Ivory Trade and Movement Restrictions

Unless you read the White House Blog daily, you no doubt missed a quiet but monumental announcement. On February 11, 2014, the White House issued an executive order essentially banning international trade in items containing ivory, as well as tightly controlling movement of personally owned items containing ivory. Two weeks later, on February 25, 2014, Dan Ashe, director of the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, released Director’s Order 210 giving the draconian details of implementation. The executive order and director’s order were immediately enforced, including being applied to CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) import and export applications filed months earlier. Restrictions on intrastate and interstate sales and movement were announced on May 15, 2014, along with other revisions discussed below. The Executive Branch and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service have ignored federal requirements for publication of proposed regulations and public comment before enforcement.

You have perhaps learned, e.g., of violin bows belonging to members of touring European orchestras being confiscated upon entry to the United States, or of the refusal to give a CITES permit for the import of a significant harpsichord by a United States collector/performer. The new regulations are being enforced through immovable, irrational requirements that ignore personal property rights of owners of legally acquired items containing ivory. Further complicating the situation are diverse actions by individual states, in particular, New Jersey, New York, and California. These actions have far-reaching effects among musicians, collectors, musical instrument dealers and repair people, and everyday citizens.

According to President Obama, the United States needs to “lead by example” with tough restrictions on all trade and movement of ivory. It is unclear why any country—especially China, the primary and nearly sole market for illegal new ivory—would be influenced by restrictions in the United States. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has acted, in their words, “to close the loopholes” of transportation and markets for illegal new ivory in the United States, theoretically reducing pressure on elephant populations.

The illogic of thinking a legally acquired musical instrument, or ivory-inlaid 17th- or 18th-century furniture, or ivory Torah pointers, or knives or canes containing antique or pre-Convention (1976) ivory would be conduits for new ivory seems apparent to us, but the new regulations are rigidly defended by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service staff. Director Dan Ashe also states that they cannot tell new from old ivory thus justifying their methods (guilty until proven innocent, yet worse), a statement that has experts and repair people familiar with antique ivory shaking their heads in strong disagreement. In truth, I think he is speaking more to the lack of expertise among inspectors. In the United States, there are few instances of trade in illegal new ivory, though a few notable episodes have helped fuel this maelstrom, one involving faked African antiques in Philadelphia, and another of faked Asian antique figurines in New York City. Both were caught by appropriate profiling of the merchants and thorough investigations. The nets are being cast far wider now, and being visible targets, musical instruments have been particularly persecuted.

So, why the urgency and drama? The story is that the African elephant is in dire danger of losing 1/5 of their population over the next twenty or thirty years and then extinction. Beware the numbers appearing in seemingly reputable publications, as incorrect, unsubstantiated figures are being propagated. In stark contrast, looking at CITES’ own recent reports,¹ there are currently about 500,000 African elephants in Africa, down from a probable 600,000 in 1989.² About 22,000 elephants have been killed in each of the last several years, an admittedly horrific number, but actually decreasing, not increasing as claimed. 

According to the CITES report referenced above, the poaching rate appears to have leveled off and further affirms that poaching is primarily due to “extreme poverty and lack of governance in the affected areas.” Local farmers and corrupt game wardens earn huge payments for leading poachers to their prey. In some countries elephants are already at risk, while in others they are over-populated, causing serious problems by destroying farmers’ crops and overgrazing their own protected preserves. In these countries, culling is necessary. Their governments want to sell their large ivory stores in a controlled fashion, to raise money for the local human and elephant populations. A regular source of legal ivory sales would dramatically bring down prices and deter the brutal and horrific practice of poaching.³

Prior and current rules 

(These are subject to change.)

Previously there were no domestic restrictions for sales or travel of items containing ivory and CITES permits could be acquired for import and export of legally acquired ivory by following instructions, paying a fee, and filling out paperwork, a somewhat onerous but do-able process. Exemptions were granted allowing import or export of items that could be demonstrated to be antique (over 100 years old), or pre-Convention (1989 for African elephant ivory). All of this changed in February. “Commercial” imports of ivory are forbidden. Period. No exceptions. Exports are limited, but the hoops to jump through have made permits virtually impossible to acquire. As of May 25, 2014, the details of the regulations were eased somewhat thanks to various musical instrument related organizations with lobbyists working tirelessly in Washington, D.C., but the limitations and requirements are still unreasonable and unclear and were expanded to severely restrict sales within states and across state lines.

The most up to date summary can be found at www.fws.gov/international/travel-and-trade/ivory-ban-questions-and-answ…. Remember while reading this web page and the explanations of it below, that qualifying for the CITES documents is extremely difficult. Here is the summary, with remarks about qualifying for the exemptions below.

Commercial imports

Forbidden. If you buy an instrument out of the country, you will not be able to get it into the United States. Note that the term “commercial” is being applied to any transaction that could be conceived of as resulting in a financial gain. For example, if you want to import an instrument and donate it to your favorite institution, they consider that commercial, since you may be applying for a tax deduction for the donation. Instruments bought overseas before the ban was announced, but awaiting their import permits, had their permits abruptly rejected. 

Personal imports 

You may import an item containing ivory as part of a household move or inheritance, or as part of your own musical instrument or as part of a traveling exhibition as long as the item contains “worked elephant ivory that was ‘legally acquired’ and removed from the wild prior to February 26, 1976 and has not been sold or otherwise been transferred for financial gain since February 25, 2014.” Thus you will not be able to bring in (or out) of the country any ivory-containing item that was purchased after February 25, 2014. (This is at least a significant improvement of the original specification of not being transferred for financial gain after 1976!) This freezes instrument ownership for touring musicians and amateurs as of the date of the Director’s Order. Additionally, the individual or group must qualify for a CITES musical instrument certificate and the musical instrument containing worked elephant ivory “must be accompanied by a valid CITES musical instrument certificate or equivalent CITES document.” The instructions do not specify what would qualify as an equivalent document. 

Commercial export 

While the rules state that pre-Convention and antique items containing worked ivory may be exported, in reality the new requirements to qualify for a CITES export certificate are extremely difficult-to-impossible to satisfy. Fortunately, in May they did eliminate two of the most ridiculous aspects of the February 25th Director’s Order, wherein 1) no domestically made items containing worked ivory could qualify, and 2) the exporter had to supply evidence that the item had entered through one of the “specified ports” for ivory import/export, despite the fact that these ports did not exist before 1982. If the ivory was repaired or modified after 1973, it will not qualify. If the item was originally imported after 1982, then it must demonstrably have been imported through one of the 13 ports of entry designated for antiques made of Endangered Species Act-listed species (Boston, Massachusetts; New York, New York; Baltimore, Maryland; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Miami, Florida; San Juan, Puerto Rico; New Orleans, Louisiana; Houston, Texas; Los Angeles, California; San Francisco, California; Anchorage, Alaska; Honolulu, Hawaii; and Chicago, Illinois).

To qualify under the antique exemption, the exporter must document the item’s age and identify the species used. Proof of age can be through scientific testing at an accredited laboratory or facility, a qualified appraisal, or provenance through other documentation, such as a detailed history of the item, family photos, ethnographic fieldwork, or other evidence that assigns the work to a known period of time. Fortunately, most musical instruments can be dated quite accurately. The species can be identified through DNA analysis (but this is unusable as the large quantities required would destroy that part of the musical instrument), or a qualified appraisal or other documentation that demonstrates the identification of the species through a detailed provenance. In practice, there have been difficulties with Fish & Wildlife permit examiners insisting on satisfying all of these dating and species methods and requiring a description of the “scientific method” used to make the species determination. Note that there are visual ways to identify the different types of ivory, except that Asian and African elephant cannot be visually distinguished. (See www.fws.gov/lab/ivory_id.php and www.fws.gov/policy/do210A1.pdf.)

Again, the ivory must not have been “repaired or modified.” U.S. Fish & Wildlife agents reviewing applications are insisting on full details of restorations, not just whether the ivory was repaired. This despite that in reality, restorers do not need to, want to, or use (expensive, illegal) new ivory. There are synthetics and ample supplies of surplus antique ivory, e.g., in the form of old piano key tops. Regardless, as the rules are written, if the ivory was repaired, they can refuse the application even if you just filled a crack with dental epoxy. Whether having glued a piece back on would result in denial is unclear.

The burden of proof has been laid heavily on the exporter in an “all are guilty until proven innocent” fashion. Fish & Wildlife agents reviewing applications since February have been virtually impossible to satisfy. Some insist appraisers are trained in biology or wildlife forensics. The director has told them they don’t have to believe any documentation and to “set a high bar.” This writer, who has been importing and exporting antique pianos for over ten years, was informed that the common knowledge, as well as published information, that piano key tops were made from African elephant ivory, was now insufficient. This was despite pointing out that I was initially told by a Fish & Wildlife official years ago that African elephant ivory (Loxodonta africana) was the correct species to specify for ivory key tops and all my other previous applications were all accepted stating this species.

The Musical Instrument Certificate or “Passport”

After being besieged by concerned touring musicians, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and CITES created a new permit certificate for people traveling regularly with their instruments, called the Musical Instrument Certificate or “Passport.” The application is available on the Fish & Wildlife website (www.fws.gov/international/pdf/permit-application-form-3-200-88.pdf).

They require a signed appraisal or other documentation to demonstrate the age of the ivory-containing item, which must pre-date 1976. You must also include a signed statement (though it does not say signed by whom) that the item has not been repaired or modified on or after December 28, 1973, with any part of any species covered by the Endangered Species Act. That should suffice for antiques (over 100 years old), but for export of younger items, it additionally says the applicant must also state whether the item was bought, sold, or “offered for sale by you or anyone else” since December 28, 1973, in which case “there may be a need for additional information and the Division of Management Authority will contact you directly.”

Confusingly on the form, this last category is apparently not applicable if your instrument includes African elephant ivory. What is worrisome is that the wording opens the door to interpretation by the examining agent to not allow the export at all if the subject item contains elephant ivory. Additionally worrisome is the inclusion of a note that African elephant ivory removed from the wild after February 4, 1977, is not considered to be pre-Convention (for the purposes of this application, since it most certainly is in the rest of the world). Given the recent difficulty in establishing the species of elephant to the satisfaction of the USFWS agents, it will likely be difficult to get approval for any personal musical instrument containing ivory to travel.

Note that you need a different CITES form for each endangered species in your instrument, including rosewood and tortoiseshell. Also note that you and your instrument will need to exit and enter the country ONLY through one of the 13 designated ports for ivory: www.fws.gov/le/designated-ports.html.

If your instrument contains a listed endangered plant species, you are further restricted to exit and enter through a designated port for listed plant species: www.aphis.usda.gov/import_export/plants/manuals/ports/downloads/cites.p….

Obviously this makes travel arrangements even more complicated and there are no plans to expand on the number of designated ports.

A fee of $75 is due with the application, which can take 45–60 days or more for approval, processing, and return. The certificate is good for three years, but you must bring the instrument back into the issuing country before it expires, at which point you can apply for a new certificate.

For all forms applicable to musical instruments, see: www.fws.gov/international/permits/by-activity/musical-instruments.html.

Domestic: intrastate and 

interstate trade and movement

Beginning on June 26, 2014, domestic sellers of items containing worked African elephant ivory must demonstrate that any item offered for sale—whether across state lines or within a state—was lawfully imported prior to the CITES Appendix-I listing of the African elephant (January 1990) or under a CITES pre-Convention certificate. Appendix-I covers species around the world most at risk as a result of international trade. Non-commercial movement is still allowed. There has been no clarification of how commercial may be defined beyond sale or what documentation is needed for such things as household moves. Some fear that traveling over state lines to perform at a paid concert could be considered a commercial transaction. Emphasis seems to be on sales, but given the vagueness of the rules both to the populace and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service agents, and recent aggressive enforcement, it is a concern. At least one piano transport truck has already been stopped and questioned with the result that the firm will no longer move pianos with ivory key tops. Another said they would just leave any questioned piano on the roadside and keep going. 

Unfortunately for musicians and others involved with legally obtained pre-Convention ivory, public support for the ban is being fanned with false numbers, hysteria, dramatic photos, and endorsements by celebrities who apparently can’t do the simple research required to discover the truth. For example, the performer Billy Joel publicly requested people save elephants by not having their pianos made with ivory keys, apparently unaware that no pianos have been made with ivory key tops in the United States since 1956 and in Europe since the 1980s. It appears that there is massive funding for public “awareness” and high-level political influence by some large conservation groups.

California, New Jersey, and New York State

Individual states have begun a hodgepodge of their own restrictions. In spring of 2012 California began to enforce a law that has been on their books since 1970 by raiding an auction house in northern California and seizing approximately $150,000 worth of ivory objects. This law has no exemption for antique and pre-Convention ivory and criminalizes possession with intent to sell, with stiff penalties. Introduced on May 8, 2014, both houses of New Jersey’s legislature quickly and quietly passed a draconian bill signed by Governor Christie on August 1, 2014. This law includes elephant, hippo, mammoth (which has been legally used to substitute for elephant ivory in recent years), narwhal, walrus, and whale ivory. It is unlawful to import, sell, purchase, offer for sale, barter, or possess with intent to sell any item containing ivory. 

There are no exceptions for antiques or pre-Convention ivory. It is legal to convey ivory to the legal beneficiary of an estate after death or in anticipation of death. The penalties are stiff, and ivory products will be seized and transferred to the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection for “proper disposition.” The New York State legislature quickly followed with a ban on the sale of elephant and mammoth ivory and rhinoceros horn that Governor Cuomo supports. The New York Department of Environmental Conservation may issue permits for the sale of documented antiques over 100 years old and containing less than 20 percent ivory and musical instruments made prior to 1976 (this is bad luck for the New York owners of Bösendorfers and Hamburg Steinways made in the 1980s with ivory key tops). Fines are steep and felony charges possible. (See www.governor.ny.gov/sites/thediapason.com/files/GPB44-IVORY_BILL.pdf.)

In all these cases, vagueness of wording is a serious problem. Technically, federal laws take precedence, but until court battles ensue, those with non-antique but pre-Convention ivory or insufficient “proof of provenance” will not be able to sell their items intact.

Current and potential effects

Many antique and pre-Convention cultural artifacts contain ivory, including Torah pointers, George Washington’s false teeth, medical demonstration figures, scrimshaw art, and of course, musical instruments. Key tops, guitar nuts, saddles and tuning pins, wind instrument rings, stringed instrument bows, organ stop knobs, and more have been made from ivory for its workability, beauty, availability, density, durability, and tactile and acoustic properties. Many musical instruments remain in active use for generations and commonly travel with their owners.

Already, the international import ban has prevented collectors from importing important pieces for study, performance, and recording in the United States. Because of the abrupt announcement and enforcement, quite a few people buying or selling internationally have found themselves unable to get instruments to their new homes. Reduced to the domestic market alone, musical instrument values will necessarily drop. If domestic trade is further restricted this summer, the value of ivory-containing objects will be reduced to virtually nothing, nor will anyone be able to receive a tax deduction for donations of instruments to institutions since that is considered “financial gain,” a serious potential loss of donations to colleges, universities, museums, and other public institutions.

The restriction of musical instrument certificates to instruments that have not transferred ownership for any financial gain after February 25, 2014, prevents internationally traveling musicians from upgrading, or ever again purchasing any instruments or bows containing ivory that can travel with them. Given the expense and paperwork to obtain the musical instrument passports, along with the aggressive and suspicious stance of the customs officials, it is highly likely there will be less touring of musicians in and out of the United States. Again, musical instruments containing ivory will be significantly devalued. (See www.wqxr.org/#!/story/newark-officials-seize-budapest-orchestras-violin… and www.nytimes.com/aponline/2014/08/05/us/ap-us-travel-brief-bagpipes-at-t….)

Additionally, it will take a great deal of time, paperwork, and human power to administer and enforce all these new regulations. This will cost taxpayers dearly and consume considerable personal time for applicants, while not preventing the loss of one elephant to poaching.

Look-alike problem

It is very important to point out that customs agents are rarely skilled at identifying materials and may even presume, for example, that all instruments of a type are suspect. This has resulted in items containing “look-alike” materials and even with no ivory-like material being confiscated from their cases at border crossings with no explanations. It is highly advisable to have prepared and accompany your instrument with copies of an official appraisal or listing by the maker of the materials used in your musical instrument, whether it contains any suspect species or not. Also insist, as is your right, to be present when your instrument is inspected before shipping. Take photos of what is in the crate or case before shipping.

Late-summer developments

On July 14, 2014, two bills (H.R. 5052 in the House of Representatives, and S. 2587 in the Senate) were introduced; both would prohibit U.S. Fish & Wildlife from implementing any “new rule, order, or standard regarding the sale and trade in ivory that was not in place before February 25, 2014.” As of August 2, H.R. 5052 had 20 bi-partisan co-sponsors, an encouraging development. In addition, in early July, the House Appropriations Bill for the Department of the Interior included language that would prohibit U.S. Fish & Wildlife from spending any funds to enforce any rules, orders, or standard not in place before February 25, 2014. The appropriations bill has passed the Senate but faces a battle in the House of Representatives. The appropriations bill language is intended to put a moratorium on enforcement until a permanent method of undoing the disastrous actions of February 11 and 25, 2014, can be put in place. The appropriations bill includes other language against other more publicly controversial programs, but I am hopeful the ivory section will be kept as a trade-off against other concessions. The final hurdle is, of course, whether President Obama will sign or veto any of these bills.

What you can do to help

It is urgent that we eventually press for a permanent solution to protect cultural artifacts made before any species included in them was declared endangered. The current problems are regulations and enforcement rules, not laws, and can be changed with enough pressure. Lobbyists are working for groups such as the League of American Orchestras, National Association of Music Merchants, and some private individuals (e.g., through the important Podesta Group), and are kindly sharing information and guidance. Thanks to the efforts of many, we have the promising bills to be debated in Congress. Numbers count! It is critical for as many people as possible to write to their members of Congress, the President, the Secretary of the Interior, the Director of Fish & Wildlife Services, those on the Committee for Wildlife Trafficking (www.fws.gov/international/advisory-council-wildlife-trafficking/bios.ht…), Natural Resources, and the Congressional Committee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans and Insular Affairs. See https://www.govtrack.us/congress/committees/HSII/22.

Most useful is to try to get a personal or phone appointment with your senators and representatives and explain why these regulations are harmful and will not save any elephants. E-mails through their websites are also working for some. Ask them to support and co-sponsor H.R. 5052 and S. 2587. You can find your senators and representatives at www.opencongress.org/people/zipcodelookup.

The important talking points are:

• We want to end the poaching of African elephants and illicit trade in new illegal ivory, but banning the domestic sale and trade of legal ivory in the United States and preventing import of antique and pre-Convention items containing ivory will not stop poaching, nor save one living elephant. 

• The July 2014 CITES meeting emphasized that the cause of poaching is extreme poverty, lack of governance, and corruption in the affected areas. Efforts need to help the affected communities and fund intelligence operations that locate poachers and dealers.

• The ban unnecessarily hurts owners of antiques and pre-Convention items containing ivory legally imported into this country by stripping their value, resulting in a taking of billions of dollars from law-abiding Americans. The domestic ban would devastate the current market in worked ivory items, causing legitimate business owners and everyday citizens tremendous economic harm. Note how the ban will hurt you personally. The analysis of the economic effect of this ban by U.S. Fish & Wildlife is grossly understated.

• The proposed ban would make the survival of cultural and historic artifacts much more unlikely, and keep them out of collections where they would be preserved. It is highly likely that the ban and regulations are against the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. (See www.nps.gov/history/local-law/nhpa1966.htm.)

• Even the author of the African Elephant Conservation Act of 1989 testified at a congressional hearing on June 24, 2014, that this ban will not help to stop poaching and was never the intent of the AECA. (See www.fws.gov/international/laws/aeca_fv.html.)

• The current requirements for the antique exemption for export are still virtually impossible to meet for many legally obtained items due to a lack of documentation never previously required to stay with the instruments.

• Ideally, ivory regulations should revert to where they were on February 1, 2014, which did indeed stabilize elephant populations since their inception.

This is one of those times when we all need to stand up for what is right and fair. Somehow we need to get the powers in charge to understand that not one elephant will be saved by these absurd regulations, but our cultural, historical, and musical heritage will suffer, as will private individuals and owners of small businesses.

Here is contact information for the appropriate government officials:

Sally Jewel, Secretary of the Interior

Department of the Interior

1849 C Street, N.W. 

Washington, DC 20240

E-mail: [email protected]

Web: Feedback form

Daniel M. Ashe, Fish & Wildlife, Director of External Affairs

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

1849 C Street, NW

Washington, DC 20240

E-mail: www.fws.gov/duspit/contactus.htm

1‑800‑344‑WILD (9453)

Barack Obama, President of the United States

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW

Washington, DC 20500

E-mail: www.whitehouse.gov/contact/submit-questions-and-comments

Representative Ed Royce

Chairman, Committee on Wildlife Trafficking

1380 S. Fullerton Road, Suite 205

Rowland Heights, CA 91748

To write your local senators and congressmen see: www.opencongress.org/people/zipcodelookup. 

For further reading: www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/02/11/fact-sheet-national-stra…. ν

Notes

1. www.cites.org/sites/thediapason.com/files/eng/com/sc/65/E-SC65-42-01_2… “Interpretation and implementation of the Convention: Species trade and conservation: Elephants: Elephant Conservation, Illegal Killing and the Ivory Trade,” Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna, 65th Meeting of the Standing Committee, Geneva, Switzerland, July 7–11, 2014, especially pp. 10–11.

2. A. M. Lemieux and R. V. Clarke, “The International Ban on Ivory Sales and its Effects on Elephant Poaching in Africa,” The British Journal of Criminology (vol. 49, no. 4), 2009, pp. 451–471.

3. Testimony of Jack Fields, June 24, 2014, at Hearing of Subcommittee on Fisheries, Wildlife, Oceans, and Insular Affairs. http://docs.house.gov/
meetings/II/II22/20140624/102350/HHRG-113-II22-Wstate-FieldsJ-20140624.pdf.

Awareness in the wild

Cecil the Lion was a famous and favorite icon of Zimbabwe’s safari tourist industry. He was beloved by thousands who visited his home in Hwange National Park, and his photos were published around the world. He was thirteen years old and was central to a long-standing conservation study by biologists at Oxford University who had fitted him with a tracking device when he was six years old. He was huge and majestic, and he was easily recognizable because of big black streaks in his mane.

In the last days of July 2015, Cecil became an instant posthumous global celebrity when he was killed by Walter Palmer, a dentist and skilled trophy hunter from Minnesota. International news services and social media have been crackling with the story, Palmer is in hiding, the guide and landowner who had been paid to help with the hunt have appeared in court and been released on bail, and Cecil’s remains have been returned to the Zimbabwean government.

Palmer had paid for a license for such a hunt, but allegedly illegally lured Cecil outside the park, and as of this writing on August 1, the United States and Zimbabwean governments are discussing Palmer’s extradition. Thanks to social media, donations are pouring into wildlife conservation funds in six-figure clumps. Jane Goodall, who famously has spent more than fifty-five years studying chimpanzees at Gombe National Park in Tanzania, released a statement lamenting Cecil’s death that concludes, “Only one good thing comes out of this—thousands of people have read the story and have also been shocked. Their eyes opened to the dark side of human nature. Surely they will now be more prepared to fight for the protection of wild animals and the wild places where they live. Therein lies the hope.”

You can read the full statement on Dr. Goodall’s blog at www.janegoodall.org. And by now, her “thousands of people” must be many millions.

The timing of Cecil’s death was exquisite. Just a few days earlier, on July 25, while traveling in Kenya, President Obama released a statement that would effectively ban commercial trade in African elephant ivory in the United States. That announcement follows Obama’s executive order of July of 2013, in which he declared that the United States should “lead by example,” encouraging other nations to step up their active participation in the preservation of that majestic species. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) followed on February 25, 2014, by proposing a new rule affecting the trade and movement of ivory. You can see a simple summary of the specifics of the 2014 rule at www.fws.gov/international/travel-and-trade/ivory-ban-questions-and-answ…. For more background, I recommend you refer to the excellent article written by harpsichord specialist Anne Acker and published in the September 2014 issue of The Diapason. Ms. Acker did a great deal of excellent research and was generous with her time talking with me.

The specifics are presented in a chart. They include exemptions for any ivory more than one hundred years old (difficult to prove in many cases) and light exemptions for the domestic transportation of privately owned ivory. If you want to bring your grandmother’s harmonium home, there are no federal restrictions, unless your grandmother lived outside the United States.¹ No importing of ivory is permitted, period—except sports-hunted trophies. There is no restriction on importing sports-hunted trophies. Hang that on your wall.

Citing CITES

On July 1, 1975, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Flora and Fauna (CITES, pronounced sight–eze) was implemented, the culmination of nearly fifteen years of international negotiation. The text of the treaty had been finalized two years earlier by eighty nations. Today, more than 180 nations enforce the terms of CITES, which oversees the protection of more than 30,000 species of animals and plants. You can see a list of protected species at www.fws.gov/
endangered/species/us-species.html. They are categorized as “E” (endangered), “T” (threatened), “SAT” (threatened because they’re similar in appearance to an endangered species), etc.²

Loxodonta africana (the African elephant) is the source of the most highly prized ivory, and that species was added to Appendix I of CITES on January 18, 1990. USFWS regulations currently in effect allow trade in ivory that was legally removed from the wild before that date.

With Obama’s Kenyan announcement, the clock started ticking. The USFWS released the latest version of the new ban on trade and movement of ivory. The agency is receiving comments from the public until September 28, 2015, after which the regulation will be amended once more and put into force. The version now open to comment includes revisions of that published in Feburary 2014 (that you’ve already read). You can read the latest proposed revisions at www.fws.gov/international/pdf/african-elephant-4d-proposed-changes.pdf…;

Again, it’s a neat summary, comparing the present proposal with that of 2014, and it’s easy to read. While commercial imports are entirely prohibited, sports-hunted trophies would now be limited to two per hunter per year, a big improvement over no limit at all, but if you maxed out the limit year after year, you’d need a mighty big house in which to hang them.

The Times Square Crush

Anyone who has navigated the sidewalks and pedestrian walkways in New York’s Times Square knows about the crush of humanity that throbs twenty-four hours a day. On June 19, 2015, the USFWS staged a different Times Square Crush. A huge industrial rock-crushing machine, the hulking behemoth that crushes boulders into gravel at highway-construction sites, was driven into the center of the square, and a ton of ivory artifacts that had been seized in an undercover operation was sent up into the machine on a conveyor belt and crushed to powder. Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell presided over the event.

Two years earlier, the USFWS staged an ivory crush in Denver, Colorado, at which six tons of artifacts were destroyed. A statement published on the website of the USFWS reads, “Since that crush, several governments throughout Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia, have also destroyed ivory, joining with us to highlight this worldwide crisis and emphasizing that only a worldwide solution will stop wildlife poaching.” You can read the full statement and view videos of the Times Square Crush at www.fws.gov/le/elephant-ivory-crush.html.

These events were controversial—cheered by conservationists who believe that eliminating the commercial value of ivory is the strongest tool for the elimination of illegal poaching, and decried by others who claim that such destruction will not bring back dead elephants, and that diminishing the value of the ivory will diminish the care of the animals in the wild and drive the ivory market underground, likely leading to higher prices for illegal ivory. Still others feel that destruction of beautiful artifacts may make an emotional or political point, but would never have any impact on illegal poaching in Africa.

Who uses elephant ivory?

Readers of The Diapason will naturally think of musical instruments. Piano, organ, harpsichord, and harmonium keyboards were most typically made of ivory. Ivory veneers on natural keys are prized because as a natural grained material, ivory absorbs moisture, so the perspiration from the performers’ fingers doesn’t build up into slick pools on the keys. Ivory is also the most durable natural substance used on keyboards and arguably one of the most beautiful. And many organ consoles have engraved ivory knob faces, knob heads, and coupler tablets. 

Many guitars, violins, and other stringed instruments have small ivory parts such as the bridges and nuts that bear the strings, where it is prized for its acoustical properties. Ivory is also used for decorative elements on many musical instruments, and some wind instruments, both western and non-western, are made entirely of ivory.

Artisans who fashion high-quality pool cues are the largest consumers of new ivory (except in China, where carving remains prevalent), which is used in the tip (where the cue meets the ball) and the ferrules that join sections of the cue. Master players feel that those ivory parts give the ideal strike of cue to ball. No pianos and only a very few pipe organs are built with new ivory on the keyboards.

Builders of custom firearms use large pieces of ivory for rifle stocks, pistol grips, and many forms of ornamentation. And there is an active community of carvers and sculptors who specialize in working with ivory.

What does it have to do with me?

The proposed ban on trade and movement of ivory would have a big effect on the manufacture, restoration, sales and purchases of musical instruments. The American Institute of Organbuilders (AIO) has engaged a lobbyist, and the Associated Pipe Organ Builders of America (APOBA) is participating in a larger lobbying effort spearheaded by the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM).

There is a revision aimed at musical instruments. In the “Proposed Changes” PDF that you’ve just read, the section of the chart devoted to “Sales across state lines” includes an exemption for certain manufactured items that include a small (de minimis) amount of ivory. Here’s the section from that PDF that defines de minimis:³ 

“What is the de minimis exemption? 

The proposed rule provides an exemption from prohibitions on selling or offering for sale in interstate and foreign commerce certain manufactured items that contain a small (de minimis) amount of ivory that meet the following conditions: 

A. If the item is located in the United States, the ivory must have been imported prior to January 18, 1990, or imported under a CITES pre-Convention certificate with no limitation on its commercial use. 

B. If the item is located outside of the United States, the ivory must have been removed from the wild prior to February 26, 1976. 

C. The ivory is a fixed component or components of a larger manufactured item and not the primary source of the value of the item. 

D. The ivory is not raw. 

E. The manufactured item is not made wholly or primarily of ivory. 

F. The total weight of the ivory component or components is less than 200 grams.

G. The item must have been manufactured before the effective date of the final rule.”

Item “F” in that list is directed at musical instruments. The USFWS acknowledges that 200 grams is the typical weight of the ivory veneers on a piano keyboard, and as that would allow the usual amounts of ivory found in stringed and wind instruments, it seems a fair number.

But let’s talk about the organ. A standard 88-note piano keyboard has 52 natural keys—the average weight of ivory for each natural key is about 3.8 grams. A standard 61-note organ keyboard has 36 naturals, which at 3.8 grams each would total about 137 grams for each keyboard. And here’s where the math fails for the pipe organ:

• Most organs have at least two keyboards—ivories on a two-manual organ would weigh a total of 272 grams, well over the limit.

• Many finer organ keyboards have special thick-cut ivory, at least twice as thick as that found on a piano.

• Many organ consoles have ivory knobs and tablets. The elegant 1¼″ ivory faces found on older E.M. Skinner organs weigh about 10 grams each.

• Using those facts, a four-manual console with a hundred knobs would contain nearly 1400 grams of ivory, which is almost 3¼ pounds!

That may seem like a lot of ivory. But let’s go back to the sports-hunting exception. According to the website www.fieldtripearth.org, the average weight of an African elephant’s tusk is around 135 pounds. A trophy hunter could legally bring home four tusks a year—that’s 540 pounds hanging over someone’s fireplace.

Under the proposed restrictions, it would be illegal to buy, sell, or transport organ consoles, it would be illegal to file or sand existing ivory during restoration of a console, and it would be illegal to use replacement ivories salvaged from other keyboards to replace those chipped or cracked. “Working” ivory, altering existing and otherwise legal artifacts, would be completely prohibited. If your church hired an organbuilder from another state to restore the Skinner organ, they would be prohibited from transporting the console back to their workshop. They’d have to leave the keyboards and stop jambs behind.

What’s the solution?

Earlier, I mentioned that the clock is ticking while the USFWS receives comments from the public. The USFWS website has clear instructions about how to submit your opinion:

We have published a proposal to revise the African elephant rule under section 4(d) of the ESA [50 CFR 17.40 (e)]. This proposed rule is open for public comment until September 28, 2015. To view a PDF of the proposed rule, go to http://www.fws.gov/international/pdf/african-elephant-4d-proposed-rule-….

To read the proposal and provide comments upon publication, please go to the Federal eRulemaking Portal at http://www.regulations.gov. In the search box, enter FWS-HQ-IA-2013-0091 (the docket number for this proposed rule). You may submit a comment by clicking on “Comment Now!” The Service will review and consider all comments received by September 28, 2015 before publishing a final rule.

While preparing this essay, I’ve spoken with the presidents of the American Institute of Organbuilders and the Associated Pipe Organ Builders of America, the attorney engaged by the National Association of Music Merchants, a supplier of ivory, and an environmental journalist, and I’ve heard conflicting opinions. 

Some conservationists hold an extreme position that all trade in ivory should be banned without any exceptions. Others feel that some kind of middle ground is reasonable, and the USFWS seems to be receptive to such input. The 200-gram exception shows that. Still others feel that the proposed restrictions are counter-productive and could actually result in harming the stability of the elephant population while encouraging illegal trade. 

What’s the answer?

I will go to www.regulations.gov, enter FWS-HQ-IA-2013-0091 into the search field, and submit these suggestions:

• On January 18, 1990, the African elephant was added to Appendix I of CITES. The current regulation allows trade of de minimis amounts of ivory that was legally removed from the wild before that date.

The spirit of the 200-gram exception is to exempt ivory as found in musical instruments.

Pipe organs require more natural keys than pianos. Because the use of ivory as found in organ consoles is identical to that in pianos, any amount of ivory found in pipe organ consoles, legally removed from the wild before January 18, 1990, should be exempted.

• Much of the impetus behind the bans and the staged crush events is the possibility of new ivory being disguised as antique and slipped into the market. (Anyone who has spilled coffee or tea on a keyboard knows it can be done!) But I doubt such disguise is possible with older organ keyboards.

I wonder if the USFWS can suggest ways that legitimate craftsmen could help watch for disguised illegal material.

• There’s an exception in the proposed rules for museums, allowing the display of ivory artifacts in their galleries, or as part of traveling exhibitions.

Religious, educational, and other not-for-profit institutions could be granted similar exemptions for the preservation of their existing musical instruments.

• If the regulation allows even one self-indulgent trophy hunter to bring home a carcass or part of one, it shouldn’t restrict the sale of an historic organ console.

My several conversations have made it clear that whatever revisions are made, no new use of ivory and no importation will be permitted. That’s off the table. This will devastate some businesses, and severely limit others. It’s likely that no new “working” of ivory that’s less than a hundred years old will be permitted, including material dating from before 1990. While it’s possible that a subsequent presidential administration would weaken or reverse these rules, there’s less than a month left as you read this to comment before they take effect.

While I believe that ivory is the premium material for use on keyboards, I know very well that there are other suitable, even desirable materials. Cow bone has natural grain and therefore similar absorbing properties, though quality varies, and I know of bone keyboards that haven’t held up well. Many tropical hardwoods (some of them endangered species) work well, though they don’t wear as well as either ivory or bone. Fruitwoods are great, and you can throw the scraps in your barbeque grill to flavor the meat. And pretty much every modern concert piano has plastic keys. Scores of great musicians play on plastic before huge audiences every day. It would be hard to maintain that it’s impossible to build pipe organs without new working of ivory.

The 1990 rule works for me. If musical instruments built since then included ivory harvested earlier, they should be exempted. But from now on, no new cutting of any ivory.

Notes

1. I’m discussing only federal restrictions. It’s important to note that some states are enacting more restrictive rules, possible criminalizing possession of ivory, including mammoth ivory, which is not an endangered species. 

2. Go to www.fws.gov/endangered/species/us-species.html, and click on “mammals.” You’ll see that the African elephant is listed as threatened, not endangered. 

3. According to the dictionary imbedded in my laptop, de minimis is an adjective defined as “an amount too trivial or minor to merit consideration, especially in law.”

The right tool for the right job

Parking a car in New York City is not for the faint of heart. I can reliably find a space in our neighborhood, as long as I remember to feed the meters ($3.50 per hour), and move the car, following street sweeping regulations, between 8:00 and 8:30 a.m. every day except Sunday. If I park at 7:00 p.m. on Saturday, I don’t have to do anything until the Monday morning sweepers. There’s an easy rhythm to weekday parking on East 9th Street. The entire street turns over for the sweepers, and like clockwork, at 8:30, the parking spaces fill with contractors’ trucks. There are six apartment buildings on our block, perhaps eight hundred apartments, and there are always a slew of home renovations going on. Co-op apartment buildings have rigorous rules stating the hours during which contractors can work,¹ so they all drive off between 4:30 and 5:00, and the whole street opens up.  

People in other neighborhoods enjoy “Alternate Side Parking” (ASP). There, parking is free, but cars must be moved at times designated on signs on every street, for example, 9:00 to 10:30 a.m., Monday and Thursday. At those times, car owners sit in their vehicles reading the newspaper, doing e-mail and crossword puzzles, and drinking coffee. An armada of police cars and tow trucks lurks at the end of the block until the appointed time, followed by the sweeper with lights flashing and horns blowing. No one doubts the sincerity of the enforcement of these regulations. The moment the posted time passes, motorists jockey to reclaim their spaces in a two-ton ballet that can get pretty comical.

The city maintains a website/app/phone service called 311 where they publish announcements such as snow-related school closings, and the blessed suspension of ASP for such reasons as religious holidays. When ASP is suspended, parkers get the relief of a few extra days of not having to move their vehicles. Funny when you think of it though—why have a vehicle if you have to go out of your way not to move it?

I have two secret weapons when I need to park my car for more than a couple days. One is a space in a commercial lot at 125th Street in Harlem, frequented by moving companies, bookmobiles, and bloodmobiles. It’s a thirty-minute ride on the subway, but it’s inexpensive and handy. The other came when we finished the installation of an organ in suburban New Jersey a couple years ago, and the pastor generously offered me parking privileges in their lot. It takes me almost an hour to get there by train, but if I’m not going to need the car for more than ten days, it’s worth the ride.

City slicker

Throughout my career, I’ve kept a fleet of tool bags, work lights, and vacuum cleaners in my car, taking for granted that I would always be able to park easily close to the job site and carry my tools inside. But when Wendy and I moved to New York City a couple years ago, I realized that I should create a “City Bag” that would stow enough tools for typical service calls and be light enough to be carried on the subway. Simple idea—but it turned out to be a tricky challenge. We work on organs with electric, pneumatic, and mechanical actions, which means I need to have several layers of specialized tools with me. Electrical testing equipment, soldering iron, tuning cones, voicing tools, pallet spring pliers are added to a collection of ordinary hand tools. You don’t need a wind-pressure gauge at every service call, but when you need one, you really need one, and Ace Hardware doesn’t carry them. And a good tool kit includes at least a dozen screwdrivers of different shapes and sizes—there’s always one ornery screw hidden behind a windchest leg that calls for an impossible angle. 

Besides tools, the conscientious organ technician carries an assortment of five or six different types of leather and felt for pneumatic repairs. He has little packages of replacement chest magnets and magnet armatures, leather and Heuss nuts for tracker action (and the special nut driver for the Heuss nuts), felt punchings for keyboards, screws, nails and brads, doodads and widgets. He has wood glue, contact cement, epoxy, and super glue, and he carries a tube of silicone adhesive (tub caulk), but he won’t admit to it. He has silicone lubricant, graphite, WD-40, a styrene candle stub (for lubricating screws), and oil and grease for blower motors. He has a couple flashlights and a fluorescent worklight with extension cord.

The terrific advances in battery technology means that cordless drill/screwdrivers are really useful, and there are some compact models that are surprisingly powerful. With a charger and one spare battery, you can work all day. Add that to your kit, along with a couple indexes of screwdriver and drill bits. I add a Tupperware container full of unusual bits. This includes bits I’ve filed fine and/or narrow for special applications, some extra long ones, and a messy heap of screws, just in case.

When I set out to assemble a City Bag, I found a neat, briefcase-shaped bag with lots of pockets, zippered compartments, a padded shoulder strap, and a little plastic tray with dividers to hold assortments of doodads. I stuffed it with hundreds of tools, bottles, vials, sandpaper, lens cleaners for my glasses, earplugs, band-aids, and all the scraps and paraphernalia I could think of. I included an electric meter, soldering iron, test light, and a wind-pressure gauge. Great, but it weighed a ton. 

I lumbered onto the 6 train to go to the Upper East Side for a service call and was exhausted by the time I arrived. And I was missing tools from the first moment. Over the next several sessions I kept a list of things to add, and tried again. During this period, my piano tuner came to our apartment twice, and I envied the backpack-shaped thing he carries. It seemed to include everything he needed, but of course, he just doesn’t need as much as I do to service pipe organs.

In the months before Easter I visited dozens of churches, some in New York where I lugged the City Bag on and off the subways, and some in suburbs and in Boston where I could use my car and the larger, more comprehensive sets of tools. But even then I was often missing things, or at least having to trudge back to the car for something. It was time to start over and get it right. I figured that after more than 40 years in the business, I should at least have a proper tool kit.

We spent a week at our place in Maine where I have a nice workshop. I dumped out both of my tool kits in separate piles and spread them out on a clean workbench. Now it was easy to compare the two, take an inventory, and complete them both by routing through drawers of old tools and buying a few new things. I decided not to worry about some details—it’s okay if diagonal wire cutters in the two kits have different colored handles.

I compared and combined the lists of stuff besides tools—leather, parts, lubricants, adhesives, solvents, and the like. Because the City Bag is necessarily smaller than the Car Bag, I had to make some tough choices, but I did save some space by switching to small containers of things. (I don’t need the 11-ounce WD-40, or the 8-ounce Titebond glue in the City Bag.)

I had grown to dislike my Car Bag. It was made of heavy nylon fabric, but it was square and bulky with hard corners, so it banged against my knees as I carried it. I found a new beauty with 60 pockets and a big center compartment. I added a second larger kit with wheels and collapsible handle that holds the cordless drill and lots of the other heavier stuff. And I got a couple of bungees so I could strap the Car Bag to the top of the Roller Board. Terrific. 

I stuck with the same briefcase style thing for the City Bag, but added a Big-Mouth satchel for the bulkier stuff and a totally cool collapsible two-wheel dolly, again with bungees. It’s heavy on the subway stairs, but rolls like a dream on the sidewalks—and when I go to a church and open my bags, those tools gleam and fairly jump into my hands.

It’s a tool thing.

People who work with tools have a thing about tools. My Facebook page is loaded with colleagues’ photos of new tools. One colleague posted a video he took aboard his new tractor while rototilling his voluptuous garden. “No texting while tilling!” Another friend shared photos of his stroke sander—a cool rig with very long belt of sandpaper that passes “360 feet of abrasive over the wood per second.” Several organ shops have recently acquired CNC routers, those pickup-truck-sized magical computer-guided rigs that take much of the hand labor out of building just about anything from wood.

Near our place in Maine, there’s an old-timer who runs a boatyard. He’s also the town’s harbormaster. The centerpiece of the place is an ancient truck-tractor (the front part of a semi-trailer truck) moored to the ground and fitted with a huge winch. A forty- or fifty-foot wooden sailboat is floated up to a huge car mounted on rails, balanced and secured on stands, and the powerful old diesel engine roars and belches as it draws the 80,000-pound boat out of the water. That machine is just as much a tool as the knife in his pocket.

A couple months ago, the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum in New York City (5th Avenue at 91st Street) hosted an exhibition of tools. It included a remarkable variety of things from tiny pocket kits of gentlemen’s grooming tools, to a scale model of a 4,500-ton Tunnel Boring Machine (TBM) with a cutting diameter of more than 50 feet. The centerpiece of the exhibit was a spectacular sculpture comprising thousands of hand tools suspended mobile-style, arranged with pass-through aisles. But the one that really got me was the “Tonometer” designed and built in 1876 by Rudolph Koenig (French, born in Germany, 1832–1901). It comprises 670 tuning forks that span the 49 semi-tones of four octaves (that’s almost 14 forks per semi-tone), which “afforded a perfect means for tuning any musical instrument.”² I wonder what Monsieur Koenig would have thought of the $9.95 Cleartune app I have in my iPhone.

Chimps do it.

Jane Goodall started studying chimpanzees in the Gombe Stream Chimpanzee Reserve in Tanganyika in 1960. I expect that most of us have seen films produced by the National Geographic Society that document her work. In November of 1960, she watched a chimp she had named David Graybeard poking pieces of grass into a termite mound, then raising the grass to his mouth. She didn’t understand what he was doing, so after he left, she tried it herself and found that the termites gripped on to the blade of grass. She realized that David was using the grass as a tool to feed himself by fishing the insects out of their otherwise inaccessible habitat. 

It’s funny to think that there is not much of a leap from a chimpanzee fishing for termites to a French scientist machining 670 tuning forks or to a modern crane or hydraulic machine. Of course our tools have gotten increasingly sophisticated and complex, but every tool shares the same conceptual origin—the adaptation of something to help us do work. Tomorrow, I’m joining a couple of my colleagues from the Organ Clearing House in Pittsburgh to dismantle an organ. Can’t wait to wheel those new kits into the building.

Government regulation

When I lived in rural Ohio, I had a neighbor who was a truck driver for a well-known chemical company. You might guess that his job was delivery of product. But no. They filled his truck with frightful waste, cracked the spigot at the back of the trailer, and sent him driving across the country, dribbling poison on the highways. It’s reasonable for the government to contain that sort of activity. 

In 2006, the pipe organ trade was involved in an example of government regulatory hooey when the European Parliament passed the Restriction of Hazardous Substances Directive, which restricts the use of six substances in electrical equipment. It was aimed at the careless disposal of millions of cell phones and other personal electronics. Fair enough. I agree that we shouldn’t poison our rivers and lakes with lead, mercury, cadmium, hexavalent chromium, polybrominated biphenyls, or polybrominated diphenyl ether. Each one sounds nastier than the last. (You can read more about this at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Restriction_of_Hazardous_Substances_Direct….)

But wait: Pipe organs are electrical equipment, and it’s hard to hide that they have significant lead content. The European Parliament was talking about parts-per-million, while we measure our lead by the ton. Nevertheless, the restriction stood. The organ from a British cathedral was dismantled for restoration, and the new restriction would mean it couldn’t be put back together. The short story is that the international pipe organ community flung petitions back and forth across the Atlantic, and a loophole was created to separate pipe organs from
this restriction. 

The September 2014 issue of The Diapason included an excellent and troubling article by Anne Beetem Acker titled “The 2014 Ivory Trade and Movement Restrictions.” On February 11, 2014, President Obama issued an executive order effectively banning the trade and transportation of ivory, period. Ms. Acker describes the loophole: 

You may import an item containing ivory as part of a household move or inheritance, or as part of your own musical instrument or as part of a traveling exhibition as long as the item contains “worked elephant ivory that was ‘legally acquired’ and removed from the wild prior to February 26, 1976, and has not been sold or otherwise been transferred for financial gain since February 25, 2014.”³

That’s it. Until February 11, 2014, we at the Organ Clearing House considered ivory keyboards to be an asset. A simple organ built by Schantz or Reuter in the 1940s would have ivory keyboards, and because ivory is such a durable material, they would often be in perfect condition. I choose not to share my political views in this public forum. That’s not the point of this magazine or my regular column. But I sure wish my president had thought this one through a little better. To the best of my knowledge, Harry Truman and Richard Nixon are the most recent presidents who played the piano. I don’t know if Bill Clinton’s saxophone has any ivory on it.

I’ve had the thrill of an hour-long ride through the Thai jungle on a huge and gentle elephant. I am horrified by photos of majestic animals slaughtered for their tusks. I may be shortsighted and politically incorrect, so help me here. How in the name of tarnation will selling and moving a sixty-year-old pipe organ contribute to the slaughter of elephants?

I work with keyboard instruments every day. I talk regularly with dozens of colleagues across Europe and the United States. And I read the publications from our professional organizations like the Organ Historical Society, the American Institute of Organbuilders, and the Associated Pipe Organ Builders of America. Excepting a few private conversations, Ms. Acker’s article is my first exposure to the severity of this order.

Some of my colleagues only build new organs, so are not affected by President Obama’s executive order. But the market for new instruments has been shrinking steadily for years, and many of us in the world of organbuilding find much, if not most of our revenue in the renovation and restoration of historic organs. 

On February 10, 2014, it was perfectly legal to dismantle an organ with ivory keyboards, load it in a truck, take it across state lines to your workshop, restore it, return it to the church, and be paid for your effort. Now it’s not. The fact that Obama’s language includes “trade and movement” implies that we couldn’t even do it for free. 

What do you think? ν

Notes

1. This is good for the quality of life as it limits noise to certain hours of the day, but surely adds to the cost of renovations.

2. Cooper Hewitt Design Museum, legend at tool exhibit.

3. Anne Beetem Acker, “The 2014 Ivory Trade and Movement Restrictions: New regulations and their effects,” The Diapason, September 2014, 28.

Alaska officials ponder
only road to Juneau

Juneau, Alaska, is currently accessible only by airplane or boat. The city of 31,000 is the capital of the state, but many Alaskans have never been there because of its remoteness. That could change a little if the state government’s plans for a 65-mile, $281 million highway survives in the federal transportation bill, The New York Times reported.

The highway would connect Juneau to the rest of the state’s highway system through Canada, but some residents vehemently oppose the idea. They like Juneau’s remoteness. If Alaskans wanted a more accessible capital, they could move it to Anchorage or another city, but several attempts over the past 40 years to do just that have failed. Even with the highway, the trip from Juneau to Anchorage would be 800 miles.

The planned highway is a proposal of Gov. Frank Murkowski and U.S. Rep. Don Young, who is influential in transportation policy as chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee.

Critics say the road would cost too much and possibly take funding away from other needed infrastructure projects. They also say the proposed alignment would threaten bears and other animals in the Tongass National Forest and would be dangerous in winter because of avalanches.

A draft environmental study is scheduled to be released this month. If the highway is not built, Juneau will remain the only state capital that cannot be reached by car.

ARTBA grassroots program
wins Telly Award

The American Road & Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA) has won the 2004 Telly Award for the multimedia training program it produced this year to help construction-industry workers across the nation get involved in federal legislative advocacy in support of increasing federal transportation investment.

The prestigious award, founded in 1979, annually showcases the best work of the most respected advertising agencies, production companies, television stations, cable operators and corporate video departments in the world.

More than 10,000 entries from all 50 states and five continents are submitted annually. On average, only about 7% of those entries are selected as winners. The Telly Awards are affiliated with the Center for Creativity, an organization that was founded in 1963 to research and study advertising, design, production and journalism.

ARTBA developed “Mobilize! A Grassroots Legislative Action Program for Transportation Construction Firms,” which includes a 10-minute DVD, CD-ROM, PowerPoint presentation and instructional booklet. It is believed to be the first multimedia package developed by a national transportation association to facilitate grassroots training.

The program provides information about how decisions made by Congress and the White House affect the transportation construction market. It also offers employees tips on how to get involved in helping shape federal policies that will benefit their future livelihoods.

ARTBA engaged Washington, D.C.-based LAI Creative Media for the production work, and the DVD features innovative grassroots techniques that have been used successfully by Harrisburg, Pa.-headquartered Stabler Cos./PSI and by Oldcastle Materials Inc., which is located in Washington, D.C.

The association distributed nearly 1,500 kits to companies throughout the country with the goal of bolstering activities in support of a significant increase in federal transportation investment as part of the TEA-21 reauthorization.

Cement demand up in 1st quarter

Portland cement demand increased 14.8% in February, followed by a 23.8% increase in March, according to The Monitor, published monthly by the Portland Cement Association (PCA). On a seasonally adjusted annualized basis, March’s reading of 125.9 mmt is a single-month record. Year-to-date consumption is tracking 12% above last year.

Blended cement was rather flat in March at -0.3%. Year-to-date consumption is down 12.3%.

Masonry cement consumption increased 28.3%, following significant gains in January and February. Year-to-date consumption is 21.3% above 2003 levels.

Cement and clinker imports continued to grow at 7.9% in February and 11.5% in March. Year-to-date, imports are up 13.7% from the first three months of last year.

PCA’s statistics reflect the latest data from several government-issued reports.

Environmental streamlining
a success in marshland highway

Involving all the interested agencies early allowed the Federal Highway Administration and the Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development (LADOTD) to finish the environmental study of a replacement highway through a sensitive marsh area in just 44 months, according to a “Success Story” on the website of the American Association of State Highway & Transportation Officials.

The new Louisiana Rte. 1 will provide enhanced access to the vital oil, gas and fishing industries in the gulf area. It also will provide a more reliable evacuation route in case of a severe storm such as a hurricane while preserving the marshes that buffer the area from those gulf storms.

The new four-lane highway will replace an old two-lane structure. Instead of a lift bridge over Bayou Lafourche at Leeville, there will be a new fixed, high-rise bridge. The road will stretch 16 miles from Fourchon to Golden Meadow.

Ronald Ventola, chief of the Regulatory Branch of the New Orleans District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, credited the FHWA and the LADOTD for understanding the sensitivity of the habitat and being willing to adjust the construction plan. He also gave the resource agencies credit for understanding the need for the highway and the lack of good alternatives.

One accommodation to the habitat was the decision to use “end-on” construction except for the high-rise bridge near Leeville. According to the end-on construction method, the heavy equipment working on Rte. 1 will sit on a platform on concrete piles instead of in the marsh. A crane on the platform will drive piles and place segments of the viaduct bridge then move to the next platform and repeat the process.

The FHWA and the LADOTD also undertook a study of the effect on the marsh grasses of the shade from the new structure.
The marshes are already threatened. In the past 50 years, 1,500 square miles of Louisiana’s gulf wetlands have disappeared through erosion and subsidence. In 2000, while FHWA and LADOTD were preparing the Environmental Impact Statement for Rte. 1, another 164 square miles of the salt marsh suffered a severe dieback of marsh grass. With the continuing erosion of the coastal marshes, the existing highway has become increasingly susceptible to flooding during storms.

The agencies that participated in the planning included the U.S. Coast Guard, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the National Marine Fisheries Service, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and others.
Those involved in the process said the cooperation and mutual respect among the agencies proved the U.S. DOT could streamline the environmental review process with the least effect on the environment.

The new La. Rte. 1 will become part of the National Highway System in view of its intermodal link to the U.S. energy supply.

Protection Tip of the Month

Many eye injuries on construction sites result from flying wood dust and other debris like paint chips, dirt and concrete particles. Solvents, paints and adhesives used in construction can be toxic to the eyes and skin. Eyewashes and drench showers should be in place to mitigate such hazards at heavy construction sites. Equipment ranging from bottle eyewashes through portable stations to plumbed fixtures is available to meet the unique needs of your work site. And an updated American National Standard for emergency eyewash and shower equipment includes minimum performance requirements and installation, maintenance and training specifications. ANSI Z358.1-2004 may be ordered by contacting ISEA, 1901 N. Moore St., Suite 808, Arlington, VA 22209 or 703/525-1695 or visit www.safetyequipment.org.

HIGHWAY NAMES
IN THE NEWS

Association news >>>>

JCB Inc., Savannah, Ga., has restructured its North American sales and marketing: Bob Wright will head dealer development, remarketing, governmental sales and business planning; Bruce Narveson has been named vice president of sales for the Northeast region; Jan Nielsen is now general manager for the Central region; David Hahn has been named general manager of the Western region; Ron Fulmer is now general manager for Canada; and Gordon Henderson will continue as vice president of sales for the Southeast region.

Meris Gebhardt has joined the sales staff at Tracker Software Corp., Snowmass Village, Colo.

PBM Concrete, Rochelle, Ill., has merged into J.W. Peters, Burlington, Wis.

JLG Industries Inc., McConnellsburg, Pa., has made a binding offer to purchase Delta Manlift, a Tonneins, France, subsidiary of the Manitowoc Co. Inc. JLG also will acquire certain intellectual property and related assets that will allow it to relaunch selected models of Manitowoc’s recently discontinued Liftlux aerial work platforms at a later date. Scott Brower has been named vice president of marketing and market development at JLG.

Anthony E. Fiorato, president and CEO of Construction Technology Laboratories, Skokie, Ill., has been elected president of the American Concrete Institute, Farmington Hills, Mich.

The American Society of Safety Engineers, Des Plaines, Ill., has been named secretariat of the American National Standards Institute’s A10 Accredited Standards Committee on Safety Requirements for Construction and Demolition Operations, which aims at protecting workers and the public.

Vernon Wehrung, president of Modern Precast Concrete, Ottsville, Pa., has been elected chairman of the board of the National Precast Concrete Association, Indianapolis.

Tim Gillespie of Sika Corp., Lyndhurst, N.J., has been voted a fellow of the International Concrete Repair Institute.

Engineering news >>>>

C. Diane Matt has joined Women in Engineering Programs & Advocates Network as the first executive director.

Arthelius “Trip” Phaup, P.E., is relocating to Ralph Whitehead Associates’ Atlanta office to assume the duties of Transportation Group leader.

James Rowan has been named area manager for the Philadelphia office of Parsons Brinckerhoff Quade & Douglas Inc. Parsons Brinckerhoff has appointed Mary Clayton North Carolina area manager.

HNTB Corp., Kansas City, Mo., has appointed Mary Axetell senior vice president. The firm also has appointed four vice presidents: Uri Avin, Rhett Leary, Jim Riley and Mark Urban.

Ben Berra of Skelly and Loy Inc., Harrisburg, Pa., has been designated by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission as a qualified bog turtle surveyor in Pennsylvania.

Raymond F. Messer, P.E., has been named by Texas A&M University’s Department of Civil Engineering as the recipient of the Friend of the Department 2004 Award. Messer is president and chairman of the board of Walter P. Moore.

Horner & Shifrin Inc., St. Louis, Mo., has named Jamie McVicker, P.E., transportation/civil project manager, as an associate of the firm. Lisa E. Fennewald, P.E., also has been named associate and promoted to assistant project manager.

KS Engineers, Newark, N.J., has added Eugene W. Little and Eileen Della Volle as vice president of business development.
URS Corp., Seattle, has named Dave Alford manager of the company’s Pacific Northwest region.

Michael D. Spitz, P.E., has joined McMahon Associates Inc. as a senior project engineer in the firm’s Cape Coral, Fla., office.
At Carter & Burgess Inc., Kenneth Carper, P.E., CPSWQ, has joined as a vice president and unit manager of the Raleigh, N.C., Transportation Programs Unit, and James “Woody” Woodruff, P.E., has joined as a senior project manager in the Salt Lake City office.

Part 3: Reporting on events of the last generation of the 20th century

From its 66th year of publication to the year 2000, The Diapason gave the account of an astounding range of events which shaped the musical life of organists in the latter half of the twentieth century. The impact of the historic organ revival shaped events on one hand, while the technology of electronic organs seemed to dominate musical activities on the other. The September, 1975 issue of The Diapason featured a banner headline which read: "Mormons Ban Pipe Organs from New Meetinghouses." The full text of the policy document # 75-4962 of headquarters of the Church of the Latter Day Saints was quoted verbatim.

Just a year before, at the Cleveland AGO convention of 1974, Robert Glasgow presented Tournemire's Sept Chorals-Poemes pour les Sept Paroles du Xrist (Opus 67) on a large Baldwin Organ at St. Michael's Church in Cleveland, Ohio. Only a few blocks away, there stood an new instrument built by John Brombaugh of Middletown, Ohio,  which was one of several  revolutionary organs built in the twentieth century in the USA. (Others include the Brombaugh at Ashland Baptist, Toledo, and the Fisk organs at Mt. Calvary Baptist, Baltimore, and Harvard Memorial Chapel, Cambridge.)

This organ (which was installed a year later in Grace Episcopal Church in Ellensburg, Washington) was played by Gustav Leonhardt in a presentation of early music at Trinity Cathedral, Cleveland. The organ introduced contemporary organists to a meantone temperament, wedge bellows, decorated casework, facade pipes of nearly pure lead, folding doors, a flat pedalboard and the responsive key action and "flexible wind" of historic instruments.  What an impression this organ must have made on visiting organists!

The juxtaposition of electronic organs with the influx of historically inspired organs from Europe seemed to set the stage for the last half of the twentieth century. The Diapason reported a full gamut of activity which featured both harpsichord and organ builders. One notable article was "Harpsichord Music for a Wedding," by Larry Palmer. One can see from these features the tremendous influence of early music on all phases of the organist's endeavors, as well as certain technological developments which seemed at the time to be inevitable.

A recurring theme in the years that closed the 20th century was the competitive impact of American versus European organ building. In 1971, Diapason editor Robert Schuneman recounted studies of American tariff regulations and various protectionist considerations. Then he placed at the feet of American organ builders, an "Artistic Challenge."

All of this seems to us to be a severe challenge to the American builders. We don't agree with the total indictment, but we do agree with the premise that only an artistic instrument will survive in this world. And we do agree that the American consumer product has often, but not always been short on quality. But we also feel that not everyone will agree on what an "artistic instrument" should be. When it comes to quality of work and materials, this is a little easier to define and evaluate.

Nevertheless, the indictment has been made, and we are not the first to state it publicly. We are sure that these words have been said before, and that they will be said again. American organ builders must and can answer to it. To let it be, to ignore it, is to invite its acceptance as truth. Is the poor artistic quality of the American organ the real reason for the upsurge in imported organs? We feel that the answer is part yes and part no. We would invite American organ builders to share these pages with us in responsibly answering the indictment made above.

The index to the issues that followed these benchmark events of the '70s were filled with milestones. The Diapason covered the work of the Organ Clearing House, major restorations of historical organs and celebrations of landmark organs of artistic merit. Articles written in response to the passing of E. Power Biggs and Rudolph von Beckerath seemed to crystallize the elements of the American organ revival in a uniquely positive way. George Taylor's 1977 remembrance of the von Beckerath legacy to American organ builders brought to light the work of his American students and apprentices. Throughout the pages of The Diapason, one could follow the artistic endeavors of an emerging generation of organ builders--the emphasis was on individual achievements of dedicated artisans, as well as factory production of major organ builders. The Diapason became known for its coverage of "The Art of Organ Building," to quote from the title of a 1977 article submitted by Rudolph von Beckerath.

On a personal note, I must thank Will Headlee, one of my former teachers, for donating his extensive collection of Diapason issues to Western Washington University in Bellingham--since they were duplicates in the library, the University graciously passed them on to me. I have watched visiting organ enthusiasts lose all track of time while looking over these back issues of The Diapason. This reportage of contemporary organ building and playing has now become history--and The Diapason Index is a guide that can start an interested and inquisitive reader down the path of discovery of these formative years.

One may search The Diapason Index on the Internet at www.wu-wien.ac.at/earlym-l/organs/diapason.search.html