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<br />Water Resources People and Issues <br /> <br />Q: Approximately when did you work on this report? <br /> <br />A: From about July of 1934 to December '34. Cooke was still chairman of the <br />Water Planning Committee, but his interests were shifting in the other <br />direction. He was not replaced as chairman until he had the REA fully under <br />way. <br /> <br />So by the end of '34 you had a report from the National Resources Board. <br />Then it promptly was replaced by other agencies with very similar <br />membership. 1t was at that stage that Wolman took over from Cooke as <br />chairman. Markham continued as a member; John Page was the <br />representative of the Bureau of Reclamation. Other members were the head <br />of the Soil Conservation Service, the head of the Fish and Wildlife group, the <br />chief hydrologist from the U.S. Geological Survey, the principal engineer <br />from the Public Health Service, and the principal engineer from the Federal <br />Power Commission. Barrows and Woodward; Thorndike Saville from New <br />York Uni,;ersity; Ed Hyatt, state engineer of California; and four <br />nongovernment folks along with Wolman made up the total committee. <br /> <br />Q: Was Marshall Layton from the Geological Survey the chief hydrologist? <br /> <br />A: No. It was N.C. Grover. They then undertook to prepare, basin by basin, <br />an examination of problems and promising projects-construction pro~ects -1nd <br />investigation projects-for the whole country. <br /> <br />Q: This report was then submitted to the President? <br /> <br />A: It was submitted to the President on November 9, 1936. The device for doing <br />so was th<.t under the old Public Works Planning Act the President was <br />empowered to prepare a program of public works. They used this as the <br />legislative authority on which they then proceeded. . This continued for a <br />period of years. The National Resources Board, National Resources Planning <br />Board, National Resources Committee-it went through various names but <br />retained substantially the same top membership-never had solid legislative <br />authority from the Congress. Congress was unwilling to establish them as a <br />permanent, weJl-grounded organization; they lived by executive orders and <br />broad interpretations of other legislation. Marion Clawson describes the <br />process in ,Yew Deal Planning [Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1981]. <br /> <br />12 <br />