Marjory Stoneman Douglas Dedication to the Florida...

The Everglades; a treasured river Marjory Stoneman Douglas (April 7, 1890 – May 14, 1998) was an American journalist, writer and environmentalist known for her staunch defense of the Florida Everglades against draining and development. Moving to Miami as a young woman to work for The Miami Herald, Douglas became a freelance writer, producing over a hundred short stories that were published in popular magazines. Her most influential work was the book The Everglades: River of Grass (1947), which redefined the popular conception of the Everglades as a treasured river instead of a worthless swamp. Published the same year as the formal opening of Everglades National Park, the book was a call to attention about the degrading quality of life†¦show more content†¦A concrete network of canals was designed to bring water from the lake area to surrounding farmland in the dry season. Florida was becoming a booming area and more people came and more acres of the Everglades were cleared for farms, ranches, housing, roads, and railways. And more and more; the Everglades were dying (Miami Museum of Science, 1995). Douglas was quickly drawn into the debate over the future of the Everglades. Many people, including Floridas governor, Napoleon Bonaparte Broward, were in favor of draining the Everglades. But others, like Frank Stoneman, disagreed. Marjorys father, Frank Stoneman supported the preservation of the Glades, an idea that made the developers furious. He wanted this wilderness area to be left untouched. Her earliest notions about the Everglades came directly from her father. She became convinced that the Glades should be preserved in a natural state. She joined a committee to establish the area as a national park, which would give the Everglades the protection of the federal government. Finally there was a public outcry for change. Now that it was almost too late, wrote Marjory, men began to realize that the water supply was never just a local problem. The Everglades were one vast unified harmonious whole in which the old subtle balance which was destroyed needed to be replaced or restored (Bryant pg 57, 1992). A new, scientific study of the region recommended