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Concord Journal, Jan. 30, 1997
"Former Trustee always believed Middlesex School would preserve Estabrook Woods"
The following letter, addressed to the chairman of Concord's Natural Resources Commission, was also submitted to the Concord Journal for publication. It was written by Lucy Tittmann of Cambridge, a long-time Trustee of Middlesex School:
Dear Dr. Windmiller [Chair of the Concord Natural Resources Commission]:
Though my husband and I moved away from Concord in 1992, I follow with dismay Middlesex School's efforts to build a bridge across Bateman's Pond to create parking areas, playing fields and faculty housing in their property in the Estabrook Woods.
For 12 years I was on the Board of Trustees at Middlesex School and during much of that time I was on the Buildings and Grounds Committee. We often discussed the possible construction of new playing fields and the building of new faculty housing, but using the woods was never a part of our solution.
At some point, around 1990, a colleague and I were asked to walk through the school's property in the woods; the purpose was to look at the trees, the ecological communities, the rock outcroppings and the lay of the land, all with an eye, I understood, and to draw up the existing conditions for the board.
We were not asked to propose future use. I myself was excited to analyze the land because there had been conversation among some of us about the development of nature walks, biological study areas and even about the making of a proposal to obtain funds to enhance the natural flora and to create an area for native plants, an arboretum of sorts.
My partner for this study created a report on his own and presented to the board his idea for building a "mirror" campus on that area. I was astounded because the spirit of our study was not to have taken this direction.
I am still astounded.
It had always been my understanding that the magic of the woods was to be respected. The existence of the woods had always been touted as one of the school's assets. We all knew how much the former headmaster, Monk Terry, and the then headmaster, David Sheldon, loved the woods. We were worried that Harvard might develop or sell its holdings there.
Until this point there had not been, to my knowledge, serious discussion of the woods as a place for expansion of the school's building projects.
Our family lived in Concord for more than 30 years, and I was a member of the Natural Resources Commission for some of that time. In Concord there was fear that Harvard would develop its land, but we never feared that Middlesex would violate their ownership in the woods.
Now Harvard has agreed to keep its property as wild land in perpetuity and Middlesex is making plans to go in with bulldozers and change the earth!
In the last decade it has become more clear what pollution can do to the balance of nature in a place; we are tracking changes to our delicate amphibians, we follow with fear the disappearance of fragile ecosystems.
At the same time, in our own garages we put down sawdust to collect the drips of oil from our cars. And those of us with lawns are beginning to realize that fertilizers for green grass leach into wetlands and into aquifers and river streams.
The best-seller "A Civil Action" makes it clear what pollution can do. The Estabrook Woods is one of the only sizable tracts of natural land within Route 495. How can Concord or Middlesex or any of us stand by and let it be chiseled away any more?
How can we condone the addition of more car grease and oil and fertilizers into Bateman's Pond?
I wish that Middlesex would seriously pursue solving their needs by going westward across Lowell Road, and I feel that the Town of Concord should defer condonement of the use of their woods until all possibilities have been pursued.
Once it's gone, it's gone.
Lucy Tittmann, [former Middlesex School
Trustee]
Landscape Architect
Cambridge, Mass.