It was in the 1980s that I first became aware of the Northern Michigan Environmental Action Council (NMEAC) and sent in my membership to help with their mission of “education and action” on behalf of the earth.

Reflecting back to Summer 1993, I can feel the balmy evening when Sally Van Vleck and I sat at the picnic table at Neahtawanta Inn while she recounted the founding of NMEAC.  I was living at the Inn for the Summer helping her and her husband Bob Russell, run the B & B aspect  of their social justice center.  I had no idea I was signing up for an activist primer download, from both her and Bob.  

Much of my memory of my time with NMEAC is vague, but I will try to relate as much as I can. I had saved a lot of information from then - news articles, etc.  but lost it all in our house fire last summer. But I'll do my best.

In 1985/1986 MDOT wanted to clear-cut M-72. Phil Thiel convinced Jim Olsen and me and some others to oppose them. In addition to Jim’s Complaint, each of us adopted a tree and vowed to protect it. We pretty much won, saved a lot of the trees. Clarence Kroupa, the man who invented trees, was our expert. This is the tree I adopted.

Yes, the rumors are true, NMEAC really did begin with a conversation between 4 women sitting around a kitchen table in 1980. Back then, one of the hot issues was nuclear power, so when we learned that a request had been filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to increase the capacity of the spent fuel rod tanks by placing the used fuel rods closer together, the environmental community had concerns. The management of the plant insisted that it would be safe; however, others who knew about this sort of thing were wary.