Acid Rain and Vermont’s Waterways
Vermont’s water quality has long been a top concern for scientists and residents, and in the 1980s it reached national attention as acid rain came to the forefront of public understanding. What is acid rain, anyway? Why was Vermont getting so much attention? And where are we now in addressing those challenges?
This Episode’s Featured Object:
Map of Regions Sensitive to Acid Deposition in Vermont
Amanda: Today’s map is the most modern map in our series, dating from a little less than forty years ago. It’s got a lengthy title – “Map of Regions Sensitive to Acidic Deposition in Vermont.”
The map itself is really kind of beautiful. The whole state of Vermont is covered in layers of blue, darker along the spines of the mountains and lighter in the valleys. The darker the blue, the less “buffering capacity” there is in that area – we’ll talk more about that later. There are squares and circles scattered across the landscape, some completely filled in and some partially filled in. The legend at the side explains that those squares and circles represent rivers and streams – and how filled in they are represents their level of alkalinity. There’s a lot of data in this map, and all of it ties back to one big thing: acid rain.
Rock Point, Burlington, Vt. Dry Plate Negative, courtesy of Library of Congress
Last Stand of the Red Spruce by Bob Mello
Author Photo – Bob Mello
Episode Transcript
Amanda: This is Before Your Time, presented by the Vermont Historical Society and Vermont Humanities. Every episode, we go inside the stacks at the Vermont Historical Society to look at an object from their permanent collection that tells us something unique about our state. Then we take a closer look at the people, the events, or the ideas that surround each artifact.
The objects that we’re looking at for these episodes are maps. Each one represents a different moment in Vermont, with questions that spiral out and persist to our present day.
Today’s map is the most modern map in our series, dating from a little less than forty years ago. It’s got a lengthy title – “Map of Regions Sensitive to Acidic Deposition in Vermont.”
The map itself is really kind of beautiful. The whole state of Vermont is covered in layers of blue, darker along the spines of the mountains and lighter in the valleys. The darker the blue, the less “buffering capacity” there is in that area – we’ll talk more about that later. There are squares and circles scattered across the landscape, some completely filled in and some partially filled in. The legend at the side explains that those squares and circles represent rivers and streams – and how filled in they are represents their level of alkalinity. There’s a lot of data in this map, and all of it ties back to one big thing: acid rain.
If you’re of a certain age, you have definitely heard of acid rain. Maybe you were a kid like me when it was a big concern, and you imagined it as actual acid coming down from the sky to scour away everything in its path. The story this map tells is much more subtle than that, and it goes back to something that was a pretty big deal in the 1980s in Vermont – and still has lessons for us today.
Bob Mello: So I when I came to Vermont, I began climbing mountains. My first mountain was camel’s home, and and it’s still my favorite mountain to climb.
Episode Credits
Before Your Time is presented by Vermont Humanities and the Vermont Historical Society. This episode was produced by Amanda Kay Gustin, Ryan Newswanger, and Noel Clark. Thanks to our guests: Bob Mello, Bruce Forsberg, and Karen Bates. Special thanks for the support of this limited series goes to the Lake Champlain Basin Program and their Champlain Valley National Heritage Partnership Corridor of Commerce granting program.
Music is by Michael Chapman and the Woodpiles, Monument Music, Doug Organ, Raft, Dan Phillipson, and Jacob Nicou.