Voices for the Environment - Episode 1: A Preservationist Spirit

The Berkeley Remix

Episode 1: A Preservationist Spirit The podcasts for "Voices for the Environment: A Century of Bay Area Activism" are part of a Bancroft Library Gallery exhibition at UC Berkeley. This exhibit charts the twentieth-century evolution of environmentalism in the San Francisco Bay Area through the voices of activists who galvanized public opinion to advance their causes—from wilderness preservation, to economic regulation, to environmental justice. The "Voices for the Environment" exhibition was curated by UC Berkeley's Oral History Center and is free and open to the public from Oct. 6, 2023 to Nov. 15, 2024, in The Bancroft Library Gallery, located just inside the east entrance of The Bancroft Library. You can visit the "Voices for the Environment" exhibit website at ucberk.li/VoicesExhibit (case sensitive) Episode 1: A Preservationist Spirit. This podcast episode accompanies a section of the 'Voices for the Environment" exhibition that explores how, after the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, demands to rebuild San Francisco targeted the state’s ancient and fire-resistant redwood trees, while desires for a reliable water supply called for damming the Hetch Hetchy Valley within Yosemite National Park. In the decades that followed, an outpouring of activism shaped the ensuing conflict between economic development and environmental protection, and fueled a preservationist spirit in the Bay Area that would only grow over the century. This podcast episode features historic interviews from the Oral History Center archives in The Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley, including segments from the "Growing Up in the Cities" collection recorded in the late 1970s by Frederick M. Wirt, as well as oral history interviews with Carolyn Merchant recorded in 2022, with Ansel Adams recorded in the mid-1970s, and with David Brower recorded in the mid-1970s. The oral history of William E. Colby from 1953 was voiced by Anders Hauge, and the oral history of Francis Farquhar from 1958 was voiced by Ross Bradford. This episode also features audio from the film Two Yosemites, directed and narrated by David Brower in 1955. This episode was narrated by Sasha Khokha of KQED Public Radio and The California Report Magazine. This podcast was produced by Todd Holmes and Roger Eardley-Pryor of the Oral History Center of The Bancroft Library at UC Berkeley, with help from Sasha Khokha of KQED. The album and episode images were designed by Gordon Chun. A written version of this podcast is available at https://update.lib.berkeley.edu/2023/10/03/podcast-episode-1-a-preservationist-spirit-in-the-bancroft-gallery-exhibit-voices-for-the-environment-a-century-of-bay-area-activism/ Visit the Oral History Center at ucblib.link/OralHistoryCenter (case sensitive)