The ADK-Connection
Some may have heard in the past at Schoharie Crossing, we’ve discussed at times the connection of the Adirondack Park and the Erie Canal. In fact the canal system is given some modicum of credit for the ultimate decision of the New York State legislature to create the forest preserve that has evolved into what we know today as the Adirondack Park.
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| Algonquin Lake & the Wright Peaks - National Geographic |
As Philip G. Terrie
mentions in his book Contested Terrain: A
New History of the Nature and People of the Adirondacks, by mid-19th
Century the Adirondack region was less densely populated as much of the rest of
New York. The growth of the populace in
the state had been born by an immigrant influx in the early decades of the
century that was in part an effect of the Erie and Champlain Canals. Within what is now the Adirondack Park, the
population was not so much increased and it remained mostly New England and New
Yorker born according to census data. In
fact, within those years following the American Revolution from
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| Verplanck Colvin |
Following the 1872 establishment of
the Yellowstone National Park,
a comprehensive survey of the mountainous region of northern New York was
called for. The surveyor, Verplanck Colvin
would be given the task and often drive his crew to near mutiny in its
execution. The team traced the source of
the Hudson River to a
small pond on the side of New York’s tallest mountain – Mount Marcy. Colvin’s 1874 report urged the creation of
the Adirondack region into a park to the State Legislature. In it he was to “show that the practical
continuance of the canals, or their enlargement, for shipping purposes, whether
it be the Erie, the Champlain, or the Black River, depends in the future, as it
does almost entirely at present on the numerous rivers of the wilderness…” To continue economic growth and prosperity,
the region must be protected as “destruction [of] vast forest which covers from
three to five thousand square miles of Northern New York…” would also destroy
the resource of the geological advantages the state possessed and benefited
greatly from. In Paul
Schneider’s work, The Adirondacks: A
History of America’s First Wildness he covers this concept in exploring the
origins of the Park within the larger context of the exploitation of the Adirondack
region’s resources.
Schneider discusses the impact that
the logging and mining industries in particular had on the ecological systems
of the state. Tax defaulting and land skipping schemes were the normal modes of
operation for logging companies at that time; while mining operations not only
stripped mountains of minerals and metals but also of their timber in order to
make charcoal for smelting
ore. Companies would buy land – often at
tax sale – then strip them of their resources quickly before they defaulted on
taxes without a single payment. By the
late 1800’s an area of nearly 1.75 million acres had felt the full wrath of
industrialized man. These acres that Colvin had surveyed were
again recommended to be protected as a refuge and on May 15th 1885, Governor David Hill
signed the first legislative action in a two part series that would establish
the Forest Preserve to “be
forever as wild forest lands.” More
consolidating and structure would be needed to secure the watershed of the
Mohawk and Hudson Rivers.
New York State had begun the
practice of acquiring land in the Adirondack region by the 1870’s, foremost to
stem the tide of corrupt company practices of tax defaulting on lands just to
pick them up at a cheaper price while profiting greatly from the timber. From 1872 to 1884 the State lands grew from
40,000 acres to 700,000 acres. As Philip
G. Terrie points out, the years between 1825 and the 1860’s –fueled by the
canal system and railroads- brought an era of travelers, tourists and shifting
settlements of populations across the state as well as nation. The Adirondacks saw a new class of traveler
into the region, but with the movement of people there was also the movement of
ideas, culture and innovation. Early
logging of the virgin Adirondack forest was mostly for particular species of
trees such as pine for lumber or hemlock for tanning. By the later decades of the 19th
century a chemical process to create pulp
from timber transformed the approach to felling trees and along with a swell in
the paper industry the region saw greater devastation as selective logging
became a process of the past. Every tree
could be utilized now for either pulp or to be turned into charcoal
for the iron industry. Much of the
eastern Adirondacks suffered the worse of this methodology – directly affecting
the water levels of the Hudson and eastern section of the Erie
Canal.
George Perkins Marsh
published Man and Nature; or, Physical
Geography as Modified by Human Action in 1864 outlining the impact on what
we would call the ecosystem of the Mediterranean region due to the abuse of its
resources, the felling of its timber and transformation of its landscape. In particular Marsh called out the
deforestation as direct cause to the climate change of the region. Decades later and half way around the world,
it seemed the very same was occurring in New York. The healthy forested mountains that once
retained moisture from rain and melting snow were now gasping wastelands.
The Adirondack
region, prior to the 1870’s had, despite the logging and mining, remained
healthy enough to provide the gradual release of water into the overall system
of creeks, streams and rivers. A series
of devastating wildfires during seasons of drought in the later portion of the
decade fueled by the brush and bark remains of logging, added to the overall apocalyptic
landscape. With millions of acres of tree’s now gone, “the runoff occur[ed]
rapidly, [causing]…alternating flood and drought.”
It was then that the “transportation
interested feared…such a disruption” as the viability of the waterway came into
serious consideration. By 1892, pressure
from early preservationists, fire insurance companies, shipping interests and
hydro-powered mill companies achieved pressuring the stagnant New York State
Legislature to approve greater protection of the Adirondack
region. Governor Roswell P.
Flower signed an act that provided increased protection of 2.8 million
acres within the Blue Line. The park was to “be forever reserved,
maintained and cared for as ground open for the free use of all the people for
their health and pleasure, and as forested
lands necessary to the preservation of the headwaters of the chief rivers of
the state…”* - and in the case of the Erie Canal, an
artificial river as much as any other.
This act of legislation unfortunately
consisted of little bark and even less bite…
Just two years later New York State
was in the process of writing a revised State Constitution. Years of drought, forest fires and advocacy
from wealthy industrialists fearing economic shortages caused by decreased
shipping on low rivers meant the insertion of Article 7 Section 7 that banned
lumber harvesting to protect the future of the Empire State.
*Emphasis
Added
Are you a member of Meetup.com? There's a great meet up planned for Saturday, July 9th to paddle the Schoharie Creek &...
Posted by Schoharie Crossing State Historic Site on Monday, March 28, 2016
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