"Conserving the Commonwealth" is the book that anyone interested
in conservation and environmental issues has been waiting for. This
history describes the earliest days of Virginia's environmental
movement, recounting the efforts of a farsighted group of leaders
to preserve Virginia's priceless resources--open land, waterways,
and historic sites--and to create new parks within reach of all the
state's citizens.
In 1965, Governor Albertis Harrison selected State Senator
FitzGerald Bemiss to chair a commission-the Virginia Outdoor
Recreation Study Commission-to make recommendations for improving
the state's outdoor recreation facilities. Inspired by Bemiss's
leadership and a newly awakened concern for the environment, the
commission reached far beyond its mandate, addressing the entire
range of the Commonwealth's natural and man-made resources: open
land, pristine waterways, and historic buildings. The result was
Virginia's Common Wealth, a publication that inspired the
environmental movement for the balance of the twentieth century and
served as the framework for Virginia's public efforts to conserve
its natural and historic resources.
Bemiss gained powerful advocates for Virginia's environment in
governors Linwood Holton and Gerald L. Baliles, delegate Tayloe
Murphy, attorney George Freeman, and law professor A. E. Dick
Howard. Beyond the public administrative and legal history of
governmental environmental efforts, "Conserving the Commonwealth"
recounts the efforts of private groups such as the Virginia chapter
of The Nature Conservancy, the Piedmont Environmental Council, the
Chesapeake Bay Foundation, and the APVA Preservation Virginia,
which all fought valiantly to preserve Virginia's fragile open
spaces and irreplaceable historic sites and buildings. The book
also points out that in spite of all those early efforts, the state
of Virginia's environmental health today is deeply threatened.
In his afterword, FitzGerald Bemiss reflects on the continuing
need for regional planning, an efficient public transportation
system, and funding for existing programs. Three appendices provide
tabular information on Virginia's state parks and conservation
easements, and include the text of a 1965 article by FitzGerald
Bemiss on urban political needs. The book will be of interest to
planners, environmentalists, and preservationists, and to all who
care about preserving Virginia's natural resources.