedevery opportunity to be on theriver, and I learned fast.

The thrill of engaging thedynamic whitewater environ-ment, and the pleasure of un-

derstanding it, led me to buymy rst kayak that season. Ihad taught myself the Eskimoroll the summer before on arelatively at stretch of river,

so I had a small head start.Another advantage was that I found

myself in a whitewater culture. Guideslived, breathed anda generally loqua-cious bunchtalked whitewater con-stantly. Whereas it was harder to ndclimbing partners among my peers thanId expected, it was impossible not tond friends itching to go paddling, so Iwas soon kayaking on most of my daysoff. In the evenings, after a long dayworking on the river, wed run it againfor fun. I came to love kayaking and raftguiding equally. I loved the challenge ofgracefully handling a large, heavy craftin whitewater, and the way a raft mustcrash through waves and hydraulics. In

a kayak, one sits just below the waterssurface, and, therefore, right in the midstof the rivers features. This, combinedwith less momentum and a much morestreamlined design than a raft, lets onefeel intimately connected to the river.

Around the middle of the summer, Istruck up a friendship with a guide frommy training class named Heather Donald-son. Immediately after college, she hadtaken a two-year associate position at aneconomic consulting rm in D.C. At theend of her stint there, she had watchedcolleagues go off to graduate school andlucrative careers, but she was compelledto do something different. Having raftedwith her father growing up, she wasdrawn to the river.

Heather and I had a wonderful timetogether that season, basking in the joyof each others company and of livingoutside. We were also starting to discoverthe depth of our shared values. Immedi-ately after the season ended, we would

embark on an eight week cross-countrycamping and climbing trip, and wevebeen together ever since. Years after thatrst season, I proposed to her on a cliffoverlooking the Gorge. This June, wespent a weeks vacation camping therewith our four month old daughter.

The New River usually mellows outin mid-summer, when the water leveldrops. It is still a serious Class IV run, but this is when guides start dreamingabout the Gauley. A smaller river, theGauley drops steeply through a ruggedand more remote canyon.

Generally considered second onlyto the Grand Canyon for the quality andintensity of its commercially runnablewhitewater in this country, the Gauleyholds a very special place in the heartof every boater I know who runs it. It ismuch steeper, narrower, and more tech-nical than the New, but also boasts bigwaves and hydraulics. Gauley seasonwhen, four days a week in Septemberand October, water stored all summerbehind the Summersville Dam is released,

creating in the fall what might be averagenatural spring owsis the pinnacle ofthe West Virginia whitewater season.

The Upper Gauley section, beginningright below the dam, offers the biggestaction. Its ve Class V rapids give pauseto even the most experienced guides, andany complacency in many of the countlesssmaller rapids can be very dangerous. Itdemands a lot of energy, focus, and hardwork, but this is amply rewarded with the

unparalleled fun it offerswhich, alongwith the beauty of the craggy canyon, iswhat makes the Gauley famous.

It is humbling to attempt to do theGauley justice in words. At Pillow Rockrapid, the river charges through a con-striction aimed at a big boulder and pilesup on the rock in a huge version of whatis technically known as a rock pillow.Rafts and kayaks ride up on the pillow at

high speed, and not all rafts make it backdown right-side-up.

The feeling of a good run at the sec -ond drop of Lost Paddle Rapid (wherea friend actually lost his battle, andwas forced to hike out, the rst time Ikayaked the stretch) is unforgettable.The raft stands up against, and crashesthrough, the giant wave at the lip of thedrop, before going over the drop, anglingsteeply downward, only to crash through

another large wave before the crew isforced to regain composure to help theguide paddle the boat around Six-PackRock. If a guide pins his raft on Six-Pack,he owes each of the other guides on thetrip a six-pack, but this will be the leastof his concerns.

The Upper Gauleys nal Class V,Sweets Falls, is a 14-foot waterfall thatcan be run very gracefully, but can force-

fully eject guide and crew if they are leftor right of the subtle correct line.

After that rst summer of learningthrough immersion, I was able to bothkayak and raft guide the Upper Gauleya few times that rst season, and I washooked. I would be back to guide full-time for the next three seasons.

Heather and I return to the Gorgeareaa four-hour drive from our homein Charlottesvillewhenever we can,though the demands of work and familysometimes make us think wistfully ofthe days when we lived there. Its river sand rocks, forests and creeks, will alwaysoccupy a central place in our hearts, andI imagine us climbing and boating therefor the rest of our lives.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Tom Cormons is the Virginia CampaignCoordinat or for Appalachi an Voices. Tomearned his law degree with a concentrationin Public Interest Law and Policy at UCLAand is a member of the Virginia State Bar.He lives in Charlottesville with his wife,Heather, and daughter, Brooke, and spendsany free time he can nd climbing, hiking,running rivers, or playing music.

A High Water YearContinued from previous page


Generally considered second only to the Grand Canyon

for the quality and intensity of its commercially runnable

whitewater in this country, the Gauley holds a very special

place in the heart of every boater I know who runs it.



10/13

1. Duke Energy CarolinasAdvan ced Clean Coal Cliff-

side Unit 6 Cost Estimate Report, June 29, 2007 NC

Utilities Commission Docket No. E-7, Sub 790

http://www.duke-energy.com/pdfs/Cliffside_-_

June_2007_NCUC_Cost_Estimate_Update.pdf.

2. Coal River Wind Fact Sheet - accessed 20 August,

2008 (http://www.coalriverwind.org/wp-content/up-

loads/2008/07/crm_factsheet.pdf)

3. Based on DOE/NETL-402/061308, June, 2008, The

Impact of Advanced Syngas Conversion Technolo-

gies on the Cost of Electricity from Gasication-

based Power Generation Platforms. Numbers were

derived from parameters in the SCPC Baseline

power system example in the LCOE model (Table

1, page 4) with adjustments made for stated capac-

ity and current cost gures for the Duke Cliffside

proposal.

4. Source: CPUC GHG Model Documentation: New

Wind Generation Resource, Cost, and Performance

Assumptions (www.ethree.com/GHG/10%20

RPS%20Assumption s%20v2.doc). Based on Wind

Busbar Levelized Costs by Zone model (Table B)

using a base capital cost of $1,635 /kW installed

capacity. Model inputs adjusted based on the Coal

River Wind Project fact sheet (reference 2).

5. Based on average US residential customer consump-

tion of 920 kWH/month). Source: EIA/DOE Electric

Sales, Revenue, and Price, 2006. http://www.eia.

doe.gov/cneaf/electricity/esr/esr_sum.html

6. Based on the spot market price ($140 per short ton)

and Btu content of Central Appalachia Coal (Big San-

dy/Kanawha 12,500 Btu,1.2 lbSO2/mmBtu) from the

EIAweekly coal report for the week of August 22nd,

2008. Source: http://www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/coal/

page/coalnews/c oalmar.html. Total coal consump-

tion was determined from the DOE/NETLmodel (seereference 3) using a Btu content of 12,500 Btu/lb and

a transportation cost of 25% above minemouth price

(assumption for eastern coal - see reference 3).


editorials

Lttrs to t ditor

ergy by ad for t poplPublic opinion polls are showing a serious problem with the

debate over our future sources of energy: the American peoplestrongly agree on solutions.

Well over 80 percent of Americans consistently agree onrenewable energy and conservation. In poll after poll, peoplestrongly approve of the idea of building a sustainable future fortheir children. They also want America to lead in the kinds of re -newable energy technologies that will make this a better world.

A majority favor conservation, solar, wind, hydro, and bio-fuels. But most Americans dont want new coal or nuclear powerplants.

Whats the problem? In a democracy, when the public strongly

agrees on something, public servants should be scrambling tomake it so.

And yet, the utility industry and the government have man-aged to invert their priorities. Coal and nuclear power dominatetheir plans for our future. There are almost no serious effortsat conservation, and only tiny efforts focused on solar wind orhydro.

What does this enormous gap show? Is it a reection on thestate of our democracy, or the lack of leadership in government,or the lack of innovation in industry, or the potential force behinda consumer revolution?

Our vote goes to all of the above, but one thing stands out.The American people will insist on the right choice.

Pity the fools who try to stand in the way.

Winds of change on Coal RiverAs this issue of Appalachian Voice goes to press, Co-op Amer-

ica has announced that this years Building Economic AlternativesAward will go to the Coal River Mountain Wind Project.The award recognizes the projects determination to harness

economic action for a better world -- using the jobs created bya renewable energy project to save a mountain ecosystem andmountain communities.

The award also highlights the difference between an emergingvision of a strong, healthy Appalachian economy and the devasta-tion that the coal and oil industries would impose.

Given fuel prices at the pump and our deer-in-the-headlightsfederal energy policy, its clear that we need to lift our visions andour voices once again. Its clear we need to create an energy policyas if people and the future mattered.

Were not on unfamiliar ground. This happened in WWII ,when American soldiers were so frequently called on to act in-dependently. It happened in the Civil Rights movement, whenSoutherners longed for a future without hate.

And it is happening now, as we begin to envision a future forour children and grandchildren that doesnt depend on the ruth-less and immoral devastation of Gods creation.

The nation is well served by efforts like the Coal River WindProject. It has shown that independence of thought and spirit isTHE renewable resource in America.

Natural Gas is Responsible

Dear Appalachian Voices,

With reference to your Spring 2008 Ap-

palachian Voice on natural gas drilling As aclean fuel natural gas is reasonably available

in this country. Coal seam gas extraction has

garnered increased attention due to its avail-

ability; but it is NOT a new energy source. In

southern Appalachia, Energen (a large regional

natural gas distributor and driller) has done

extensive drilling in the Alabama region for

at least 20 years. There is a strong movement

in this direction as it is an available resource.

Energy prices have reached levels that make

this resource more exploitable On the positive

side is that technology has become increasingly

effective in drilling. Now this technology needs

to be applied to limiting damages.

There is without question a need to limit

environmental damage. However, drilling is

not as invasive as mining activities as it has a

more constrained footprint. The effort should

be placed on assuring that property ownerrights are respected and that environmental

measures and clean-up are maintained after

drilling ceases. This includes reseeding local

grasses as well as native trees to integrate with

the landscape.

Sincerely

Charles B. Jones Jr.

Knoxville TN

Kudos from NashvilleDear Appalachian Voices,

Thank you for posting your website. At

82+ I read Appalachian Voices and marvel at

the diversied and informative articles in each

issue.

For someone who strongly believes in

history/ heritage /legacy, I congratulate your

efforts!

Keep up your wonderful project! God bless

our nation and you.

Nick Christodoulou

Nashville TN

Note: Mr. Christodoulou grew up in Welch, WV

and has written extensively about the Appalachia of

his youth. He was interviewed about his submarine

service in World War II on usmilitaryhistory.com

podcasts. Look for the podcast episode The Cookand the Scabbardfsh.

Cliffside Power Plant, nC

coalpower

windpower

Appalachian Voice welcomes letters to the editorand comments on our website. We run as manyletters as possible, space permitting. Write [email protected].

Coal river Mtn wind farM

Wind farm campaign for Coal River Mountain

Residents of West Virginias CoalRiver Valley have launched anexciting new campaign to bring awind farm to Coal River Mountain.

Coal River Mountain is one ofthe last mountains left intact in thebeautiful Coal River Valley of WestVirginia. However, Massey Energyhas plans to mine 6600 acres of themountain - almost 10 square miles ofwhat would be the tallest peaks everto be mined in West Virginia.

Fortunately, there is an alternativeto mountaintop removal mining

wind power. This is a uniqueopportunity to move our nation andWest Virginia toward the productionof clean energy, and to preserve ournations mountains for generationsto come.

But the best part of the wind projectis that it could generate electricity at alower cost than a new coal-red power

plant such as Duke Energys proposalfor the Cliffside power station in NorthCarolina. Considering that:

- The cost of building coal-redpower plants has more than doubled

in the last few years;- The price of Central Appalachian

coal is up more than 500% since2000;

- Congress is poised to act onclimate change legislation that woulddrive the cost of coal power evenhigher; can we afford not to invest inclean and renewable energy?

Please visit www.CoalRiverWind.org for more information and to getinvolved. And dont forget to signthe petition and tell your friends todo the same.

Benets of a Coal River

Motai wid farm:

Create Jobs 200 local

employment opportunities during

construction, and 50 permanent jobs

during the life of the wind farm. It

takes only 27 years for a wind farm

to provide a greater number of one-

year jobs than the four surface mines

combined.

Create energy Provide 440MW

or enough energy for 105,000 homes

indenitely, as well as a sustained

tax income that could be used for the

construction of new schools for the

county.

Create eConomiC Potential

Allow for concurrent uses of the

mountain including harvesting of wild

ginseng and valuable forest plants,

sustainable forestry, and mountain

tourism, as Coal River Mountain

is one of West Virginias nest

mountains.

Preserve Heritage Coal

River Mountain has provided for the

people of the Coal River Valley for

generations. A mountaintop removal

mine would block residents from

the mountain and destroy the lands

ancestors once lived on, as well as

the family cemeteries they rest in.

ProteCt tHe land andCommunity More than 500,000

acres in West Virginia alone have

been destroyed by surface mining.

Mountaintop Removal mining buries

and poisons drinking water, increases

ooding, damages homes and

personal property, and devastates

wildlife habitat.

vs.

Nameplate Capacity 800 Mw (1) 440 Mw (2)

Capacity Factor 85% (3) 30% (2)

Annual Operationand Maintenance $49 million

(3) $15 million (4)

Generation 6.0 Million Mwh/year (3) 1.2 Million Mwh/year (4)

Homes Powered 540,000 (5) 105,000 (5)

Cost to Build $1.8 billion (1) $720 million (4)

Annual cost of coal $364 million per year (6) $0

Levelized Costof Electricity 12.6 per kiloatt hour (3) 9.4per kiloatt hour (4)

th g m c



11/13

For or mmbrsFor or mmbrs


We encourage you to patronize members of the Buisness League.To become a business member please visit

www.AppalachianVoices.org or call us toll free at 877 -APP-VOICE

New and Renewing Business League Members JUne 2008-AUGUsT 2008

Black Mountain BooksBlack Mountain, NC

Blue Smoke CoffeeRoasting Co.

Rome, GA

Doe Ridge PotteryBoone, NC

Dulaney Hollow at Old

Rag Mountain B & B Madison, VA

Enter the EarthAsheville, NC

Liberty BicyclesAsheville, NC

M-PrintsBoone, NC

Medicine Man Craft ShopCherokee, NC

Peppers RestaurantBoone, NC

Purple OnionSaluda, NC

Rosettas KitchenAsheville, NC

Solar Age PressPeterstown, WV

Stick Boy Bread CompanyBoone, NC

Sundance MountainLands

Banner Elk, NC

The Dripolater

CoffeehouseBlack Mountain, NC

APPALACHIANVOICES

The Upper Watauga Riv-er just got a new friend.

Donna Marie Lisenby,an award-winning envi-ronmental advocate, beganserving on the staff of Ap-palachian Voices as the rstUpper Watauga Riverkeeperthis June.

Lisenby will be a full-timepublic advocate for the entire watershedincluding the Watauga River, the ElkRiver, Roan Creek and Watauga Lake.

Her job with Appalachian Voices is

to serve as the leading advocate for thehealth of the Watauga River watershedand provide a visible presence on theriver as well as its tributaries.

In effect, she will speak for theriver, its problems and potential solu-tions while ensuring enforcement andcompliance with environmental laws.She will work as investigator, scientist,lawyer, and advocate, protecting thepublics right to clean water and healthysheries.

All Waterkeepers worldwide serve

as the representative of the publicsinterest in clean water and healthysheries by providing testimony, expertopinion and/or presentations at city,county, state and federal proceedingsand meetings.

The Riverkeeper is responsible fororganizing a diverse constituency ofpeople in the upper Watauga Riverdrainage, including water drinkers,swimmers, fishers, boaters, propertyowners, farmers and business owners

for the purposes of 1) expand-ing the number of people whoadvocate for healthy rivers; 2)raising public awareness of Riverissues and; 3) providing trainingfor citizen activists.

Lisenby will also reviewdevelopment activities, facilities

that discharge waste-water and any otherpotential threat to waterquality and quantitythen actively seek solu-tions while facilitating

public education aboutriver issues. It is impor-tant for a Riverkeeper to establish andmaintain relationships with local andstate elected and appointed ofcials,especially local officials engaged inplanning, zoning, enforcement, andother areas directly related to the healthand well being of the river. In additionto partnership approaches, if necessaryto protect the publics right to cleanwater, a Riverkeeper will use litigationand administrative challenges against

polluters and government in appropri-ate circumstances. Through the supportand vision of Appalachian Voices andits members, Lisenby will protect thepublics water from polluters.

One of the many public servicesa Riverkeeper provides is to identifyand respond to citizen complaints soconsistently and diligently that theRiverkeeper becomes recognized by thecommunity as the foremost investigatorof water pollution problems. If you ob-serve water pollution anywhere in theNorth Carolina or Tennessee portions

of the Watauga Lake watershed, pleasecall our tll-fr llut tl at1-877-277-8642.

Mrcry polltioIs the rst concern

Dealing with mercury from coalred power plants is one of the most im-portant issues on the Watauga River.

In 2007, the Tennessee Departmentof Environment and Conservation(TDEC) issued a fish consumption

advisory for Watauga Lake for large-mouth bass and channel catsh due tohigh levels of mercury. Both the EPAand the FDA have established a fishesh limit of .3 parts per million formethylmercury, mercurys most toxicform. Eating sh with methylmercurylevels higher than .3 ppm is consideredpotentially detrimental to the health ofhumans, particularly children. At onesampling site in the Roan Creek embay-ment of Watauga Lake, samples of 15largemouth bass contained an averageof .59 ppm of methylmercury.

That is almost double the safelevel.

The high level of contamination seems

odd for such a pristine mountain lake,located far from pollution sources andbordered by the Cherokee National Forest,several state parks and wildlife manage-ment areas. Yet the U.S. has 1,100 coal-redpower plants that release more than 48 tonsof mercury into the air every year, account-ing for more than 40 percent of airbornemercury emissions in the nation.

Coal-red electric power plants arethe largest source of anthropogenic, orhuman-caused, mercury air emissions inthe United States. Mercury is depositedonto the ground or directly into water-

bodies as fall out from the air emissionsof coal-fired power plants. It can bewashed from the land and carried torivers, streams, and lakes by stormwater.When elemental mercury lands in water,it is transformed to methylmercury, themost toxic form of mercury, by microor-

ganisms found in water and sediment.Small aquatic organisms consume

mercury as they feed, and then theyare eaten by larger and larger animals,with the mercury accumulating at eachstep; this is called bioaccumulation. Fish

that are higher in the food chain, suchas largemouth bass have much highermercury concentrations than sh thatare lower on the food chain. Organicmercury concentrations can be morethan 1,000 times greater in the sh thanin the surrounding water. Humans be-come exposed when they eat sh thatare contaminated with mercury.

High levels of mercury in devel-oping fetuses and young children canirrevocably effect their neurologicaldevelopment leading to developmentdelays and learning disabilities. Babiesare exposed to mercury from their moth-ers blood in the womb, as well as from

breast milk. Mercury poisoning can alsocause lung, kidney, heart, and immunesystem damage. An estimated eight per-cent of women of childbearing age haveunsafe levels of mercury and the leading

mercury researcher at the United States

Environmental Protec-tion Agency estimatesthat 410,000 babies borneach year in the U.S.

have unsafe levels ofmercury. Based on Cen-ters for Disease Control data, the NorthCarolina Department of Health and Hu-man Services recently estimated that atleast 13,677 children per year are bornin NC with blood mercury levels thatplace them at risk for lifelong learningdisabilities, ne motor and attentiondecits, and lowered IQ.

Just 1/70th of a teaspoon of mer-cury can contaminate a 25-acre lake.Partial testing of less than 60% of NorthCarolina waters by the Department ofEnvironment and Natural Resourcesdetermined that 1000 miles of NorthCarolina rivers plus an additional 29,522acres of freshwater lakes, reservoirs andimpoundments are impaired for mer-cury. Mercury impaired more acres ofwater in North Carolina lakes than any

other source including Chlorophyll a,turbidity, high pH, dioxin, nutrients, lowpH and aquatic weeds.

The contamination of WataugaLake and the human health impacts ofmercury led the Watauga Riverkeeperto legally challenge the construction ofa new coal red power plant at Cliffside,NC by Duke Energy. Adding more coalred power plants not only pollutes theair, destroys the Appalachian mountainsthrough the devastating practice ofmountain top removal and contributesto global warming but it also poisonswaterways with the toxic heavy metalmercury. Coal red power plants area quadruple harm to the environment.They must be stopped and after onlytwo months on the job, the WataugaRiverkeeper is doing her part to protectthe Watauga River and its watershedfrom pollution.

Appalachian Voice will be keepingtrack of the Upper Watagua efforts infuture issues, especially sedimentation,which another important problem.

Award wiigRivr Gardia

For the past 10 years, Lisenby servedat the helm of the Catawba RiverkeeperProgram and was recognized as Char-lottes Best Advocate by CharlotteMagazine in May, 2000. She was alsorecognized as a 1999 Guardian of theEnvironment by The Charlotte Ob-server, In addition, she was selected asa recipient of the Charlotte CoalitionsBlue Thumb award.

The Catawba Riverkeeper Programis also the only environmental organiza-tion to receive three Best of CharlotteAwards for Best Effort to Improve theEnvironment in 1999, 2000 and 2004.Other awards include the MountainIsland Lake Marine Commissions Blue

Fin Award for 2003, the Lake James TaskForce Award for Outstanding and Distin-guished Service in 2004, and the 2005 J.H. Mac McSwain Community ServiceAward for exemplary community serviceto the Lake Wateree Community.

In 2005, Ms. Lisenby was elected byher fellow Waterkeepers to serve as a

board member of Waterkeeper Alliance.The Waterkeeper Alliance is the in-

ternational organization led by Robert F.Kennedy, Jr. There are currently 177 lo-cal Waterkeeper Programs in the UnitedStates, Canada, Mexico, Bolivia, Australia,Africa, India, China, Europe and Russia.Waterkeeper Alliance and its member or-ganizations around the globe spend eachday protecting the waterways upon whichall living beings depend. The Alliance ap-proves new Waterkeeper programs andlicenses the use of the Waterkeeper names.

The Waterkeeper program names, suchas Riverkeeper, Lakekeeper, Bay-keeper, Coastkeeper and others, aresynonymous with effective citizen action.

Appalachian Voices Lanches upper WatagaThe law of this nation says that the water

of this country belongs to the people.

Riverkeepers protect the people.

-- Donna Lisenby, as quotedin the High Country Press

Photo by Michael Joslin



12/13


Cogars still

fasciat

Appalacia

atralists

By Noa Davidai

Pop quiz: Which mammal has themost widespread distribution in theWestern Hemisphere? No, its not therat, the squirrel, or even the deer. Itis us, ladies and gentlemanhuman

beings. But this was not always, or

naturally, the case. In the not-so-distantpast, the mammal with the most ex-tensive natural range in the Americaswasa large cat.

This is no ordinary cat. It is a cat ofmystery. A creature often surrounded

by fear and misunderstanding. Andno wonder. We cannot even agree onits name. Sometimes called the Cat ofOne Color, its many aliases include:puma, panther, mountain lion, cougar,as well as catamount (the mascot ofWestern Carolina University).

The cougar (the name preferred byexperts) is the largest of the small cats.It is classied as a small cat because itpurrs like a housecat instead of roar-ing like a lion. Yet this once-commonneighbor of ours is now practicallyeliminated from the Appalachians. Itsmystique is such that locals and visitorsalike constantly claim to have seen one,

much like a ghost in the attic.Should the fate of this cat be of any

concern to those of us living besidethese beautiful mountains?

Through most of his career, biologistand naturalist Donald Linzey has beenhaunted by the intrigue of the cougar. In1963, as a young doctoral student fromCornell, Linzey discovered the marvelsof the Great Smoky Mountains NationalPark as he conducted research there onthe ying squirrel. Subseq uently he

became a park naturalist, then principalinvestigator for endangered speciesresearch in the southern Appalachiansand a biology professor at WythevilleCommunity College in Virginia. Hehas stayed close to the Smokies both inlocation and affection.

In 1978, Linzey organized a con-ference on the Endangered Species

of Virginia, the first one of its kindin the state. It was at this conferencethat his devotio

august 2008 appalachian voice newsletter

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