Fifty years ago this month, leading experts from around the globe created a major buzz in Victoria Harbour on Georgian Bay, just east of Midland.
For the 10-day period of Jan. 29 to Feb. 8 in 1974, the Sportsman Motor Inn played host to experts from every continent, all of whom were working at the meeting titled the Workshop on Impact Studies in the Environment, also known as WISE.
Conference co-chairman was R.E. (Ted) Munn, who at the time was the chief scientist for the air quality branch of the Atmospheric Environment Service (AES) of Canada. Through his lifetime, Munn would become a prominent and award-winning Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada member, spearheading global environmental change.
The workshop was a co-sponsored affair through the U.N. Environmental Program, Environment Canada and UNESCO.
While a brief overview of the event was recorded in the February 1974 edition of the AES publication Zephyr, a fuller picture was provided within the pages of the Midland Free Press newspaper.
The other co-chairman was Polish-born François Naftali Frenkiel, living in Washington as of the 1974 meeting. His pioneer work on the physics of fluid dynamics was key toward future computer modelling of turbulence and urban pollution.
They weren’t the only attendees, however. Boasting scientists and environmental experts from 15 countries and every continent (despite Antarctica not being mentioned), the fields of ecology and mathematics were also involved as participants joined from Argentina, Austria, Belgium, France, India, Japan, Kenya, Spain, the U.K. and Venezuela.
Munn told Free Press reporter Ken Somers the group was carefully chosen and included “superstars.”
“The participation by experts from so many nations underlines the importance attached to environmental impact studies and the application of the findings, in all parts of the world,” said Munn to Somers.
As for the book, Somers paraphrased Munn.
“Among highlights of the text which has been produced is the need to consider an integrated approach to regional planning, and that full consideration be given to the physical, biological, economic and social environments. Also of extreme importance is that impact studies should be undertaken at the outset and not as an afterthought in planning regional development.”
While Munn told Somers that the working title would be Victoria Harbour I, it was later compiled and released as Environmental Impact Studies and has since been a source of reference in global environmental documents through its translations into multiple languages.
Gratuitous attention was also given in the Free Press article to the local angle.
Sportsman’s Motor Inn owners Jim and Carol Ashworth were prominent, with Carol photographed and quoted, as Somers admitted early in the article that he was in over his head with the scientific aspect. She noted she was “scared at first” by the unexpected magnitude of her guests, but later shared “you were all beautiful people” as she thanked them.
Additional mention was given to AES representative Gord McKay, as well as the dedicated workers at the convention: Dr. A. Chisholm for the shuttle service between Victoria Harbour to Toronto; Dr. J. McTaggart-Cowan; and Ann Bishop and Mary Anne Simonetta who were credited with helping typing through 25,000 sheets of paper until the supply ran out.
Day trips were also made to Sainte-Marie among the Hurons and Niagara Falls, but other than a photo in Zephyr to illustrate the group of scientists and environmental experts, the delegates primarily stuck to working at the meeting.
Somers wrote that when the convention concluded on Friday, Feb. 8, 1974, that Munn would be writing Environmental Impact Studies while flying to another meeting to be held in Nairobi, Kenya the following Monday.
