A CHILD'S GARDEN OF POLLUTION

[Music] [Music] I'm Bill Bixby you know Eddie's father and this is Eddie Brandon Cruz no this isn't the courtship of Eddie's father it's a different kind of program one which we believe is important to everyone it's a program about our environment the way we use it the way we misuse it the way we live with it the way we might die with [Music] it here we are and out you go yeah but Dad I don't see anything well way do we get to the edge come on want to race you're on is this where he used to come when you were a boy mhm how far away could you see then well all the way to the ocean D was it pretty that in the time span of a single generation this world has become so polluted that a man can't even show his son the places of his childhood a hill that I used to run and play on or a mountain that I would just sit and look at would wonder I can't show him because smog gets in the way I can't even show him the stream when I used to go fishing because it doesn't exist anymore at least not the way it was when I was there the water is so filthy now the fish refus to live there but what is worse is the children's story such as Robert Lewis Stevenson's A Child's Garden of verses May no longer be meaningful to children because the Beautiful Nature images that are used are unreal to them they're a fantasy as remote as uh a world without television but what is real is that Edy is the first generation to have been born and raised in a totally polluted atmosphere do you realize that he and others his age have never once in their lifetimes taken a single breath of outdoor air that was clean hey sport want to1 okay we owe it to Eddie to all the eddes of the world to try and understand what's happened here and to do something about it so we would like to invite you on a journey sometimes strange very often frightening a journey into a child's Garden of pollution [Music] Dad h when did we start making pollution a long time ago I guess but nobody paid much attention to it till the 1950s that was when DDT was first used by Farmers to kill pests that destroyed their crops and it worked but it did other things too leaves that were sprayed with DDT fell to the ground where they were eaten by insects and the insects were eaten by birds and the birds died and the forest which had known the singing of birds for a thousand years was quiet Dad well DDT hurt me I mean if I don't touch it I don't know Eddie why not well because it's in the atmosphere now and and in the ground where it runs off into streams and then into all the oceans of the world we're actually living in a sea of pesticides Eddie and it's getting worse someday somebody should say don't use it yeah that's right Eddie but there are always people who say why shouldn't I I believe that the people that are complaining about the pesticides don't know what they're talking about or else they're trying to make a mountain out of of a mole hill the public don't have the the true picture uh you talk to any farmer and I don't think he feels he could get along without it only 5% of the land has ever had pesticides applied to it yet its residues have been found everywhere even on the Greenland ice C and even in American cities why do you know that pesticide residu have been found in unborn babies and in mother's milk breastfed babies in America today consume four times the daily amount of DDT judged safe by the United Nations Farmers may not be be able to get along without pesticides but a lot of other people would like to [Music] try but it's not only pesticides that pollute the atmosphere it's the automobile too 60% of the smog hanging over America's cities is caused by the family car the man who knows more about this than just about anybody else is caltech's Ari hogin Schmid he rides the freeways measuring carbon monoxide it is just a question of the density of the traffic and then uh it shoots up now we have been drive driving here over the 100 again and now we have that that blue car in in front of us and uh we are picking up his exhaust you see it goes to close to 60 parts per million there it goes over the 60 that little Volkswagen here you see 60 and so anytime that another car with this exhaust comes close by uh you uh see the pointer uh move the the the air conditioning in a car doesn't help to take the smoke out it just uh it doesn't pass through activated charcoal it's a it's only a cooling effect and uh it doesn't make any difference well here here we uh have there it goes up to over the 100 now it is 95 over the 100 again over the 100 it stays over the 100 that's probably that car that just came by here still over the 100 the best thing is to stay home there it goes up to over the 100 now it is 95 over the 100 again over the 100 it stays over the that's probably that car that just came by any bread hold it it out each day of Our Lives we breathe 18,000 times 500 cubic feet of air is taken into our lungs polluted air it's estimated that if we to reduce air pollution by 50% we could cut death from lung cancer and other lung diseases by 25% we could reduce death and disease from heart disorders by 15% and we could reduce the nation's medical bill by at least $2 billion each year but the most important medical statistic of all concerning air pollution has yet to be calculated Dr Roman y okay we uh know that the older people now are having more disease with smog just in the last half of their life our older population have had at least 25 years of Clean Air to breathe before the smog problem got this bad but now our children don't know what clean air is they'll be breathing dirty air for all of their lives and what this will do to them when they're as old as these patients I don't know findings from studies made recently at two medical schools in England indicate that at a very early age children raised under conditions of high pollution begin to show evidence of permanent malfunction it's believed that most of them will be chronically ill by the time they reach the age of 30 hold it breathe now and again and again Dad yeah if the air is too dangerous to breathe in we can wear oxygen suits just like the Spacemen yeah but we may have to ready you see we spoiled our air just as we spoiled our water pollution has even reached the oceans and now even and they are in danger of dying there's nothing beautiful about looking at the sea anymore offshore rigs sit in the Horizon where they all too frequently spill their oil out over the waves part of the garbage that's filling the sea and making it ugly and killing [Music] [Laughter] it [Laughter] this picture was taken at night time in total darkness off the coast of California and this is a boat this is another example an unusual laboratory in Downey California the space division of North American Rockwell Corporation here Dr Robert Styers uses high altitude sensors to detect pollution a device from outer space research at work on problems here on Earth now let's add some color to it and see what's happened here the yellow represents the fact that this boat has is discharging something sewage Oil Garbage from its Villages this represents dumps by other boats in an earlier time what we're doing here is tracking down pollution by means of advanced technology we take black and white infrared photographs place on the table show it through the TV Camera display it on the TV monitor here this is an aerial view of some very pretty Countryside with a nice little stream running through this area the stream appears clear and very nice in fact people swim in this and fish in here all the time now let's add some color and see what some of the dangers are in this stream the purple area may have a one more please the purple areas you see in here represent growth large growth of algae in the Stream algae grow because of organic material on further investigation with discovered that sewage partially treated sewage is dumped on the hillside up here and it seeps down into this stream supporting the algae this is the same stream as it enters into the ocean this is the ocean here are the beaches and this is the stream now with color we will see what happens when a polluted stream dumps into the ocean you want notice that the polluted stream the contaminated water does not go way out in the ocean as would be hoped and disappear it does run right along the beaches these are public beaches in heavily populated areas and sticks close to the Shoreline pollution it's impossible to escape from it pesticides washed in from the land and other chemicals debris human and Industrial it all ends up in the sea and the sea is dying dad mhm who is to blame what do you mean I mean if something is wrong someone is to blame for it our children to blame well I guess we all already each and every one of us when you get right down to it the main problem of pollution is people there are just too many of us we crowd ourselves into every available inch of space stripping Hills and everything that was once beautiful we don't let anything stand in our way of destroying the environment we build cities that are monuments to congestion we pollute our senses with garish signs and Loud Noises we take open spaces and we shut them in it seems sometimes that we Purp purposely design our Open Spaces to make sure that they will not perform ecologically for the good of the community all this we do to ourselves in the name of progress but most of what we do to ourselves is build freeways that cover the land with concrete and provide room for more and more automobiles that pollute the environment more and more and more sometimes you wonder if cities are built for people or for cars it's all part of a way of life that we have chosen for ourselves we want to go places fast so naturally we take an airplane a jet airplane and in so doing we add the pollution 7 billion gallons of jet fuel are used in the United States each year and most of it spreads out over the land in a steady flow of black [Music] exhaust [Music] pollution is isn't all as impersonal as jet planes or vast stretches of ocean it gets back to the way we choose to lead our lives for many of us we shop our way into pollution we buy too many things some of which create enormous pollution problems like laundry detergents containing phosphates which end up poisoning our waterways and so many of the things we buy come wrapped in plastic and then those things are placed in bags and then into other bags the problem of disposing all these things becomes Monumental it averages out to 5 lbs of garbage per person per day that is a billion pounds of garbage each and every day this is a nation that is being buried in its garbage and it keeps on coming we are being polluted by products the public wants them industry turns them out to do this power is being used in increasingly large amounts and power generates heat it is in this process that perhaps the greatest of all dangers to man exists thermal pollution atmospheric changes which may ultimately destroy all life on [Music] Earth and all this we have done to ourselves we've built cities and have seen them crumble we've moved mountains and have seen them turn to dust we've dreamed dreams and have seen them shatter we have lived Our Lives among those dreams and now we can dream no [Music] more [Music] [Music] I'd ra be a spiral than a sare yes I will if I could I surely [Music] would I'd rather be a hammer than a nail yes I would if I Only Could I surely [Music] I let a man gets C up to the he gives the world it's it's [Music] I'd rather be a forest than a street yes I would if I could I surely would I'd rather feel the Earth beneath my feet Yes I would if I could I surely [Music] [Music] would [Music] dad are we in endangered species too in a very real sense Edie I think that we [Music] are dad is there anything I can do I think there is any a great man once asked us for commitment and sacrifice he said uh ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country and I think it's time for us to renew that commitment you know maybe this will bring us together all of us young and old black and white rich and poor maybe it's time to say no more no matter what the consequences we must do it if we are to live and not die Dad yes Eddie will you take care of me oh yes Eddie I will Dad mhm will other fathers take care of their sons too oh I hope so [Music] hone