(gentle music) (playful music) (typewriter keys clacking) (paper rustling) - In "Upon Further Review," former Mossback's Northwest Producer Stephen Hegg and I take an older episode of the series and update what we heard from viewers, and what we learned after it was broadcast.

In this case, we go back to last December's half hour anthology special "Wild Times" about the history of the Northwest Wilderness.

One focus was on Washington's own Supreme Court Justice, William O. Douglas, an avid hiker and wilderness advocate.

Take a look.

(bright piano music) During his Supreme Court years, he became one of the greatest advocates for wilderness preservation.

In the 1950s, he led a group of activists and enthusiastic hikers down the wild Pacific coast of Washington from Cape Alava to La Push.

The object was to protest a proposed highway down that coast.

Through groups like the Sierra Club and the Wilderness Society, and using his celebrity to motivate the grassroots, he helped save wild areas all across America.

From the Potomac to the Pacific.

(bright piano music) - Well, that's a period piece.

It reminds me of our family's hiking and camping trips.

Knute, Douglass was known as an environmentalist who walked the talk, and he was famous.

He was on the Supreme Court.

But there were other environmentalists, notable ones.

Why did you wanna focus on him?

- I've been an admirer of Douglas since the 1960s.

And in high school I wrote him a fan letter and he replied.

He's always embodied the northwest environmental ethic and his life and work provided I thought, a thread that linked the episodes together.

And for this segment, I wanted to focus on a thing called the Beach Hike.

(soft rhythmic music) He led down the Washington Coast from Cape Alava to Rialto Beach near La Push.

We had found this amazing color footage of that hike from 1958.

- It's amazing that footage exists.

- Yeah, it is amazing.

The purpose of the hike was to highlight this incredible stretch of wild coastline.

The state of Washington was seriously considering building a highway down it.

Not unlike the highway along the Oregon coast.

Environmental activism was in its infancy, and Douglas used his celebrity to lead hikes or walks elsewhere to get media attention.

He invited activists, government people, the media to come along.

And one filmmaker did.

Louis Huber who made outdoor films.

And after the special aired, I was contacted by Mossback viewer, Philip Fenner, who said, he had found that film in the basement of the founder of the North Cascades Conservation Council.

And it was simply marked Beach Hike.

He had it digitized and it was in terrible condition.

He contacted another filmmaker and that filmmaker had found Huber's films were donated to the Oregon Historical Society.

And in 2015 it was restored and that's what we used.

(inspirational music) - It's incredible that an event of that era was documented by still photographs even.

But here we have color footage of a wilderness hike.

- It's clearly an important event.

The film is available on YouTube so people can go see the whole thing if they want.

Hear the narration.

- [Narrator] Something was at stake that concerns you and me and our children, and the children of our children.

- So, at the end of the hike, they're confronted by a protester and his son, and they've made a whole bunch of signs.

And my favorite one was "Bird Watcher Go Home."

- Who was for the project?

Who would benefit from the building of this highway?

- So, the argument for the highway was that more people could access the coast.

That it would be an economic boom for the Olympic Peninsula.

Facing the opposition, help the hike, get media coverage.

Go Home Bird Watcher.

And also highlighted arguments that people had.

It underlined the urgency, I think, of stopping it.

- Well, it must have worked because there's no highway there that I know of.

- It's still wilderness and that was the whole point.

(soft piano music) There's another important person who emerged from this event.

- Who was that?

- Polly Dyer.

(soft piano music) Polly Dyer was a woman who moved to Washington from California about 1950.

California, she was really involved with the Sierra Club, the Wilderness Society.

And she threw herself into activism related to protecting wilderness in the Pacific Northwest.

So, she testified for the Wilderness Act.

She was involved in helping to preserve parts of Olympic National Park.

She was a co-founder of the North Cascades Conservation Council, which won the fight to create North Cascades National Park.

She served on their board for nearly 60 years.

- Wow.

- Yeah.

She died in her 90s not that long ago.

- So, Douglas and Dyer were the early A-Team in preserving parts of the Wild Northwest.

- Yeah, they really were.

We're lucky to be able to watch them in action in this rare, restored film of activism in action.

(gentle rhythmic music) - [Presenter] For more on this episode, listen to the "Mossback Podcast."

Just search for Mossback wherever you listen.