The North Coast times-eagle., June 20, 2000, Page 12, Image 12

PAGE 12
NORTH COAST TIMES EAGLE , SUMMER/FALL 2000
FROM A PHOTOGRAPH BY REX ZIAK
KEWPIE ZIAK
THE ENVIRONMENTALIST LOGGER
INTERVIEW BY STUDS TERKEL
Studs Terkel interviewed Bob 'Kewpie* Ziak in 1980, ten years before Kewpie's
death in the summer of 1990. The following interview appeared in Terkel's book,
American Dreams: Lost & Found, published Iri 1981' by Parrtheon Books. >.
Kewpie Ziak, who was born in 1917 and fought in World War 2, was a rare and
singular man. He was inspiringly eloquent with a good humored lilt to his basso voice.
He could be as scathing or as oratorical as a Roman senator. He was a man of the woods
who was legendary for his courage and protection of wildlife. He created a sanctuary for
birds and animals along the Columbia River and risked his life to defend eagles and their
nest trees, almost single-handedly forcing timber companies to stop cutting the trees.
He protected salmon spawning grounds from the depredations of a mining company and
helped stop construction of an aluminum smelter that would have grossly polluted the
lower Columbia estuary. He hunted bear hunters with fists and guns. He was nationally
known as 'The Environmentalist Logger' for his practices of sustainable logging and
We're in logging country: Knappa, Oregon. It is near
the mouth of the Columbia River.
He's a chunky, muscular man, built along the lines
of Hack Wilson, the old Chicago Cubs slugger. He is 62.
Enthusiastically, he talks of "the vast coniferous
forest. You're always aware of the scent of trees if you're
a logger. It turns you on. You know you've struck a cedar
that may have been buried in the ground for a couple of
hundred years.
The beauty is going The old timber that was majestic
has been eliminated In the old days, the Douglas fir was mixed
through with Sitka spruce, western hemlock, and the great
cedars All through the woods. you found a beautiful mix of
trees Today, trees are planted in pre-determined distances
apart It is something to be controlled.
The forest to me is an awesome and beautiful place.
You see this little baby elk that we have in the voods here? Isn't
it a little beautiful cuddly thing? But watch that elk grow, and
eventually he becomes a magnificent bull, with a huge rack of
antlers, a deep chest, and proud eyes. He’s not cute and cuddly
anymore He is awesome. That is the way it is with trees. You
see cute little Christmas trees you'll put on the table. They're
immature little things They have not attained the magnificence
that nature puts on these trees at 500 years They take on
character. They're always in a battle The wind's after them, the
lightning's after them.
The timber companies don't want a single tree standing
any more They don't understand that a tree, a snag, is not only
a hotel for birds and bats and bees. They are magnificent works
of art created by nature and beyond the ability of man to equal
There's a tree down the road here a few miles that's over ten
feet in diameter at the butt At the very tiptop of it is a magnifi-
1
I
reforesting timber on his land near Knappa. He thought in terms of centuries, expressed
through the cycles of his beloved forest. History might regard his legacy as lasting.
I knew who Kewpie*wds long before I rriet him, and for the last five years of his
life I saw him once or twice a week, usually in an Astoria coffee place where he talked
to everybody and genially reparteed with the hired help (he often brought flowers and
chocolates for the waitresses). He treated everyone the same, friend and foe, stranger
and kin — straight in the eye and never mincing his words or passion, although he
tempered his profundity with fellowship and humor.
Something he said to Studs Terkel might just be his own metaphor: "Before I die,
I'd like to hear the howl of timber wolves that used to exist here in our woods." His howl
is greatly missed and needed now more than ever.
Read this with the thunder of his barrel deep voice in your ear; even when he
spoke quietly he rumbled like a storm over a nearby hill.
..D.,r
cent crown of jewels: a nest of bald-headed eagles. Timber
companies are indifferent to your feelings I don't think they
have any feeling for beauty, for something that is old.The only
feeling they want is the tons of pulp to come out of there.
Today, when they come to a canyon, they start switch­
backing, criss-crossing back and forth with bulldozers, tearing
up the ground, silting the creeks, and putting 5 acres of ground
out of production per mile of road. Old-time loggers were not
able to reach many of the rough places, so these patches and
trees were left. The younger loggers were not here to see what
there was before If you've never known something, it's difficult
to appreciate what has been lost.
I was bom and lived here in a logging camp. My dad
was a logger He was a big, rawboned, powerful man of a very
happy nature. (Softly) I can see him coming home nowvwth his
logging clothes on. a rifle in his hand and a deer on his back.
The first sounds I can remember are the voices of loggers and
the sounds of locomotives and (steam) donkeys. As a kid, it
seemed to me more plentiful of everything. The forests were still
virgin. There were fish in the sloughs, lots of water-fovd, and it
was a very happy time No on can grow up here and not be
aware of the birds and animals and the river. It gets in your
blood, in your thinking, in your way of life
THE OLD WARRIOR DIES
BY HOWARD BRUNER
Bob Ziak was a man's man, a two-fisted barrel-chested
warrior who contained elements so anomalous he disarmed his
opponents through sheer amazement His arsenal contained
guns, fists, heavy machinery and poetry A visionary in Can't
Bust 'Ems and Hickory, Kewpie had reached a stage of develop­
ment far beyond the norm for this woodsy resource dependent
area He had gone to the well and found that his life was inextri­
cably wound up with the lives of the creatures and land around
him Perhaps he had caught a glimpse of the place we really are
in the scheme of things. He had made the ultimate jump of faith
in his demal of free agency without consequences He accepted
the responsibility we god-like humans have for all other forms of
life.
This hard living, rough and tumble logger was also a
gentle and nurtunng force in the hundreds of thousands of lives
he touched By setting up and maintaining a sanctuary for game
birds in this world-class mecca for fowl hunters, he had more of
an effect on the fortunes of dwindling avian populations than vwll
ever be accountable Long before the counters and oglers put
new value on the natural vonder of a goose 'V. Kewpie had
adopted his feathered brothers and sisters When the call was
made to cut the nest trees of the eagles, he was the man who
put his body between further life and the ultimate desolation of
an eagleless sanctuary The bear of these woods had one voice
speaking for them: Kewpie refused to let the high-tech, dog-
enhanced slaughter go unchallenged and stood his ground
against all comers His was a bravery and commitment the likes
of wrfiich we will probably never see again
I always had a thrill of anticipation when my travels took
me to his magnificent sanctuary. For I was sure to see upwards
of thirty species of birds from passerines (songbirds) to raptors.
Depending on the season and weather a cast of hundreds was
always to be enjoyed And if one was lucky the man on the
tractor seeing a disciple from his vtfiite farmhouse on the hill
would come down to do that which has almost gone the way of
extinction: he would come down to pass the time of day. I can
recall many times when I found myself transported out of the
daily stress/performance cycle, having a conversation that was
the ultimate in entertainment and relaxation For Kewpie had
that aura of one who was at peace with himself, and although
more often than not our subject was centered on those who were
less inclined to see the paradise factor in life on this earth, he
had the gentle confidence of one vtfio sees past all earthly
foibles
Kewpie is gone He is wild and free Never again wall I
see the tractor with the dog in scoop and the jovial 'mayor* of
Brownsmead driving That is not where I will find Kewpie I vwll
find him in a scud-tom autumn sky filled with the urgent cries of
his brothers and sisters I wall find him in the winded trees of a
spring glade, bom on the cathartic edge of wildness He wll
always be an intregal part of that vtfiich he loved and helped.
That which has now taken his spirit
Howard Bruner wrote his memoir for the October 1990
issue of the NCTE He moved later that year from Astoria to
Eugene Like Kewpie Ziak he has fought long and courageously
to preserve wildlife and the natural environment