page_title: Cuyahoga River
section_title: Environmental cleanup
hierarchical_section_title: Cuyahoga River / History / Environmental cleanup
caption_attribution_description: City pump station discharges sewage into the Cuyahoga River
context_page_description: The Cuyahoga River is a river in the United States, located in Northeast Ohio, that runs through the city of Cleveland and feeds into Lake Erie. As Cleveland emerged as a major center for manufacturing, the river became heavily affected by industrial pollution, so much so that it "caught fire" at least 13 times, most famously on June 22, 1969, helping to spur the American environmental movement. Since then, the river has been extensively cleaned up through the efforts of Cleveland's city government and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. In 2019, the American Rivers conservation association named the Cuyahoga "River of the Year" in honor of "50 years of environmental resurgence."
context_section_description: The Cuyahoga River, at times during the 20th century, was one of the most polluted rivers in the United States. The reach from Akron to Cleveland was devoid of fish. A 1968 Kent State University symposium described one section of the river:
  From 1,000 feet [300 m] below Lower Harvard Bridge to Newburgh and South Shore Railroad Bridge, the channel becomes wider and deeper and the level is controlled by Lake Erie. Downstream of the railroad bridge to the harbor, the depth is held constant by dredging, and the width is maintained by piling along both banks. The surface is covered with the brown oily film observed upstream as far as the Southerly Plant effluent. In addition, large quantities of black heavy oil floating in slicks, sometimes several inches thick, are observed frequently. Debris and trash are commonly caught up in these slicks forming an unsightly floating mess. Anaerobic action is common as the dissolved oxygen is seldom above a fraction of a part per million. The discharge of cooling water increases the temperature by 10 to 15 °F [5.6 to 8.3 °C]. The velocity is negligible, and sludge accumulates on the bottom. Animal life does not exist. Only the algae Oscillatoria grows along the piers above the water line.  The color changes from gray-brown to rusty brown as the river proceeds downstream. Transparency is less than 0.5 feet [0.15 m] in this reach. This entire reach is grossly polluted.
  At least 13 fires have been reported on the Cuyahoga River, the first occurring in 1868. The largest river fire, in 1952, caused over $1 million in damage to boats, a bridge, and a riverfront office building.
  Things began to change in the late 1960s, when new mayor Carl Stokes and his utilities director rallied voters to approve a $100-million bond to rehabilitate Cleveland's rivers. Then the mayor seized the opportunity of a June 22, 1969 river fire triggered by a spark from a passing rail car igniting an oil slick to bring reporters to the river to raise attention to the issue. The 1969 fire caused approximately $50,000 in damage, mostly to an adjacent railroad bridge, but despite mayor Stokes' efforts, very little attention was initially given to the incident, and it was not considered a major news story in the Cleveland media.
  However, the incident did soon garner the attention of Time magazine, which used a dramatic photo of the even larger 1952 blaze in an article on the pollution of America's waterways. The article described the Cuyahoga as the river that "oozes rather than flows" and in which a person "does not drown but decays" and listed other badly-polluted rivers across the nation. (No pictures of the 1969 fire are known to exist, as local media did not arrive on the scene until after the fire was under control). The article launched Time's new "Environment" section, and gained wide readership not only on its own merit, but because the same issue featured coverage of astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landing on the moon the previous week in the Apollo 11 mission, and had Senator Ted Kennedy on the cover for a story on the Chappaquiddick incident in which Kennedy's automobile passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne, had drowned.
  The 1969 Cuyahoga River fire helped spur an avalanche of water pollution control activities, resulting in the Clean Water Act, Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, and the creation of the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA). Mayor Stokes gave Congressional testimony on his and other major big cities' struggles with polluting industries to restore the environmental health of their communities. As a result, large point sources of pollution on the Cuyahoga have received significant attention from the OEPA in subsequent decades. These events are referred to in Randy Newman's 1972 song "Burn On," R.E.M.'s 1986 song "Cuyahoga," and Adam Again's 1992 song "River on Fire." Great Lakes Brewing Company of Cleveland named its Burning River Pale Ale after the event.
  In December 1970 a federal grand jury investigation led by U.S. Attorney Robert 
caption: City pump station discharges sewage into Cuyahoga River in 1973.
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