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May 13, 2010
By Sandy Pharr and Janisse Ray | The Darien News
After one full decade, James Holland retired as the Altamaha Riverkeeper,
effective May 1.
“I believe that during the past 10 years, we did an exceptional
job of bringing environmental awareness to the citizens of Georgia,” he
said.
“We offered many programs to churches, garden clubs, Rotary
Clubs and many other organizations throughout the Altamaha River watershed
and coastal area.”
In addition to educating the public, the Altamaha Riverkeeper worked
very hard to better improve water quality for the people and wildlife
that share it.
“There were times when I wondered if we were making any progress,” said
Holland. “But, when I’d take the time to reflect on the
wetlands and marshes that still exist because we stopped improper use
of them, it is amazing what we accomplished.”
He went though some rough times as the Altamaha Riverkeeper.
“The city of Cochran put me in jail for doing my job up there,” he
said.
“And, there was an instance in McIntosh County when some citizens
tried to lie me into jail regarding the Young Man Road destruction
site.”
And, then there were all the good times.
“I would go into the schools and make environmental presentations
and then field the children’s questions at the end of the program,” said
Holland. “Our children are very smart and are much more aware
of the environmental conditions around them than kids were when I was
growing up.”
Looking into the future, he said one of the main things that is going
to be troublesome for ARK in the will be funding.
“I only hope that everyone will get behind the Altamaha Riverkeeper and
donate whatever they can afford so this great organization will remain viable
on into the foreseeable future,” he said.
A new Riverkeeper will be hired, and he will help train the person
who takes his place.
But, many believe that Holland can never be replaced.
On May 1, more than 250 well-wishers attended his retirement party,
where there were performances by musician, Randall Bramblett, and aerial
dancer, Susan Murphy.
Janisse Ray read an original composition she wrote especially for
the occasion. Following are a few excerpts from “Our River’s
Keeper,” which the author read to Holland, who was a crabber
by trade for many years:
“You are working these waters, motoring in your old boat from float to
float. You haul up the trap and take from it the crabs you are allowed to take,
returning the rest to forage through the delta mud. The numbers in the coolers
speak. They are down, 300 pounds, 225, 175. Every year they fall. You remember
1,500 pounds in a day. To watch it simply vanish is a sin against God.
“The voice of the voiceless speaks, and sitting in your rocking boat,
you begin to listen. First, there was a language to learn; a language with
that had long, scientific, technical, academic, political words, and lots of
initials, like DNR, EPD, MOA. You had to learn it all; you who never had a
chance to go to college; you who had known nothing except hard work all your
life.
“But, by God, you would understand what the people who had the river
by the throat were saying. You would learn more than you thought you ever could.
You could’ve been a biologist. You could’ve been a lawyer. You
could have been a writer or a public official. But, we needed you on the ground,
on the water. We needed you standing in front of people at public meetings.
We needed you to be our river’s keeper.
“Poor people live up and down the Altamaha. Some of us are badly educated,
even ignorant. We throw car tires and deer carcasses in the creeks. We dump
trash and other bad stuff in the river. We cut down trees. If we could understand
a car engine, we could understand a river system, and for it to run, it needs
all its parts; and the parts have to be clean, in good working order and they
need fuel.
“Industry takes advantage of our ignorance, our silence, our consuming
worries. It takes the fish, it takes the forests, it dumps copper and arsenic
into the water, it builds coal plants that fill the air with mercury that drifts
down into the river. It tries to build poultry processing plants. It tries
to build waste incinerators and biomass plants.
“You travel up and down the river talking to people. You speak
our language. You talk to chambers of commerce, city councils and county
commissions. You talk to college, high school and elementary classes.
You go to Atlanta, to Athens, to Dublin, to Brunswick, to Jesup.
You go to Hazlehurst, Ludowici, Macon, Lumber City, Everett City; to
Savannah, Baxley, Odum, Gardi. Up and down the river, in and out of
the watershed you go.
“As you go, you watch over the river, like the angels fly over, watching.
You find bad things. People who also care, who have been educated to understand
that assaults against nature are assaults against human beings.
“Everywhere you go, testing the waters with your kits, testing for fecal
coliform and worse -- you see these bad things, and you take pictures. A blackwater
creek ruined by logging, a slough being filled with construction and demolition
material. A town’s sewage pipe, stringy stuff hanging from vegetation
downstream. You send the pictures to us.
‘Y’all be the judge and the jury,’ you say.
“You had two good feet, you had a truck, you had a boat. Only private
property would stop you, as you learned after an overnight in a Cochran jail.
“You send pictures of a paper mill discharge pipe, images of foam and
purple water. A year later you send more pictures. After many years you send
more pictures – ‘Still nasty as all hell,’ you say. You test
a creek where a dairy farm runs off. The fecal coliform count is 24,000 colonies
per 100 millileters (safe contact for humans is 200).
“The pictures keep coming: clearcutting, illegal boat ramps,
a beheaded alligator floating belly-up, a deer carcass in the water,
improper stream crossing during timber operations, deep rutting, illegal
ditching, a stream destroyed by a road. ‘Shame on the person
who did this’ and ‘How to
ruin a perfect day,’ you write. ‘He needs to be in jail
along with his cohorts and if I can help him get there, I will sleep
good at night.’
“No polluter or destroyer could hide from you, and when they tried, with
backwoods abominations and ‘No Trespassing’ signs, you
took to the air.
You began to litigate, and to win. The river began to win. A people
began to reconcile themselves with their landscape, their home, and
with each other. A river joined us. A people began to reconcile themselves
with God.
“In the end, the travesty was too much even for your calm and rational
mind, too much for your immensely capacious heart. You couldn’t keep
focusing on tragedies. Now, you send pictures of beautiful things, wild things,
rare things, endangered things. Tiger swallowtail butterflies, wood storks
constructing nests, raccoons washing food, water hyacinth, gulf frittillaries,
roseate spoonbills, sunning alligators, four wood ducklings on a log. ‘Even
when I was seeing the degradation, I saw that beauty was still there,’ you
said.
“We have a story to tell. The story is about a river that is stunning
in its magnitude and in its biodiversity. It is about a man who turned his
tenacious mind and undistracted gaze upon that body of water and decided that
he would clean it up, and who, in the process, became a stellar photographer.
The story is about the creation of a group of advocates in a part of the United
States that had not known environmental advocacy, and a litany of successes
that built an environmental ethic and caused this deeply beloved sedimentary
river to run cleaner out of Georgia, into the sea.
“The story is the story of the transformation that is possible if one
wakes up to the beauty and wonder of the earth, if one fears not, if one follows
the path of his heart. The story of the transformation that is possible if
people join together and decide to protect something they love. With love,
all things are possible.
“James, we stand before you to thank you for listening to the call of
the wild. You, champion of rivers; conqueror of polluters and destroyers; defender
of wild things; campaigner for justice. What you give us is hope. You make
us want to fight. You inspire us. You are a warrior and you are fighting and
we fall in step beside you. You perform miracles in front of our eyes. Watching
you is watching the monarch emerge from her cocoon and take off over the tips
of the milkweed.
“You’ve given this place a fighting chance. You gave
it and you gave us the greatest gift a person could give, life itself,
and almost 11 years of ceaseless labor and unflinching dedication to
this grand corner of creation that is the Altamaha watershed. We are
humbled by your service.
We are honored. The words are woefully inadequate,
but they are all we have to say: Thank you.”
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Thanks to Everyone
Who Made This Party Possible
Upon his retirement,
the Altamaha River’s keeper
receives a well-deserved tribute
By Sandy Pharr and Janisse Ray | The Darien News | May 13, 2010
James
Holland's Retirement Party Photos
...and more
photos
"Our River's Keeper, Tribute to James Holland Upon His Retirement" by
Janisse Ray
View Invitation
Initiative to Protect
Jekyll Island creates slides in honor of James' work
Interview with James Holland - Part One
Interview with James Holland - Part Two
News Stories on James Holland's upcoming retirement
Altamaha Riverkeeper founder to retire
By S. HEATHER DUNCAN | Macon.com | 2-19-10
Altamaha Riverkeeper retiring 10-year post
But James Holland will still be involved with the river, photographing
its beauty.
By Teresa Stepzinski | Jacksonville.com |
2-21-10
Tribute to James Holland, Altamaha Riverkeeper
on his retirement
by Pierre Howard | The Georgia Conservancy
2-22-10
Founder of Altamaha Riverkeeper
Retires.
(pdf) The Darien News | 2-19-10
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