Dear HCN, As a longtime resident
of the Bitterroot Valley I found the article concerning the Stock
Farm development particularly poignant (HCN, 11/11/02: Behind the
gate). Copper baron Marcus Daly used his Bitterroot estate, now the
Stock Farm, as a retreat from the poisoned air, land and water of
Butte and the Clark Fork Valley, caused by the mining and smelting
which secured his wealth. The new aristocrats, relaxing behind
their gates, come to this same beautiful retreat to escape the
environmental and social havoc the creation of their vast wealth
has helped cause.
There is not a little irony in the fact
that many of these same corporate captains, transplanted here in
the “last, best place,” support an administration whose
policies threaten the ecosystems and landscapes they come to enjoy.
Besides destructive road building, oil and gas development and
timber harvesting, these policies include dismantling the Superfund
program, which is attempting to clean up Daly’s toxic legacy.
Whether it is building their trophy homes, maintaining
the golf courses and landscaping or, as in my case, taking them
fly-fishing for a living, there is a nagging feeling in the back of
the mind of many a “service employee” that we are
enabling and perpetuating the “colonization” of yet
another playground for the rich. The locals can only grin and bear
it as they make room for Lear jets and golf carts, and pray the
once-magnificent fishery of the Clark Fork may someday be restored.
Dave Jones Winston-Salem, North Carolina
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Corporate colonizers in the ‘last, best place’.
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