By Claudine Cremer 

“Even the seasons form a great circle in their changing, and always come back to where they were. The life of a man is a circle from childhood to childhood, and so it is in everything where power moves.”
— attributed to Black Elk (1863-1950)

SUSTAINABLE LIVING: Local environmentalist Paul Gallimore at the Long Branch Environmental Education Center. Photo courtesy of Pat Gallimore

The environmental movement lost a champion with the Sept. 16 passing of local activist and preservationist Paul Gallimore. With his life partner, Pat, Paul co-founded the Long Branch Environmental Education Center, protecting 1,435 acres in the Newfound Mountains starting in the 1970s and showcasing permaculture practices. 

An Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project farm, Paul grew organic berries and apples and helped to introduce blight-resistant chestnut trees. He built passive solar structures, microhydro power systems and a trout pond, and created compost to add nutrients to the soil. The center is open to the public and mentors participants in ecological practices, while nourishing their souls in the beauty of nature.

Harmony with nature

Paul had great reverence for the Native Americans who initially occupied this land and quoted Black Elk in his 2007 work, Healing Appalachia: Sustainable Living Through Appropriate Technology, co-authored with Al Fritsch, founder of the Appalachia-Science in the Public Interest, a small nonprofit in Kentucky. That publication details sustainable efforts that can be implemented to live in harmony with nature, including solar, photovoltaics, wind power, food production and preservation, silviculture, water irrigation and conservation, among others.

Paul was a champion for respecting the myriad of life forms that occupy our mountains and worked tirelessly to oppose a state law that permitted the slaughtering of 50-pound black bear cubs. (The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission redefined a bear cub as one weighing 75 pounds or less, thereby protecting smaller cubs from hunting, in 2016.) He revered the songs of birds, the diversity of reptiles and the presence of mammals on his land.

Acting locally
Claudine Cremer

My personal experience with Paul began before I had the opportunity to make Western North Carolina my home. I visited his Buncombe County mountain paradise and was awed by its involvements and Paul’s encyclopedic knowledge of the natural world. I subsequently worked with Paul in the mid-1980s to found Save the Mountains, a citizens group opposing the U.S. Department of Energy’s proposal to site a three-county, high-level nuclear waste dump with an epicenter in Big Sandy Mush. Later serving on the district staff of U.S. Rep. Jamie Clarke, I realized how serious this proposal had been and how instrumental our efforts and those of thousands of local concerned citizens had been in stopping this siting.  

My later efforts included working with Paul to encourage the co-composting of the organic fraction of Buncombe County’s landfill with clean sewage sludge from the nearby Metropolitan Sewage District (MSD), resulting in a rich soil amendment. This concept was rejected, and MSD instead built a sludge incinerator at its Woodfin facility.

When decisions were being made regarding the siting of a new landfill, Paul worked closely with residents and the county’s solid waste committee to advocate incorporating the state’s solid waste management priorities to first reduce waste, then reuse, recycle, compost and (last) landfill it. He introduced national and international experts to discuss the advantages of large-scale municipal waste recycling and composting programs as prototypes that could be implemented. These initiatives were not followed, and the county acted only to site another landfill.

As the 40-plus-year warnings of the effects of global climate change become lead disaster stories on the evening news, and our own area has been devastated by the fury of Tropical Storm Helene, I lament that the insight and common sense of individuals like Paul Gallimore have not been heeded. The greatest tribute we can provide his legacy is to pursue “good trouble” in our civic engagements and practice sustainability in our own lives.

Claudine Cremer moved to Asheville in 1982 and worked as the director of the Oakley Community Center, later serving on the district staff of U.S. Rep. Jamie Clarke. She now practices organic production at Meadow Cove Farm in Weaverville with her husband, Paul.