I’m starting to read A Crack in The Edge of the World: America and the Great California Earthquake of 1906,
because my mother was in that earthquake, and because it’s the kind of
thing I like to read. But it turns out there’s a bonus: in the third
chapter the author, Simon Winchester, is laying out the times the
country was in when the earthquake occurred. My mother was born in
August, 1900. According to Winchester, that was the year mass production
of automobiles began in this country. In 1901, William McKinley was
assassinated at the Pan-Pacific Exposition in Buffalo, New York, and
Theodore Roosevelt became president: “His dream was for Americans to
dominate in particular the Pacific Ocean...and to create in San
Francisco a base for a naval force that would secure America’s supremacy
forever.” In 1903, the Wright Brothers flew their first airplane. So
the quake was one of a series of changes that was jarring the populace.
Malvina’s father was still in the Navy when Roosevelt made his
pronouncement; he soon finished his third enlistment and started the
family tailor shop in San Francisco, making uniforms for school children
and for the sailors that were based in and passing through the city.
And now I have running through my head Leonard Cohen’s “There is a
crack, a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in.”
I
am happy to say that my friend and collaborator Judy Fjell, who is in
Japan teaching singing games to English teachers and students, survived
the typhoon and earthquake there just fine, with only a change in travel
plans when the trains weren’t running.
A couple days later:
Just
got back from a walk at the Marina with Judy, who needed some exercise
and fresh air to recover from Tokyo-to-SF jet lag. Beforehand, we went
online and I was able to show her the huge Mother Earth puppet that
Somos Mayfair brought to this morning’s demonstration.
Photo by John KokoskaIt reminded me of the goddess puppet Judy’s friends made at her Summersing music camp. This one’s been to a single-payer health care rally in Montana.
This
morning’s demonstration was against Chevron, which wants to expand its
refinery in Richmond, thereby expanding its pollution of Bay Area air.
The (Green Party) mayor of Richmond was there, and the Chicana dancers
with the puppet, an African-American rapper, Asian demonstrators against
the dictatorship in Burma which Chevron is helping prop up, and most of
the volunteers were quite young, which is encouraging. I got there too
late for the Native American drumming and everybody-in-the-circle dance.
As usual, pollution is worse where poor people and people of color
live. Here’s a pertinent message from Green for All about that.
I
left before the start of the march from the demonstration at the
Richmond BART station to the refinery itself. While the entertainment
and speeches were going on, there was non-violent training for the
planned civil disobedience at the refinery. Reminded me of the olden
days (the eighties) when we were demonstrating against nuclear
development at Livermore Labs.
And
before that, in 1963, my mother wrote a song to be used in
demonstrations against the building of a nuclear power plant at Bodega
Head on the California Coast:
Take It Away
The
Pacific Gas and Electric Company planned to build a nuclear plant on
Bodega Head north of San Francisco, quite near to an earthquake fault. A
large group of concerned people, headed up by Malvina’s friend J. B.
Neilands and other professors at the University of California at
Berkeley, were able to stop it.
We've got to take over P. G. E.,
It's become a dreadful pest.
It's spreading atomic poison stuff
Over all the Golden West.
They're starting a plant at Bodega,
A place that was wild and pure,
They call it an atomic park,
But it's an atomic sewer.
TAKE IT AWAY, TAKE IT AWAY,
There's a killer gang at the very top
Of P. G. and E. today.
We need that electric power
To make our country run,
But what's the use of electric juice
When the people all are gone.
There's a killer gang at the very top
Of P. G. and E. today.
We need that electric power
To make our country run,
But what's the use of electric juice
When the people all are gone.
All around Eureka town
Dosimeters are set,
To see, when the plant gets running,
What kind of a dose we'll get.
The primary school is across the road
From where the smoke will roll,
And there's two little dosimeters
On the schoolhouse electric pole.
Dosimeters are set,
To see, when the plant gets running,
What kind of a dose we'll get.
The primary school is across the road
From where the smoke will roll,
And there's two little dosimeters
On the schoolhouse electric pole.
They have public relations men
Could fascinate the birds,
They even hypnotize themselves
With their own delightful words.
There'll never be an accident
To set the state in flames,
They never speak of an accident,
"Excursion" is the name.
Could fascinate the birds,
They even hypnotize themselves
With their own delightful words.
There'll never be an accident
To set the state in flames,
They never speak of an accident,
"Excursion" is the name.
P. G. and E. buys lots of stuff
And local business booms;
They also buy officials
In those jolly smoke-filled rooms.
The A. E. C., the P. U. C.,
The county board and all,
They shake a leg and sit up and beg
At Gas and Electric's call.
And local business booms;
They also buy officials
In those jolly smoke-filled rooms.
The A. E. C., the P. U. C.,
The county board and all,
They shake a leg and sit up and beg
At Gas and Electric's call.
There's a rock fault at Bodega
Where many a quake has been,
And that's the very site they choose,
To put their reactors in.
There used to be an iron rule
For a plant of stone and steel,
But now they've got a quickie job
You could stave in with your heel.
Where many a quake has been,
And that's the very site they choose,
To put their reactors in.
There used to be an iron rule
For a plant of stone and steel,
But now they've got a quickie job
You could stave in with your heel.
It's time we kicked these bandits out
And took their toys away.
Lord knows it's we that foot the bills
With the taxes that we pay.
The subsidies pay half the cost,
Our gas bills pay the rest,
And we need our own great power plant
To save the Golden West.
And took their toys away.
Lord knows it's we that foot the bills
With the taxes that we pay.
The subsidies pay half the cost,
Our gas bills pay the rest,
And we need our own great power plant
To save the Golden West.
Take it away, take it away,
From the killer gang at the very top
Of P. G. and E. today.
We need electric power
To make our country run,
And we'll produce that electric juice
In a company of our own.
From the killer gang at the very top
Of P. G. and E. today.
We need electric power
To make our country run,
And we'll produce that electric juice
In a company of our own.
Words and music by Malvina Reynolds; copyright 1963 by Schroder Music Company, renewed 1991.
They
stopped it then, but I’m afraid the nuclear power industry is at it
again, and it’s just as wrong-headed as ever. Trying to use climate
change as an excuse to get going again.
©2009 by Nancy Schimmel
Photos ©2009 by John Kokoska
Saturday, August 15, 2009
EARTHQUAKES AND OTHER DISASTERS/OPPORTUNITIES
