FINDING NATURE IN AN INDUSTRIAL SWAMP: A CASE STUDY OF NEW JERSEY’S HACKENSACK MEADOWLANDS by Cheryl Ann Hendry A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in History MONTANA STATE UNIVERSITY Bozeman, Montana April 2017 © COPYRIGHT by Cheryl Ann Hendry 2017 All Rights Reserved ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This project would have been impossible without the support of many people. At the top of the list are my advisor, Mary Murphy, and my committee members, Timothy LeCain, Billy Smith, and William Wyckoff, who offered valuable insight and advice. I owe many thanks to Susan Cohen who graciously accepted, or at least did not reject, the role of an unofficial mentor. Many thanks to my colleagues and friends at Montana State University, especially to my writing partner, Sarah Coletta. Thank you to The Graduate School at Montana State for granting me a PhD Dissertation Completion Fellowship which allowed me to complete this work. I am also grateful for financial support from the Department of History & Philosophy and the College of Letters and Science, especially for the Staudohar Memorial Scholarship. I am grateful to the staff of the Meadowlands Environmental Research Institute, Hackensack Riverkeeper, Inc., and NY/NJ Baykeeper for allowing me access to their records, and to all those who shared their experiences in the Meadowlands with me. This research would have been impossible without assistance from the staff at Montana State University’s Interlibrary Loan Department at Renne Library. In their ability to track down local newspapers and obscure documents, they have enabled this historian in Montana to conduct research on a New Jersey landscape, and for that I am grateful. To my parents, Bob and Donna Hendry, who instilled in me a love of learning and a tenacity that enabled me to see this project through, and to my husband, Andy Marshall, who gave me constant encouragement in so many ways, I could not have done this without you. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................1 Historiography of America’s Wetlands ..........................................................................5 “A Landscape on the Periphery” ..............................................................................6 Historicizing Urban Wetlands...............................................................................10 Finding Nature in an Urban Swamp .............................................................................14 Urban Landscapes and the Twentieth Century Environmental Movement ............................................................................................22 Chapter Outlines ...........................................................................................................25 2. LOSING THE MEADOWLANDS ..............................................................................33 A “Coastal Cornucopia” ...............................................................................................36 Reclamation, or Making the Meadowlands “Productive” ............................................40 Draining the Meadows ..................................................................................................44 Creating Land................................................................................................................48 The Turnpike Conquers the Meadowlands ............................................................53 A Wasteland? or the “Most Valuable Acreage in the World”? .............................57 3. ENVISIONING A NEW MEADOWLANDS ..............................................................65 A City on the Reeds ......................................................................................................66 The Hackensack Meadowlands Reclamation and Development Act ...........................70 “The Delicate Balance of Nature” .........................................................................77 An Ecological Perspective: Chet Mattson and the Comprehensive Land Use Plan .....................................................................................82 Creating a New Meadowlands: The Master Plan of 1972 ............................................91 Containing Garbage at Kingsland-Sawmill Creek .................................................92 Innovative Zoning as Environmental Control........................................................96 The Wetlands Order ...............................................................................................98 Harmon Cove ................................................................................................................99 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................105 iv TABLE OF CONTENTS – CONTINUED 4. RESISTING A GROWTH AGENDA ........................................................................112 The “Illogical Incinerator”: Trading the Air for the Land ..........................................115 The Meadowlands Sports Complex ............................................................................124 New Jersey Sports & Exposition Authority v. McCrane ......................................127 Opposition to the HMDC Master Plan........................................................................138 A Promise of Preservation Broken? ............................................................................141 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................145 5. IMPLEMENTING THE CLEAN WATER ACT: A CONFLICT OVER THE VALUE OF URBAN WETLANDS ......................................................147 The EPA and Army Corps: Conflict in an Urban Wetland .........................................148 The Villages at Mill Creek ....................................................................................157 Russo Development Corporation ..........................................................................170 A Compromise: The Special Area Management Plan .................................................176 6. “WE DREW A LINE IN THE MARSH”: CITIZEN STEWARDSHIP IN THE MEADOWLANDS .....................................................................................188 Citizen Stewards ........................................................................................................190 Finding Nature in an Industrial Swamp .....................................................................198 Protecting Urban Wetlands ........................................................................................208 Building in an Urban Wetland: A Violation of Federal Law? ............................213 Rethinking Phragmites .......................................................................................216 Mitigation as Preservation?.................................................................................223 Conclusion .................................................................................................................229 7. “THE PEOPLE’S VICTORY IN THE MARSH” ......................................................235 Political Support for Preservation .............................................................................235 “The People’s Victory”: Xanadu and the Empire Tract ............................................241 A Master Plan for the Twenty-First Century ............................................................247 Conclusion .................................................................................................................250 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................254 v LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1. View of Hackensack Meadowlands ..................................................................29 2. Boundaries of the Hackensack Meadowlands District .....................................30 3. Satellite Image of the New York Metropolitan Area ........................................31 4. An Osprey and its Nest .....................................................................................32 5. Spencer Driggs’s Iron Dike System Under Construction (1867) .....................61 6. Mosquito Drainage Infrafstructure, Bergen County (1917) .............................62 7. Twentieth Century Transportation Corridors....................................................63 8. Idling Near New Jersey Turnpike Exit 18W .....................................................64 9. “Meadowlands of Today” (1968) ...................................................................107 10. “Meadowlands of the Future” (1968) .............................................................108 11. “Meadowlands of the Future” (1968) .............................................................109 12. Artist’s Rendition of Island Residential Clusters (1970) ...............................110 13. Artist’s Rendition of Berrys Creek Center (1970) ..........................................111 14. Locations of The Villages at Mill Creek Site and South Secaucus and Anderson Marsh Mitigation sites ...................................185 15. Phragmites australis and Spartina alterniflora ..............................................186 16. Potential Wetland Fill and Mitigation for Preferred Alternative, SAMP (1995) ..............................................................................187