Geography beyond Catalina

ROBERT GARDNER

The other day, one of my 5-year-old great-grandsons asked where Iraq

was. I was delighted with the question, as it suggested an interest

in geography.

When other children were playing with dolls or teddy bears, my

first toy was a jigsaw puzzle map of the United States, and by the

time I was 3 or 4, I not only knew all the states but also all their

capitals. My parents, who had only frontier, one-room schoolhouse

educations but were widely read, insisted that I know geography. My

father, who had been a cowboy and lumberjack before the turn of the

last century, had wandered over much of the West and would go through

all the western states with me on my jigsaw map and explain them to

me.

I have always contended that the teaching of history is the most

important part of the educational process. Without a knowledge of

what has gone before, we have no way of evaluating the present or

forecasting the future, and geography is an integral part of history.

As I progressed through school, I gobbled up history and geography.

(I avoided math like the plague, which is why my wife always kept the

checkbook.) Of course, geography was a much easier subject in those

days. Africa, for example, was made up of the Belgian Congo, German

East Africa, Portuguese East Africa, French Equatorial Africa,

Italian East Africa. Then the various African nations attained

independence, and a few big blocks became various small states with

brand new names -- much more difficult for students.

I thought maybe they had stopped teaching geography in school,

because when I was appointed to the High Court of American Samoa,

many educated people (being defined as people with college degrees)

asked, “Samoa? Where’s that?” When I said it was on the other side of

Catalina, that seemed to satisfy them.

I also remember, some years back, when some editorial writer was

espousing some point of view, underlining his argument with the point

that the runoff from the Sierra Nevada flowed into the Colorado

River. It doesn’t. Neither does the runoff from the Cascades, the

Ozarks, the Appalachians or, for that matter, the Alps.

Geography seems to be making a comeback, however. My

great-grandsons learned about China, India, Egypt and Fiji in school

this year. While they were big on India with its cobras, their

favorite country was China. I think that has more to do with food

than topography, since they kept talking about fortune cookies.

Hopefully, these early lessons will spark an interest in other

countries.

I fear the question on Iraq, however, is an illustration of the

way we too often learn our geography -- because of war. During World

War II, people who previously had a hard time pointing out Japan on a

map became very familiar with Tarawa, Saipan, Iwo Jima and Okinawa. A

few years later, we learned a great deal about the Korean peninsula,

then Vietnam (French Indochina on my map) and more recently countries

like Bosnia, Serbia and, of course, a region like the Middle East.

Anyway, I got out the atlas, pointed to Iraq and explained that it

was very far away. Yes, farther than SeaWorld. And then, just to make

sure, I showed him where Samoa is -- on the other side of Catalina --

about 12 hours by air on the other side -- and then I pointed out the

Sierra Nevada and showed him that the runoff goes into the San

Joaquin and Sacramento rivers, not the Colorado.

* ROBERT GARDNER is a Corona del Mar resident and a former judge.

His column runs Tuesdays.