Cuyahoga River Fire Essay

916 Words2 Pages

Humans have interacted with our planet and its glorious sights and resources in both negative and positive ways; some ways have a negative effect on our land but a positive effect on our economic progression and visa versa. Unfortunately the Cuyahoga River has been made famous because of its complications that have been caused, which has created not only economical problems but environmental problems all throughout its troubled history and is still being fixed to this day. The Cuyahoga River is a river full of antiquity at the length of a mighty one-hundred miles that winds throughout Northeast Ohio, right in the heart of the Cuyahoga Valley National Park. Before its unfortunate known past of pollution and extemporaneous fires it drew in …show more content…

Surprisingly this was not the first time that the river caught fire; it caught fire going all the way back to the twentieth century and catching fire on several other occasions. These fires only seemed to attract very little if any attention locally and globally until about a month after the fire in ‘69. A picture of the Cuyahoga River fire ended up on the front cover of a Time magazine showing flames engulfing a ship along with the river and thick smoke evading the air, which was actually not the fire from ‘69 but a much more serious fire from November of 1952; shockingly there was no image from the fire of ‘69. Although throughout much of Cleveland’s history water pollution wasn’t a worry or priority that the residents thought needed addressing. According to Michael Rotman, an author of an article called: “Cuyahoga River Fire,” he writes, “water pollution was viewed as a necessary consequence of the industry that had brought prosperity to the city.” This is what ignited a spark in the 1960’s residents of Cleveland and this is when they decided to make a change by throwing out ideas to eventually become known as

More about Cuyahoga River Fire Essay

Open Document