opposition to the proposed Northern States Power Co. generating plant at Oak Park Heights, Minn.

Briefly, our opposition to the plant is based on fears that it would aggravate air and water pollution, pose a hazard to water safety and detract from the overall recreational value of the St. Croix Valley. Since NSP announced its intentions to build the plant at Oak Park Heights, we have raised many questions as to its effects in these areas, questions which we feel have not been answered to any degree of satisfaction. In our search for answers we have gathered a wealth of information which will be submitted to you today and which we feel supports our position that the plant's economic promise does not outweigh the disadvantages it will bring.

Our complete statements of policy have been submitted, but, to summarize events leading to the formation of Save the St. Croix and to reemphasize our basic stand, I would like to add the following information.

During the summer of 1964, many residents of the St. Croix Valley became alarmed at the prospect of a powerplant at Oak Park Heights. Scientists and engineers who studied the proposed plant concluded there were ample grounds for concern in the areas of air and water pollution. This concern for the welfare of the St. Croix River spread to the many who come from the surrounding areas to enjoy this fine river. In addition, people throughout the Nation who learned of the proposed powerplant and to whom conservation is a major concern became interested in this specific problem. All of these make up the movement to save the St. Croix.

A major function of our organization has been the gathering and evaluating of information that bears on the proposed powerplant. Prime sources of information are announcements of plans by Northern States Power Co. itself. The implications of such information are worked out by our technical committee which consists of scientifically and technically trained men.

Reports, announcements, and speeches are written and sent to interested persons, including governmental bodies which we are sure welcome information and manifestation of informed concern.

Committee representatives have spoken at meetings, on television and radio. Our reports have been placed before other organizations with the result that many organizations have themselves become a part of the movement to save the St. Croix. These activities have been given wide publicity to the problems engendered by the proposed construction of a mammoth coal-burning generating plant.

To justify the truly significant support we have received, Save the St. Croix must continue to work within the framework of a policy that is socially acceptable. A policy confined to narrow selfish ends can find no wide support and deserves none. We must, therefore, urge the expansion of the recreational uses of the St. Croix River Valley by the establishment of more parks and campsites along its shores.

In yet a wider context, the total needs of the people must be considered in such a decision as the location of a powerplant.

Thus, we come to regional planning. Our magnificent assets in beauty, resources, and industry can be put to best human use by planning. It must be remembered that there is no longer any pressing need to increase our productive efficiency. Our problem is to live well

with the most productive capacity in the history of man. Electricity is already penny cheap; there is no longer any need to sacrifice good rivers to make it cheaper.

Sharing our concern for the future of the St. Croix River and Valley are numerous other conservation-minded groups, civic and professional organizations, municipalities and boating clubs. We have submitted statements from 26 of these organizations with a description of each and the number of individuals and families they represent. These organizations are: Citizens Natural Resources Association, Inc., of Wisconsin; Clear Air, Clear Water, Unlimited; Franconia, Minn. Residents Friends of the Wilderness; Hudson, Wis., City Council; Izaak Walton League of America, Minnesota Division; Kinni-Croix Recreational Area; Lakeland, Minn., Village Council; Lakeland Shores, Minn., Village Council; Minnesota Society of Architects; Miss' Croix Yacht Club; North Central Marine Association; River Falls, Wis., Boat Club; River Falls, Wis., Sportsmen's Club; St. Croix County Board; St. Croix Valley Rod and Gun Club; St. Croix River Association; St. Croix Yacht Club; St. Joseph's, Wis., Township; St. Paul Planning Board; St. Paul Yacht Club; Save the St. Croix, Inc.; Suburban Boating Club; Minnetonka, Minn., 10,000 Lakes Boating Club; Winford Lands Homeowners Association; Women's Club, Hudson, Wis.

Incidentally, two of these, the Lakeland, Minn., Village Council and the Lakeland Shores, Minn., Council fall within the confines of Washington County contrary to some information we have heard.

Now, gentlemen, so that we can all better understand the problem at hand, I would like to present at this time the spokesman for the St. Croix River Association, the dean of groups that support our border stream and has worked for 53 years for the best interests of the valley. Mr. James Taylor Dunn, their respected president and chief librarian of the Minnesota Historical Society, will speak on the history and nature of the St. Croix Valley.

Mr. Chairman, Mr. James Taylor Dunn.
Senator NELSON. Thank you.

STATEMENT OF JAMES TAYLOR DUNN, PRESIDENT OF THE ST. CROIX RIVER ASSOCIATION

Mr. DUNN. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, before I present my prepared statement I would like to acknowledge the very excellent summary made yesterday afternoon by the St. Croix River Association's valued friend and long-time active member, Chester Wilson, when he stated about the stand that has been taken by this association, and of our recommendation early in September to Governors Rolvaag and Reynolds, a joint commission be formed to study the effect of the Northern States Power Co.'s plant at Oak Park Heights.

May I further acknowledge for the record that the idea for such commission came from an outstanding editorial published on August 4, 1964, in the Red Wing, Minn., Daily Republican Eagle. The St. Croix River Association, which is made up of members from both sides of the river, is delighted that Governor Reynolds has taken this step.

The St. Croix River begins its winding journey to the Mississippi at Upper St. Croix Lake, just 32 miles south of Superior, Wis. It travels

165 miles in a southerly direction, draining a vast region of 7,650 square miles, until it reaches the great Father of Waters at Prescott, Wis. For 127 of these miles the St. Croix has since 1848 formed the boundary between the States of Wisconsin and Minnesota.

From the beginning of white man's settlement in the St. Croix Valley, the river below The Dalles of the twin villages of Taylors Falls, Minn., and St. Croix Falls, Wis., has served as an important, even an essential, part of the everyday life of the area. In the winter there was ice skating and iceboating on the wide expanse of Lake St. Croix, and during the summer, the pioneers made pleasure trips on its clear waters, fishing, hunting, and picnicking from the decks of paddle-wheel steamers and lesser craft. Such excursions were often the only forms of entertainment available to the pleasurestarved early settlers. And they made the most of the watery playground at their doorsteps. Later in the century tourists by the hundreds came to the St. Croix Valley to see for themselves the beauties they had read about in the books and in the newspapers of Chicago, St. Louis, and New York. Then, as now, residents and visitors needed the river. Its beauties invigorated them and made them whole.

All too frequently, however, as the century progressed, their anticipated pleasures died aborning, for throughout the latter half of the 19th century the lumber industry completely controlled the river. Its representatives ignored the loud complaints of those who wished to use the waters for pleasure or out of necessity. Usually the stream was so choked with logs that mail and fishing boats and pleasure steamers could not get through. The slab and sawdust dynasties of Stillwater and Hudson, believing that business came first, turned a deaf ear to both laws and pleas to keep the channel open.

To get an idea of the enormity of the lumber industry, from 1838, when the first St. Croix log was commercially cut at Marine Mills, Minn., down to the turn of the century when the entire northern reaches of the river had been ruthlessly stripped of the stately white pine and the lumberjacks and sawyers moved on to better forests on the west coast, the St. Croix was a one-industry river. For over half a century, logs were the sole foundation of the valley's prosperity and the river served as the only means of getting them to market. From 1840 through 1903, the estimated yield of St. Croix forests came to the astronomical total of over 1112 billion board feet.

After all those logs had been sawed, and the valley lay stripped, lumbering was no longer a force in the valley's economy. Area residents then began looking to the future, to the development of the river, for recreational purposes. On September 23, 1911, interested residents met at Taylors Falls and formed the St. Croix River Improvement Association to act as a clearinghouse for problems facing the valley. The organization soon made its influence felt in the lower valley of western Wisconsin and eastern Minnesota. Interestingly enough, one of the earliest problems our predecessors in the new association had to face (this was in 1912) was the arbitrary attitude of the Minneapolis Electric Co. (an antecedent of the present-day Northern States Power Co.) in regulating the flow of water over the then-new hydroelectric dam at St. Croix Falls. The complete shutting down of this man-made obstruction was especially aggravating on weekends when the river was heavily used by boaters and fishermen. This was

over 50 years ago. The river association accused the electric company of monopolistic tendencies and of trying to control both the St. Croix and Mississippi Rivers.

Since its formation, therefore, the St. Croix River Association has worked long and hard for the best interests of the valley and it has made every effort to live up to its slogan: "All united to save for our children the uses and beauties of our river and valley." Sometimes it has succeeded; at other times it has failed. What is important, however, is that the organization has not feared to speak out when the valley's natural treasures have been threatened. Its members believe that the destruction of such resources is irrevocable, and that we cannot pass this way again.

Minnesota-born Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas has warned us that some day

Americans are going to wake up to the fact that they need more than beer and television for recreation.

Here in the heart of what has long been publicized as the "Friendly Valley" we have an important and heavily used Midwestern playground at the very doorstep of a burgeoning metropolitan complex. And let us not forget that with our ever-growing population, recreation, too, has become a moneymaking industry in its own right. The St. Croix River and its lake are probably the most popular and heavily used boating waters between Lake Michigan and the west coast, with the possible exception of the Mississippi at St. Louis. For this reason, the St. Croix River Association continues to be concerned over what man will do to the clear air and the placid, clean waters of this border stream and what our boaters, canoeists, wildlife enthusiasts, and fishermen will do when threatened by the dangers of heavy barge traffic. Did we not learn this lesson 75 years ago? Will coal barges and dense smoke replace the log rafts and sawdust of yesteryear?

Carl Carmer, well-known New York State author and historian, succinctly summarized the problem when he testified at the Nation's Capital last summer against another powerplant to be constructed by Consolidated Edison in the highlands of the Hudson River: "We believe that ugliness begets ugliness," he said, "and that nature's beauty, once destroyed, may never be restored by an artifice of man." On July 10, 1964, Senator Hubert H. Humphrey wrote to me as president of the St. Croix River Association: "The St. Croix River is, indeed, one of the beautiful sites, not only of Minnesota but of our entire country," he said. And he added, "I love it as you do." To protect this beauty, the Northern States Power Co. promises every effort of good design and landscaping of its two proposed 20-story plants at Oak Park Heights to minimize the damage to the natural wildlife area of marsh and beach upon which it hopes to build. But is this enough? What will we be sacrificing in return for economic benefits which may be short lived? The St. Croix River Association is of the firm opinion that Lake St. Croix answers a recreational-yes, even a spiritual-need which is more necessary to America's health and wellbeing than all the commercial products it can provide; than all the money its clear waters can earn.

Thank you very much, gentlemen. [Applause.]
Senator NELSON. Thank you.

Mr. Thuet, do you have another witness!

Mr. THUET. At this time, we would like to dwell on the more technical aspects of the matters before us. We would like to call on Mr. Francis T. Hertes, who is a civil engineer-chairman of what we call our technical committee-who will speak on streamflow and the need for standards.

STATEMENT OF FRANCIS T. MERTES, HUDSON, WIS., CIVIL ENGINEER, HYDRAULIC SPECIALTY CONSULTING ENGINEER

Mr. MERTES. My name is Francis T. Mertes. I am a self-employed engineer with a hydraulic background, consulting engineer, from Hudson, Wis. I am registered as a professional engineer in the State of Minnesota and State of Wisconsin.

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I hope that our testimony here today, which was preceded by many months of study and opinionseeking, can be of some value in pointing the need for a strong Federal Water Pollution Preventative Act as proposed in S. 649 and authored by Senator Muskie.

The subject resource for these hearings, the St. Croix River and abutting valley, have been described very aptly by Mr. Dunn. I would like to add more detail to some of the aspects of usage and presumption as to why these usages occur.

Many persons have used the St. Croix Valley for residential purposes for many years. The trend has more recently become intensified to a point where the St. Croix Valley might be called a valley of commuters from work to a beautiful clean valley. The river is the focal point. These people have located their homes here, as I have, so we can view the river and its valley, relieve worldly tensions, and enjoy the river and valley for fishing, boating, swimming, and hunting. All of these residents have established a claim on its cleanliness. It would be folly for anyone to say that most of these residents would have located here regardless of the cleanliness.

Boaters by the thousands swarm to the river on weekends and many take advantage of this resource during the week. They come here because the river is clean, cool, and of quality acceptable to health standards. These people lay claim to their portion of the river. The rapidly growing marina industry which serves and adds to the economic structure of our valley also have their claim to a continuing clean, recreational river.

Many species of fish abound the river due to its cool temperature, lack of pollution, and adequate oxygen supply. Commercial and recreational fishermen alike derive income and pleasure from these fish. They also have claim to their part of this resource.

Then what of the many people who neither fish nor own boats but who derive great pleasure, relief, and a feeling of general satisfaction from just driving to and through the parks and roads adjacent to the river? They, too, have justifiable claim to recreational use of the valley. And what would the valley be without pure water?

We must also consider the thousands of YMCA youngsters who use the camp 3 miles south of Hudson. In addition to excellent swimming and canoeing, the valley provides them with many nature trails