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Problem of Progress. Not only has Biddle's activism infused new ardor into efforts to save historic buildings, but by defending Diamond Head, he also has enlarged his agency's scope to cover natural resources. The Interior Department's Registry of Natural and Historic Landmarks (which can freeze a historic area from further development) and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development also are involved. HUD, often damned as an urban-renewal wrecker, last year channeled $1,500,000 into preserving the nation's heritage.
At least 750 participating groups belong to the National Trust, and Biddle believes that preservation "has come to an important turning point." Now he wants to send teams into communities to help local groups pick what is good and protect it before the wrecker arrives. "The great problem," says Biddle, "is progress, which is equated with concrete and steel. We have to show people that preservation can be good business." Georgetown property owners, French Quarter restaurateurs and even citizens of Sheridan, Wyo., can vouch that preservation pays—in money as well as the pleasure of linking a precarious present with an inspiring past.
* "And when the last scene of all comes, and death takes his master in its embrace, and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by the graveside will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad, but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even in death." The speech supported a suit by an owner seeking $100 in damages for a dog shot to death as a suspected killer of sheep.