Texas: RIP forest defender Ed Fritz (1916-2008)

Dallas environmental lawyer and activist Edward C. Fritz, who proved
in federal court in the 1970s that illegal logging was occurring
throughout the national forests of Texas, died Friday at age 92. With
environmental law in its infancy, Fritz successfully pressed the
federal government and industries, ultimately steering a generation of
lawyers into conservation work.

“He was a firebrand; he was so
outspoken about things,” said David Todd , the coordinator of the
Conservation History Association of Texas . In his later years, Fritz,
known as Ned, had become “very spiritual, poetic, really, about
nature,” Todd said. Fritz was raised in Oklahoma, where time spent as
a Boy Scout launched him into a lifelong love of birding. After World
War II, in which he trained Navy pilots, he worked as a consumer
protection lawyer in Dallas. There, he began setting up a raft of
conservation and wildlife advocacy groups, including the Texas chapter
of the Nature Conservancy and the Texas Committee on Natural
Resources. In a statement Friday, the Nature Conservancy called Fritz
the “Father of Texas conservation.” His work took him across the
state, including in defense of the endangered golden-cheeked warbler
in Central Texas, but it was his efforts to stop illegal timber
cutting that brought national attention. The Big Thicket Association
in 2001 honored him for efforts that preserved 37,000 acres of
wilderness in Texas’ national forests. “He had an inspirational
quality; he was a fighter,” said David Bezanson , East Texas program
manager for the Nature Conservancy.
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/stories/local/12/20/1220fritz.html

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