Resources and the mystery of a disappearing stream
Submitted by Christine Sandahl on Wed, 2017-06-21 00:00
I have found a few interesting resources while searching for assignment information and in an attempt to find more about the watershed surrounding Spirit Lake. I had a conversation with Randy Troyer, a long time resident of Spirit Lake, Idaho. He told me that when he was a boy, there was no sewage treatment for the Spirit Lake community. Pipes led the waste to an area near the lake that was a seasonal stream. (The stream no longer exists after the dam was constructed). The waste was carried only ~600 yards, then the stream disappeared as the water went underground. This story makes me wonder about the effect this had on the Rathdrum Aquifer. Randy remembers clearly that people called the stream "shit creek". While searching for more information, I found that many towns had a similarly named creek.
Resources:
A complication of land use and background for communities near the south fork of the Coeur d'Alene river http://www.kcgov.us/departments/planning/compplan5/14%20Land%20Use.pdf
The other is a dissertation by Bradley Snow called Living with Lead: An Environmental History of Idaho's Coeur D'Alenes.
I added the Bradley Snow paper as a resource using the resource tab.
Comments
Missing creek
Very interesting story. Possiblely when places were less populated and regulated, the communities just passed their waste downstream. Not their problem anymore. Scary logic.
Yikes
Hopefully this practice has stopped everywhere in the United States. Christine do you know when this change occurred? Do you think it would have changed after President Nixon created the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1970?
Randy said it was the late 60
w sewage treatment was started in Spirit Lake, so it corresponds with EPA changes. Next week I plan take photos of the location of the old creek area.
Nixon & EPA
There was a lead up to the formation of the EPA. I was in high school and a college undergrad during those years. There was a big push by the populace to do something about river water quality due to the dumping of toxic waste from manufacturing and human waste from communities directly into our waterways with out treatment. I remember very well haw polluted large bodies of water had become - lake Erie for example. Erie was so polluted there were signs posted warning people not to swim or fish. Communites pressure, in addition to EPA regulations and the changes it enforced, led to major improvements in water treatment. Today lake Erie is a destination for sport fishing for some people I know in the mid-west. Yes - I am old enough to remember the Cuyahoga river catching on fire and burning for a few weeks as it flowed past the heavy industrial area of Cleveland, Ohio then pouring into Lake Erie. Yikes.
In the early 80's I taught in Cleveland and can report that the river was on its way to a good recovery.
When I hear about big changes to the EPA, I am worried that our country will take a big step backwards with regard to improvments to our air and water quality.
When I return from vacation I will let you know when I am taking a video field trip to "Shit Creek" with life time resident of Spirit Lake, Randy Troyer. He has some local history to share. Perhaps you could come along,