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The Hudson River: A Natural and Unnatural History
Studies the history, characteristics, and natural wildlife of the Hudson and the ways in which man has enriched or devastated the river
325 pages, Paperback
First published April 1, 1969
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
January 23, 2015
This book is subtitled “A Natural and Unnatural History.” The first three chapters describe the early exploration and takeover by Europeans (Verrazano, Hudson) of New York Harbor and the Hudson River. The Erie Canal, the steamboat era, developing appreciation of the magnificent scenery by artists, landscape architects are nicely though briefly handled. There are whole books on all of the topics for those who want more detail. This is just the curtain-raiser. The next ten chapters cover eight consecutive regions of the river along its length, from the Adirondacks to and including the submarine Hudson Canyon.
For each region we learn some geology, a lot of wildlife, a hefty dose of industrial effects. Boyle, an editor of Sports Illustrated, came at the book as a fisherman. Fish as index species, as quarry for anglers, as the population of the living river, as the victims of careless industrialization and pollution are his strong interest. His interviews with men who make their living fishing in the Hudson (for giant goldfish, among other life forms) are warm and fun. If you liked Matthieson's Men's Lives about Long Island you will enjoy these portraits.
In the section on the Hudson Highlands the book really hits stride. Here, in the only spot in the world where ocean-going freighters, still seventy miles from port, steam past steep rocky hills that rise a thousand feet above tidewater, a large utility proposed in 1963 to build a “pumped storage” plant on Storm King Mountain. The utility purposed to generate electric power by pumping water up the mountain to run it back down through turbines when demand for electricity in New York City peaked. This hare-brained proposal aroused a resistance from environmentalists, fishermen, landowners that fought for seventeen years before the utility gave up. Boyle was intimately involved with this struggle, though the book came out in 1969 when the roller-coaster ride in courts and hearings still had twelve years to run.
Quoting wiki here,
"Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference v. Federal Power Commission, 354 F.2d 608 (2d Cir. 1965) is a United States Second Circuit Court of Appeals case in which a public group of citizens, the Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference, organized and initiated legal action after the Federal Power Commission approved plans for Consolidated Edison to construct a power plant on Storm King Mountain, New York. The Federal regulatory agency had denied that the environmental group could bring action, but the court disagreed, ruling that Scenic Hudson had legal standing because of their "special interest in aesthetic, conservational, and recreational aspects" of the mountain."
From the opinion "In order to insure that the Federal Power Commission will adequately protect the public interest in the aesthetic, conservational, and recreational aspects of power development, those who by their activities and conduct have exhibited a special interest in such areas must be held to be included in the class of 'aggrieved' parties under s. 313 (b). We hold that the Federal Power Act gives petitioners a legal right to protect their special interests.
—Circuit Judge Paul R. Hays, in the court's decision for Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference v. Federal Power Commission[1]
To many people, the later case Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 US 727, decided April 19, 1972 was the watershed case in the history of Environmental Law in the United States. The plaintiffs lost The narrow holding was as follows:
A person has standing to seek judicial review under the Administrative Procedure Act only if he can show that he himself has suffered or will suffer injury, whether economic or otherwise. In this case, where petitioner asserted no individualized harm to itself or its members, it lacked standing to maintain the action.
Justice Douglas’s ringing dissent, however opened a future. The Sierra Club was not the first group to assert that individuals and groups who did not own a property or a resource should be able to defend it against depradation. The action by Scenic Hudson and its many allies. (including the Hudson River Fishermen’s Association) is usually seen as the prolonged gestation and birth of modern Environmental Law in the United States.
Boyle’s book, published in 1969, misses many important advances since in protecting the Hudson. The writer could not foresee the success of Pete Seeger’s Hudson River Sloop, then a-building, nor the founding of Bard College’s Hudsonia for biological research nor the successful actions to prevent nuclear power plants from being built elsewhere on the river than Indian Point nor the establishment of the Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area. He could not have forseen how Scenic Hudson would become a force for conservation-minded land use in the Valley.
For its time and place, this is a masterly combination of natural history, environmental activism and fish conservation. It should be on the shelf of all residents and natives of the Hudson Valley (which includes New York City and New York Harbor) and of everyone who wants a "you were there" account of how Environmental Law broke the chains.
I’d read it years ago, but pulled it for a re-read because the Hudson has suddenly become a route to market for crude oil from North Dakota. Two years ago, no crude was being barged down the river or going in a tanker. Now there are 100- 200,000 bbl (4 -8 million gallons) moving south on a typical day. This boom poses a serious threat to the River even though most of the barges are double-hulled.
For each region we learn some geology, a lot of wildlife, a hefty dose of industrial effects. Boyle, an editor of Sports Illustrated, came at the book as a fisherman. Fish as index species, as quarry for anglers, as the population of the living river, as the victims of careless industrialization and pollution are his strong interest. His interviews with men who make their living fishing in the Hudson (for giant goldfish, among other life forms) are warm and fun. If you liked Matthieson's Men's Lives about Long Island you will enjoy these portraits.
In the section on the Hudson Highlands the book really hits stride. Here, in the only spot in the world where ocean-going freighters, still seventy miles from port, steam past steep rocky hills that rise a thousand feet above tidewater, a large utility proposed in 1963 to build a “pumped storage” plant on Storm King Mountain. The utility purposed to generate electric power by pumping water up the mountain to run it back down through turbines when demand for electricity in New York City peaked. This hare-brained proposal aroused a resistance from environmentalists, fishermen, landowners that fought for seventeen years before the utility gave up. Boyle was intimately involved with this struggle, though the book came out in 1969 when the roller-coaster ride in courts and hearings still had twelve years to run.
Quoting wiki here,
"Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference v. Federal Power Commission, 354 F.2d 608 (2d Cir. 1965) is a United States Second Circuit Court of Appeals case in which a public group of citizens, the Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference, organized and initiated legal action after the Federal Power Commission approved plans for Consolidated Edison to construct a power plant on Storm King Mountain, New York. The Federal regulatory agency had denied that the environmental group could bring action, but the court disagreed, ruling that Scenic Hudson had legal standing because of their "special interest in aesthetic, conservational, and recreational aspects" of the mountain."
From the opinion "In order to insure that the Federal Power Commission will adequately protect the public interest in the aesthetic, conservational, and recreational aspects of power development, those who by their activities and conduct have exhibited a special interest in such areas must be held to be included in the class of 'aggrieved' parties under s. 313 (b). We hold that the Federal Power Act gives petitioners a legal right to protect their special interests.
—Circuit Judge Paul R. Hays, in the court's decision for Scenic Hudson Preservation Conference v. Federal Power Commission[1]
To many people, the later case Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 US 727, decided April 19, 1972 was the watershed case in the history of Environmental Law in the United States. The plaintiffs lost The narrow holding was as follows:
A person has standing to seek judicial review under the Administrative Procedure Act only if he can show that he himself has suffered or will suffer injury, whether economic or otherwise. In this case, where petitioner asserted no individualized harm to itself or its members, it lacked standing to maintain the action.
Justice Douglas’s ringing dissent, however opened a future. The Sierra Club was not the first group to assert that individuals and groups who did not own a property or a resource should be able to defend it against depradation. The action by Scenic Hudson and its many allies. (including the Hudson River Fishermen’s Association) is usually seen as the prolonged gestation and birth of modern Environmental Law in the United States.
Boyle’s book, published in 1969, misses many important advances since in protecting the Hudson. The writer could not foresee the success of Pete Seeger’s Hudson River Sloop, then a-building, nor the founding of Bard College’s Hudsonia for biological research nor the successful actions to prevent nuclear power plants from being built elsewhere on the river than Indian Point nor the establishment of the Hudson River Valley National Heritage Area. He could not have forseen how Scenic Hudson would become a force for conservation-minded land use in the Valley.
For its time and place, this is a masterly combination of natural history, environmental activism and fish conservation. It should be on the shelf of all residents and natives of the Hudson Valley (which includes New York City and New York Harbor) and of everyone who wants a "you were there" account of how Environmental Law broke the chains.
I’d read it years ago, but pulled it for a re-read because the Hudson has suddenly become a route to market for crude oil from North Dakota. Two years ago, no crude was being barged down the river or going in a tanker. Now there are 100- 200,000 bbl (4 -8 million gallons) moving south on a typical day. This boom poses a serious threat to the River even though most of the barges are double-hulled.
October 9, 2016
I was looking forward to this. It's good, but, a bit scientific for my taste. It's not grabbing me like some books do. I've picked up a few other good books that I'm enjoying more than this one. I may skim the rest. I though it would be a cultural history rather than a scientific study of the environment.
March 2, 2016
A must read
December 16, 2017
A little heavy on fishing and fish spawning. Loved the parts about colonial America.
December 2, 2013
Influential milestone in raising awareness of HV ecology.
In the early chapters Boyle paints an idyllic picture of aprimeval forest paradise with sparse native population that livedmainly off the land and needed to engage in limited amount of agriculture. The arrival of the Europeans spelled immediate eruption of violence. Not that there was none among the native tribes.... Boyle continues with a twenty page historical sketch of the HV during the 400 years and the Valley's ecology was affected. After these two chapters he proceeds to describe each stretch of the Hudson starting with the Adirondack region along with the beauty and problems each area. At this point it becomes apparent that Boyle's main interest is fish because of good half of the book is devoted to angling and description of fish. This is somewhat puzzling in this edition in view of the preface that he wrote in 1979, ten years after the first publication of the book that (he) does not "eat any waterfowls taken from the Hudson River south of Hudson Falls because of likely contamination by PCB's or other chemicals." That part is explained in the Epilogue, 1968-1978. The amount of attention devoted to fishing and the warning in the end makes the book seem irrelevant or else a historical curiosity. In addition to the fishing lore which is at times interesting and informative--there are pages devoted to a single species, sturgeon, for example, including a recipe for making caviar, or bass, there is wrangling with industrial polluters, Con Edison, governments, State, Federal, Local who are always in cohoots with those they were to watch. There is the Storm King Mountain fiasco though the first edition of the book came out before that blew over.
In the early chapters Boyle paints an idyllic picture of aprimeval forest paradise with sparse native population that livedmainly off the land and needed to engage in limited amount of agriculture. The arrival of the Europeans spelled immediate eruption of violence. Not that there was none among the native tribes.... Boyle continues with a twenty page historical sketch of the HV during the 400 years and the Valley's ecology was affected. After these two chapters he proceeds to describe each stretch of the Hudson starting with the Adirondack region along with the beauty and problems each area. At this point it becomes apparent that Boyle's main interest is fish because of good half of the book is devoted to angling and description of fish. This is somewhat puzzling in this edition in view of the preface that he wrote in 1979, ten years after the first publication of the book that (he) does not "eat any waterfowls taken from the Hudson River south of Hudson Falls because of likely contamination by PCB's or other chemicals." That part is explained in the Epilogue, 1968-1978. The amount of attention devoted to fishing and the warning in the end makes the book seem irrelevant or else a historical curiosity. In addition to the fishing lore which is at times interesting and informative--there are pages devoted to a single species, sturgeon, for example, including a recipe for making caviar, or bass, there is wrangling with industrial polluters, Con Edison, governments, State, Federal, Local who are always in cohoots with those they were to watch. There is the Storm King Mountain fiasco though the first edition of the book came out before that blew over.
February 3, 2012
A classic. One of the best books ever written about the Hudson River, if not the best. It's interesting to read with the perspective of years between its publication and today. Particularly, the last chapters on the future of the river. He warns of the possibility of exploitation and the risks of then-newly discovered chemical pollution, like PCBs. And he calls for communities to turn toward the river as an asset, for economic development, education and general wellbeing. We've clearly accomplished many of the goals he envisions, yet we are continuing to fight many of the same battles that were relevant then... along with some new ones. Also interesting, and depressing, is to read about the abundance of fish in the river just 30 years ago; while it's more beautiful today, it's arguably far less healthy, at least by that metric.
April 18, 2010
A brilliant recollection of the Hudson River, its history, its tales, its biodiversity and its pollution. A famous book amongst ecologists studying the Hudson. A easy to read and enticing book about biology. I found it unique because although from a good source and scientific, it flowed nicely and wasn't dry. Boyle, writing this in the 70s was a true optimist in the recovery of the Hudson
January 26, 2015
I just started this book. My dad is mentioned six times. So far so good!
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews