Ed Markey: “I rise in support of H.R. 193, the ``Sudbury, Assabet, and Concord Wild and Scenic River Act.'' Wild and scenic areas…”

“I rise in support of H.R. 193, the ``Sudbury, Assabet, and Concord Wild and Scenic River Act.'' Wild and scenic areas are found not only in the vast expanses of the American West but also in pockets in the midst of the cities and towns of the East. As the areas around Boston, including my own district, become increasingly crowded and urban, it is important to preserve natural areas where the beauty and tranquillity of nature can become a part of the everyday lives of local communities. Through the Sudbury, Assabet, and Concord rivers has flowed a remarkable current of history and beauty. Back in 1837 Ralph Waldo Emerson commemorated events that had taken place above the Concord River in 1775 with his unforgettable words, ``by the rude bridge that arched the flood, their flag to April's breeze unfurled, here once the embattl'd farmers stood, and fired the shot heard round the world.'' Nathanial Hawthorne wrote of the beauty of the Assabet: ``Rowing our boat against the current, between wide meadows, we turn aside into the Assabeth. A more lovely stream than this, for a mile above its junction with the Concord, has never flowed on Earth,--where, indeed, except to lave the interior of a poet's imagination.'' Today we have even greater need of scenic rivers to excite the ``poet's imagination'' in each of us.”