Marking Dr. M. Graham Netting's 100th Birthday
(October 3, 1904 - August 26, 1996)
Dr. M. Graham Netting's lifelong interest in the natural world began as a child from Wilkinsburg exploring Frick Park. That interest remained dominant as he went on later in life to become director of the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. Along the way, he helped to found the Western Pennsylvania Conservancy (1951), and served on its board until his death.
This gentle man who loved salamanders (one species is named for him: Plethodon nettings, Cheat Mountain Salamander) was a giant in the worlds of national and international conservation. For many years a governor of The Nature Conservancy and chairman of its Science Committee, he was also active in the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and an early advocate of protecting biotic diversity around the world.
Dr. Netting's personal commitment to conservation is expressed eloquently and forcefully in his widely published Conservation Commandments, which he wrote in 1953:
• Study the land so that each acre may be used wisely according to its capabilities and treated according to its needs.
• Guard well the living soil, that it may continue to nurture man:
Clothe it lovingly with vegetation,
Hold on to it tenaciously,
Restore its fertility and organic content,
Improve it as a legacy for posterity.
• Reserve water, the lifeblood of civilization:
Retard it on the surface,
Trap it in the soil,
Guard its purity zealously.
• Cherish forests that they may:
Conserve water,
Shelter life,
Provide for our needs,
Restore our tranquility.
• Respect all living things as having a role, however humble, in the balance of nature.
• Provide living museums, samples of primeval America, to be managed by nature alone, so that they may serve as reservoirs of wild species that may be needed tomorrow, and provide control areas against which man's efforts at management may be measured.
• Learn to live in harmony with nature in an ecological symphony, a mutually beneficial dependency.
Text modified from "A Personal Recollection" by Joshua C. Whetzel, Former Chairman, Western Pennsylvania Conservancy.
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