Norm Benson

Lowdermilk’s niece diary entry: Africa to Beirut

December 30, 1938 “Elizabeth Moody, age nineteen and very beautiful, accompanied her Uncle, Dr. Walter C. Lowdermilk and family on an official trip for the United States government, using their personal car and paying their own expenses, to study old Roman lands for the benefit of the US soil conservation service, and American farmers toContinue reading “Lowdermilk’s niece diary entry: Africa to Beirut”

Lowdermilk in Fascist Italy – December 1938

Walter Lowdermilk was recruited by Rexford Tugwell in 1933 to serve as the second-in-command of the new Soil Erosion Service, later called the Soil Conservation Service. In 1938, he was tasked with studying how soil affects human life and well-being. He spent two years exploring lands once ruled by the Romans to find answers. ThisContinue reading “Lowdermilk in Fascist Italy – December 1938”

Italy – December 7-11, 1938

Lowdermilk’s 1938 Buick pulled into Italy on December 7, 1938. I’ll let the niece, Elizabeth Moody introduce herself: “Elizabeth Moody, age nineteen and very beautiful, accompanied her Uncle, Dr. Walter C. Lowdermilk and family on an official trip for the United States government, using their personal car and paying their own expenses, to study oldContinue reading “Italy – December 7-11, 1938”

He may be the most influential man you have never heard of—unless you are Israeli.

Lowdermilk believed that restored soil would yield more than crops. Protect the land, manage the water, prevent famine—and allow people to live in harmony with nature and with one another. The land, he was certain, could be redeemed by science and stewardship.

Whether human conflict could be redeemed as well was another matter.

Green Games

I wrote this some time ago. I still like it. It appears we are witnessing the crumbling of the green movement, as we know it. Dr. James Lovelock, who postulated the ‘Gaia hypothesis’ of earth operating as a self-regulating organism, is the latest to stray, if not exactly leave the faith. The listContinue reading “Green Games”

It’s a Plastic World. Part 2: The Plastic Pollution Crisis

Never let a crisis go to waste, even, or especially, if it’s a manufactured one. It’s “plastics versus our planet,” California Environmental Protection Agency secretary Yana Garcia tells the camera. Secretary Garcia invoked the memory of the first Earth Day commemoration to announce California’s new regulations on . In doing so, she mixed politics withContinue reading “It’s a Plastic World. Part 2: The Plastic Pollution Crisis”

It’s a plastic world

Micro- and nanoplastics, found in the plaque within our arteries, are born from the ubiquitous presence of plastics in our environment. They are raising eyebrows and heart rates among scientists and physicians, courtesy of a groundbreaking study in the New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM). Plastic Plague: Unwelcome Guests in Your Arteries? (Chuck Dinerstein, MD,Continue reading “It’s a plastic world”

Forcing Conservation to be Californian’s Way of Life

I will be submitting a letter to California’s State Water Resources Control Board, since the “workshop” went way beyond time and it began to look like I would not get to speak until midnight, if at all. My name is Norm Benson. I am a retired Cal-Fire forester, and until our water plant was purchasedContinue reading “Forcing Conservation to be Californian’s Way of Life”

Making Conservation a California Way of Life – Part Deux

Dear members of the California Water Resources Control Board, Everything I ever needed to know about rules, I learned in kindergarten: don’t hurt other people and don’t take stuff that doesn’t belong to you. Based on these simple principles, I want to convince you that your proposed conservation law, which will be another thorn inContinue reading “Making Conservation a California Way of Life – Part Deux”

Making Conservation a California Way of Life – Part Un

In a Los Angeles Times article in early September came this non-sequitur of a sentence, “The proposed regulation, dubbed “Making Conservation a California Way of Life,” would establish tailored goals for each urban retail water supplier in the state, providing them with more flexibility to account for local conditions, according to the State Water ResourcesContinue reading “Making Conservation a California Way of Life – Part Un”