THE ACTIVIST MARTIN LITTON
PHOTO: JOHN BLAUSTEIN
CALIFORNIA-BASED JOURNALIST, editor and World War II vet Martin Litton first ran the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River in 1955. As a trivial claim to fame, he was the 185th person to descend the Grand since John Wesley Powell first did it in 1869; Litton’s distinction was rendered more an- ticlimactic by the fact that he was unable to paddle because of a shoulder injury. Yet the journey marked the beginning for a man whose legacy is as monumental as the canyon itself. At the time, Litton was battling two proposed dams on the
Green River that would flood the spectacular rock canyons of Dinosaur National Monument. Just as congress denied the dams on the Green—one of the first environmental victories in the United States—they approved the Glen Canyon dam on the Colorado River in 1956. Meanwhile, the Bureau of Reclamation planned two more
dams for the Grand Canyon itself. In 1963, directors of the San Francisco-based Sierra Club were prepared to capitulate when Litton addressed the board. Producing hand-drawn diagrams and quoting Theodore Roosevelt, Litton laid the Sierra Club’s intentions to waste. He argued that a dam would suppress the beating heart of the Grand Canyon—the free-flowing Colorado River.
“A MAN WHOSE LEGACY IS AS MONUMENTAL AS THE CANYON ITSELF.”
“Martin doesn’t have to prime for a speech,” said the late
David Brower, longtime Sierra Club board member and execu- tive director. “Martin poured it on…and we voted ‘no.’” After a campaign that galvanized the environmental movement, Presi- dent Lyndon Johnson rejected the dams in 1969. Litton championed the intangible values of wilderness—its
sublime beauty and spiritual power. He loved introducing Amer- icans to the wild Grand Canyon, and launched an outfitting business in 1972. He was the only commercial outfitter to guide on the Colorado River exclusively in wooden dories—graceful, oar-powered boats as fragile in class V rapids as wilderness in the face of human onslaught. Litton’s greatest attribute was his pig-headedness. Brower,
widely revered as the greatest conservationist of all-time, called Litton his conscience. “When I would waver in various conser- vation battles, he would put a little starch in my backbone by reminding me that we should not be trying to dicker and ma- neuver,” said Brower. “I guess I got some of my extremism from Martin Litton, and I’m grateful for it.” Litton ran the Grand Canyon for the last time at age 90. He
died on November 30, 2014, at his home in Palo Alto, Califor- nia. He was 97 years old. “The American West has lost one of its great champions,”
said current Sierra Club director Michael Brune, in a statement released December 1st. “His tenacious inability to surrender was an inspiration to the generations of environmental activists who followed in his wake.”
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