Published: April 20, 2008 12:36 am      

GLYNN: Author says world famous Niagara Falls has lost its luster

A new book on Niagara Falls suggests the world-famous destination is a prime example of how America has controlled nature, despoiled it and shrouded the wrongdoing in myth.

The curious title is an obvious attempt to convince any browser that this book is different from others that focus on the Cataract City and its major attraction: “Inventing Niagara: Beauty, Power, and Lies,” by Ginger Strand (Simon & Schuster, 337 pages, $25, hardcover).

For millions of tourists who stroll through the Niagara Falls State Park every year, the words “beauty” and “power” easily come to mind. That’s an instant and, few would argue, an accurate impression.

But what’s with the “Lies?”

In a word, Strand intensely dislikes the idea of diverting water to produce power, reshaping of the riverbed, and the stabilizing of the brink to prevent future rockslides. That tampering plus all the fake stuff within walking distance of the falls — the wax museums, the haunted houses and the mind-bogging Indian tales — makes us a virtual center of deception, according to the author.

One of Strand’s most critical observations is hardly a boost for the approaching tourist season: “Niagara is a breathtaking landmark larded with falsification, prevarication and omission.”

After all, who would want to come here on vacation?

Maybe she has a point that Niagara as a true natural wonder does not exist anymore but try telling that to the millions of camera-toting visitors who pour through Prospect Park from late May to late September, the travel writers from around the globe, the film production companies and the honeymooners., to name a few.

If it’s half as fake as Strand infers, then surely there is someone smarter than P.T. Barnum behind the scenes, turning the tap on and off.

With so many books written about Niagara, even in the past 20 years, what made the author think there was anything more to say?

“I realized there was a hidden history that hadn’t been talked about at all — landscape alterations, fugitive slaves, the Manhattan Project, on going toxic dumping,” Strand said.

Certainly, the natural and physical changes to the falls and adjacent parklands have been thoroughly documented over the decades.

The stories of fugitive slaves escaping via the Underground Railroad are vividly recounted in many histories at libraries in Niagara and Erie counties and even in newspaper archives. (The Niagara Gazette published a 12-part series based on the research of a reporter-photographer team that traveled more than 1,000 miles tracing the route of three runaway slaves from Virginia to the border at Niagara.

As for toxic dumping, the problems have hardly been hidden from the summer of 1978, when reporter Mike Brown started investigating the chemically contaminated neighborhood called Love Canal.

Subsequently, the media explored every conceivable follow-up to that environmental disaster. Admittedly, there still are still nightmares of industrial pollution but not in the LaSalle neighborhood that made headlines across the country.

Still, Strand’s book will probably fly off the shelves. People like to read about coverups, false advertising and Native American myths.

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FOOTNOTES: Despite some flaws, Strand’s book is readable and will undoubtedly jog a lot of memories for local residents as well as tourists who may have visited the natural wonder years ago. The cover is indeed eye catching and creative, which should spur sales.

Closer to the homefront, however, a sampling of how Strand describes a few familiar persons in this community:

n Maureen Fennie, local history department manager at the Brydges Library: “....skirted, bespectacled and usually sporting a strikingly arty piece of jewelry, she looks like she arrived from central casting after someone ordered up a librarian.” She also is a “sharp-eyed observer of local affairs,” the author found.

n Paul Gromosiak, local historian and author: “...an affable, white-haired man with the face of a Norman Rockwell schoolboy.”

Gromosiak dislikes how the flow to the falls has been so sharply reduced.

n Bob Baxter of the Niagara Heritage Partnership and ardent supporter of returning a section of the Moses Parkway to green space: “....He has a single gray curl in the middle of his forehead, a perfect tube where he could stick a cigarette for safekeeping, and he seems the kind of person who might do that.”

n Jacob Sherman, manager of the Maid of the Mist souvenir store in the Niagara Falls State Park: “...in a shirt and tie, a silver pen perfectly tucked into his shirt pocket, he presides over a pin-neat store: shot glasses and souvenir mugs lined up in regiments and T-shirts stacked in order of size.” Sherman’s family owned and operated the former Niagara Falls Museum for many years.

Contact reporter Don Glynn at 282-2311, ext. 2246.