What I Did: For Amber & Raffi Rose

Dear Amber & Raffi Rose,

 

I am sort of your Great Grandfather, although none of my genes actually had anything to do with you.  But maybe I passed along psychic genes?  If there are such things.  

 

Anyway, here I am.  I am your Great Grandfather (sort of) Mark J. Palmer.  That is my "work public/pen" name, one I have used since the 1970's when I first started working and writing about preservation of the Earth and its inhabitants -- mostly the inhabitants who can't speak for themselves.  Just as you now can't speak for yourself -- you need your Mama and Daddy to speak for you and protect you.  I do that for wild animals and plants and ecosystems.

 

I did it all for you, even though I did not even know you were each going to exist until about 2016 and 2020.  I did it for all the children of the Earth, who hopefully will grow up to enjoy the wild animals and plants and ecosystems that I have tried so hard to protect.  Ain't easy, but I did it.  For you.

 

You may always call me Papa Mark. 

 

I am reading David Brower's only book, Let the Mountains Talk, Let the Rivers Run. Dave was a fascinating guy, and I had the privilege of working with him on several projects.  I considered him one of my mentors when I was young.   I hope someday you read some of Brower's writings, too.  You will learn a lot.

 

My earliest mentor was my great friend Jim Schroeder, who got a spread in Life Magazine in the 1960's when he deliberately fed pigeons in the park, in a deliberate effort to get arrested and oppose the law banning feeding pigeons.  That's how much he liked pigeons.  Sadly, Jim never wrote a book, but he was the most impressive orator I ever saw.  

 

Also, now that I think of it, be sure to find mentors, older people who can help show you the way for your life.

 

Recently, Paul Watson of Sea Shepherd sent me an email, saying he was updating his contact email list.  He wanted to know what "campaigns" I had worked on.  Since I have been working on campaigns about 45 years now (or is it 46?  More like 50 years plus in 2023) that was a lot to ask.  But I decided to try to answer him.  

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Captain Paul, by the way, is famous for buying old boats, re-enforcing them, and ramming them into whaling vessels, to sink them to the bottom.  I have never done anything that wild, although I like to think that through legislation, lawsuits, and advocacy, I have saved quite a bit more wildlife, plants and ecosystems than he has.  Each of us has a different way of operating.

 

So, here is what I wrote Paul.  It is what I have done (more or less):

 

Established Endangered Species Committee of Berkeley (later, when I got more full of myself, the Endangered Species Committee of California) in 1970 on University of CA Berkeley campus.  Campaigned to shut down last whaling station in California (1972); supported listings for first Endangered Species list for California (1971); stopped development for habitat of endangered Santa Cruz Long-toed Salamander, preserving the species; opposed tuna/dolphin fleet; won state protection for mountain lions and tule elk; and Jim Schroeder and I put together the lawsuit “Wildlife Alive v Chickering” (also called the Black Bear lawsuit) that went all the way to the California Supreme Court (where we won a unanimous decision) requiring the CA Dept. of Fish and Game to consider environmental impacts of hunting under the CA Environmental Quality Act.  That court decision came in handy in the future.

 

Sierra Club:  Chair of National Wildlife Committee; Regional Vice President of Northern California and Nevada; Chair for Arctic Campaign Steering Committee (which blocked drive to open Alaska's Arctic Wildlife Refuge coastal plain to oil drilling, protecting caribou calving ground and polar bear denning areas); worked on successful passage of Alaska National Interest Lands Act (protecting an area the size of California (120 million acres) as National Parks, National Wildlife Refuges, and Wilderness Areas); spoke up on RARE II (an inventory of roadless areas potentially available for wilderness); helped pass California Wilderness Act (preserving several thousand acres of California wilderness); Chaired Condor Task Force to oppose captive breeding of condors (one we lost!  Condors have been bred in captivity and released back into California skies, but they are not doing all that well, as we predicted); opposed offshore oil drilling off California (so far, one we won); participated in Mono Lake campaign (success!);  Passage of Suisun Marsh Preservation Act extended protection to California’s largest wetland; More defense of mountain lions, CA ESA, and establishment of Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary; expansion of Henry Coe State Park to be second largest state park in CA; helped organize first and second Japan-American Environmental Conferences, where I spoke about whales.

 

(Remind me someday to tell you how I upstaged famous photographer Ansel Adams with my moose cartoon.)

 

Executive Director of Whale Center, Oakland CA (1983-90): Helped put out ECO at IWC, a daily newsletter as a voice for whales; Ended use of gill nets in CA coastal waters to protect endangered sea otters & harbor porpoises; Establishment of new Marine Sanctuaries (Monterey Bay, Cordell Bank); Worked with Earth Island Institute to develop Dolphin Safe tuna campaign; Lawsuit banning drift nets in north Pacific Ocean (leading to United Nations ban on drift nets worldwide); California and US oil spill prevention acts. On Board of Directors for CA Mountain Lion Foundation, ending mountain lion trophy hunting in CA permanently in 1990 (Prop. 117).

 

Executive Director of California Mountain Lion Foundation (1990-95):  Protection for great white shark (OK, I was slumming); support for funding of non-game programs and habitat protection by CA Fish & Game for thousands of acres of Ecological Preserves and Wildlife Areas; Proposed reintroduction of CA grizzly (not very popular with ranchers, after I saved the mountain lion); Tried to ban bobcat trapping (succeeded a few years ago, although more to go); Conducted studies and campaigns against poaching and deer habitat protection; Launched successful lawsuit to keep the endangered Mohave ground squirrel on CA endangered species list; Defended CA Endangered Species Act (and got fired for it!!).

 

Associate Director, International Marine Mammal Project, Earth Island Institute (1995-present):  Support and defense of Dolphin Safe tuna label; Editor of ECO at IWC; Blocked salt plant in gray whales' San Ignacio Lagoon in Mexico; Widened Dolphin Safe standards to include ban on shark finning, requiring release of sea turtles and sharks alive, etc.; Developed Save Japan Dolphins Campaign & "The Cove" promotion (60% decline in dolphins killed so far) – I was a consultant on the Academy Award-winning “The Cove” and appear in the Taiji episode of “Blood Dolphins” on Animal Planet; Managed successful series of lawsuits against US National Marine Fisheries Service on Dolphin Safe tuna label; Got kicked out of Inter-American Tropical Tuna Commission by government of Mexico for defending dolphins; Developed campaign against SeaWorld, ending breeding of captive orcas through CA Coastal Commission; Blocked import of beluga whales from Russia to US aquariums; Developed ongoing campaign against Japan's whaling and dolphin hunting re: 2020 Olympics.  Much More to come....

 

I am still at it.  I should also mention for you that I earned a BA degree at the University of California at Berkeley, CA, in Zoology and Paleontology (my first love at an early age was for dinosaurs), and did a couple of years of graduate work in Biology at San Francisco State University.  Although, really, most of my work through the years has been politics, not biology -- how to keep people from killing things and destroying wilderness and habitats.  Not as easy as it looks.

 

And I have done a lot of other stuff:  editing books, taking up photography, writing and editing a lot (though no books so far, except for the editing bit), visiting loads of far off places, leading whale watching trips, camping and backpacking outdoors, swam with wild dolphins, collecting books (I love reading), DVDs (I love movies), and toy soldiers (I love putting together models, painting them, and playing with them).  I have also done a great deal of partying and drinking (though gave up alcohol in 1986 -- my liver has thanked me ever since), and other rather wild and crazy things.  I even got married, to your Great Grandmother Ginny.

 

And yes, it was all mostly for me.  But it was also for you.

 

For you two are my Great Granddaughters, and I hope you both get to do everything I did and more.  I know we will be great friends, and that I will come visit you, and you will come visit me in California.  And we will write and Zoom and call one another and who knows what electronic communication in the future?  

 

Ask you father Jack about Greece and all the broken pots!!  Or my accidentally dropping him on his head at Glastonbury!  (I’ve done a lot of reading, trips, and photography involving archeology and ancient history, of late.)

 

With love for you, Amber and Raffi Rose, 

 

From your Papa Mark