In 1958, researchers from the University of Louisville and the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission gathered at a lock on the Monongahela River for routine collecting, counting and comparing of fish species.
At the time, the best way to accomplish this was what’s called lock chamber sampling, or filling a 350-by-56-foot lock with river water, injecting it with cyanide and waiting for the dead fish to float to the top. Archaic, but effective.
On this particular day, researchers opened the chamber to find one fish inside.
One fish.
It shouldn’t have been surprising, said Jerry Schulte, a biologist who managed the source water protection and emergency response team for the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission [ORSANCO] for more than two decades. After all, the steel companies that dotted the region’s riverbanks were dumping their contaminated water right into the rivers. The waterways were so acidic that the steel-hulled boats meant to last 20 years rusted out in three and the pH routinely measured less than 4.
At the time of her launch in June of 1958, the Edmund Fitzgerald was the largest vessel of her kind. At a length of 729 feet long and 75 feet wide, and equipped with a 7,500 horsepower steam turbine engine, she had the ability to carry an incredible 27,500 tons of cargo.
She and her crew served the Great Lakes for 17 years, until November 10th, 1975. It was on that day, according to the famous tune by Gordon Lightfoot, that the “Witch of November came stealin’.”
That tragic November day marks the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Click here to see underwater video of the wreck.
Eastern Hellbender will be increased in protection from special concern to threatened species, while the Bald Eagle will no longer be threatened but will be of special concern. I think this is good from a species protection perspective -- we should only be protecting those needed to be protected, and adding and removing species based on their recovery or loss.
Early in the 19th Century two families, the Allens and Kathans, settled in the Southern Adirondack Mountains of New York State. By 1960's their descendants had isolated themselves in a remote hollow high in the mountains. Below lay the great Sacandaga Valley. Its rich lands rapidly filled with farms, factories and mills.
By the end of the century, the Allens and the Kathans had intermarried: all the residents in the Hollow were related. Because of their isolation, misunderstandings developed between them and the outside world.
The economic disasters of the 1930s shut down the factories and mills. In 1932 the Sacandaga River was dammed, flooding the fertile valley below the Hollow. Forced from their homes, the valley residents sought employment elsewhere, but the Allens and Kathans chose to remain up in the mountains.
On a small mountain ridge known as the Hollow, in the foothills of the Adirondacks, indoor plumbing was first installed six years ago and many people still do not have telephones.
There may be a few signs of modernization in the area, which social workers call the Appalachia of the North: Subsistence farmers no longer keep animals inside their homes. Sales people sometimes venture in now. And more parents are sending their children to school, although they say heavy snow on the mountain roads often keeps them from reaching classes during the long winters.
Still, most people in the Hollow, home to several hundred descendants of two farming families that settled here in the early 19th century, continue to make their living as the woodsmen and trappers they have been for nearly 200 years, selling firewood or serving as guides. Few apply for social services, and the authorities rarely intervene in their lives. There are no officials, no leaders, elected or otherwise, in the Hollow, which is 35 miles north of Saratoga Springs and is in the town of Day in the northwestern corner of Saratoga County, bordering Warren County.
The location of Allentown can be found on Google Maps.
During a recent discussion concerning pre-Civil War roads in the Adirondacks I mentioned to a friend that I am amazed by the number of people who insist on calling certain roads “Old Military Roads” even though they never had a military purpose.
NORTH HUDSON, N.Y. -- Frontier Town, the state’s newest Adirondack campground, opened June 28 with promises to be a “unique, world-class” facility for traditional tent campers, RVers and equestrian campers alike.
So far tent campers and RVers have embraced Frontier Town. Horse riders not so much.
“It’s a lovely facility, but it’s just not well-designed for horse campers,” said Dan Gruen, trails council chairman for the New York State Horse Council, who visited the campground when it was finished and said he has spoken to more than dozen campers who’ve been there since.