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DESCRIPTION:The Alameda Public Affairs Forum is pleased to present Professor Gray 
 Brechin, who will speak on the subject:  “Megafollies:  A Brief History 
 of Bay Area HyperDevelopment Stopped by Citizen Activism”, on  September 
 16th, 2006, from 7 to 9 p.m., at the Home of Truth Center, 1300 Grand 
 Street, Alameda.  \nProfessor Brechin is the author of “Imperial San 
 Francisco:  Urban Power, Earthly Ruin” and  “Farewell Promised Land:  
 Waking from the California Dream” and is head of the New Deal Legacy 
 Project.  Since at least the Second World War, planners, architects, 
 newspapers, bureaucrats, and powerful business interests have envisioned a 
 West Coast twin of New York City in which a few would become immensely 
 wealthy at hidden public expense.  More bridges, highways, high rises, 
 dams, aqueducts, nuclear reactors—and less Bay—were all touted as 
 progress.  A remarkable cast of locals instead asked who gets to define 
 progress and in the process saved much of what makes the region one of the 
 most desirable and innovative in the world.  See what might have been but 
 for a plucky few who stopped the inevitable, and learn what this forgotten 
 history has to teach Alamedans and Bay Area residents today.\nDr. Gray 
 Brechin grew up in and witnessed firsthand the conversion of California’s 
 Santa Clara Valley from carbon- to silicon-based life forms. That epic 
 transformation required historical amnesia among residents and promoters 
 alike in order to keep the speculative bubble inflating, as well as to 
 deaden the pain that might be occasioned by recalling what Silicon Valley 
 replaced in the course of its triumph. Witnessing that change — along 
 with a 1985 sojourn in Venice — imbued Brechin with a lasting concern for 
 the environmental costs of perpetual and heedless urban growth. \n\nDr. 
 Brechin received a B.A. in geography and history (1971), an M.A. in art 
 history (1976), and a Ph.D. in geography (1999), all from the University of 
 California at Berkeley. Between 1978 and 1992, he worked as an 
 architectural historian, critic, and televsion producer in San Francisco 
 where he continued to develop his ideas on how humans use the earth. In 
 1978, he co-founded the Mono Lake Committee and in 1984-5 helped to break 
 the story of the poisoned Kesterson National Wildlife Refuge in the San 
 Joaquin Valley while working at KQED-TV. At that PBS affiliate, Brechin 
 witnessed the commercialization of public broadcasting — a transformation 
 as dramatic in its way as that of the Santa Clara Valley. \n\nA 
 co-recipient of the 1992 Dorothea Lange-Paul Taylor Prize given by the 
 Center for Documentary Studies, Brechin simultaneously collaborated with 
 photographer Robert Dawson on a project documenting the declining 
 environmental and social health of California. Also published by the 
 University of California Press in 1999, Farewell, Promised Land: Waking 
 from the California Dream served as the basis of a three-year traveling 
 exhibition of Dawson’s photographs sponsored by the California Council 
 for the Humanities. \n\nDr. Brechin is currently working on a sequel to 
 Imperial San Francisco. He lives in Berkeley and Point Reyes, California, 
 the latter in order to write and to better be reminded of what is of 
 lasting value\nFollowing the presentation there will be time for discussion 
 and questions from the audience. The program is free but donations at the 
 door are accepted. CD’s of all previous programs are available at the 
 website, www.alamedaforum.org For more information see www.alamedaforum.org 
 or email jrufo@sbcglobal.net \n\n 
 https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/08/25/18300621.php
SUMMARY:Megafollies: A Brief History of Bay Area HyperDevelopment Stopped by Citizen Activists
LOCATION:Home of Truth Center\n1300 Grand St\nAlameda CA 94501
URL:https://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2006/08/25/18300621.php
DTSTART:20060917T020000Z
DTEND:20060917T040000Z
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