Remembering Marty Griffin
“Do Something, Say Something, Write Something”
by Camilla H. Fox
It is with great sadness that we share the passing of Marty Griffin (Dr. L. Martin “Marty” Griffin – July 23, 1920 – May 22, 2024) a larger than life hero for wildlife and wildlands. As many of our long-term supporters know, Marty served as a Project Coyote Ambassador for close to a decade — using his voice to advocate for coyotes and other persecuted wild animals, as well as for the preservation of wildlife habitat throughout the North Bay region of California and beyond. His legacy is long and deep; his accomplishments, extraordinary; his dedication to making this world a better place for humans and non-human animals, exceptional.
It would take a book to share all of Marty’s remarkable achievements over his 103 years on this earth (many of these are recounted in his memoir: Saving the Marin-Sonoma Coast, in which he describes the successful grassroots efforts to save the San Francisco Bay and Northern California coast from the overdevelopment that devastated Southern California’s coastline). His accomplishments and conservation leadership were also featured in the documentary film Rebels For a Cause.
Marty received numerous awards for his accomplishments, and in 2019, at Project Coyote’s 10-year gala in Sonoma County, we honored him with our Force for Wild Nature Award.
As part of this award we produced a short video about Marty, his reasons for becoming a Project Coyote Ambassador, and his many accomplishments protecting wild nature. My favorite line in this video ~ when Marty says: “Do something, say something, write something…That’s what I’ve always tried to do.” Take a moment and watch Marty here:
Most of my meetings with Marty involved dinner at his and his lovely wife Joyce’s house in Belvedere, California. Over beer — or sometimes a glass of Hop Kiln wine from Marty’s former Russian River Sonoma county winery — we would discuss the latest news and campaigns around wildlife protection and habitat conservation. Marty would occasionally pull out his accordion and play a tune that always brought levity to whatever serious subject matters were the focus of discussion. During one of my most recent visits, our conversation regarding the public controversy around the presence of coyotes in Belvedere shifted to a discussion around CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations). Marty had just received a copy of CAFO: The Tragedy of Industrial Animal Factories, a book that took up half his coffee table, and he was eager to share it with me because he knew that I had worked in farm animal reform. As he flipped through the book and recited excerpts, he shared that he and Joyce were increasingly concerned about the way farm animals are raised for food. The conversation naturally shifted to the long controversy over the proposed expansion of livestock operations in Point Reyes National Seashore (PRNS) — a historic treasure that Marty and other local advocates had fought long and hard to protect. His eyes sparkled (as they always did when he spoke of something he was passionate about) when we discussed the potential removal of the controversial “elk fence” — a three-mile fence built to separate the native Tule Elk from the cattle ranches that were grand-fathered into the PRNS under a lease agreement with the National Park Service. Thanks to Marty and a wide coalition of individuals and non-profit organizations, a proposal is now being considered by the National Park Service to remove the fence.
While I — and our entire team at Project Coyote who knew him — feel deeply saddened by Marty’s passing, I know that he lived a full, vibrant and active life until the very end (he was still swimming at the local pool at age 103!). With Joyce, who is a force for wild nature in her own right, by his side every step of the way providing steadfast care and support, Marty was always surrounded by love. And while he did not live to see the removal of the Tule elk fence and the full restoration of the Point Reyes National Seashore, his legacy lives on in all who he inspired and mentored throughout his extraordinary career. As our mutual friend and long-time Project Coyote supporter Diane McEwen wrote to me on the day of his passing:
“He was a full-hearted fighter for Mother Nature. It was never part-time with Marty.”
To learn more about Marty‘s life and legacy you can view the Marty Griffin Wikipedia page.
Additional thoughts and tributes from members of the Project Coyote team who knew Marty:
“One summer day in 1986, I was training to be a nature guide at the Terwilliger Center. Marty Griffin, a delightful surprise, dropped in. Star-struck, I approached him. ‘Thank you for protecting our beautiful Marin.’ With a brilliant smile, he took my hand and said, ‘Now it’s your turn.’ As we honor his memory, may his words inspire you, too, to continue his legacy of championing the health and beauty of the land and protecting the greater community of life that depends on it.”
~Gina Farr, Project Coyote Advisory Board Member
“My late husband Charles McGlashan was so deeply and profoundly grateful for Marty’s environmental vision, leadership and unparalleled work to save some of the most beautiful and iconic places in Northern California, including Point Reyes and Audubon Canyon Ranch, that he used Marty’s book, Saving the Marin-Sonoma Coast, for his swearing-in ceremony as Marin County Supervisor in 2004. Those of us who are nourished by our explorations of the vast protected open spaces in Marin and Sonoma counties are forever indebted to Dr. Martin Griffin‘s huge heart, strategic prowess, and tireless efforts on behalf of this beautiful land and the creatures who call it home.”
~Carol Misseldine, Project Coyote Michigan Representative
Marty and wife Joyce (& dog Sophie) with Carol Misseldine and Larry Fahn ~ at Camilla and husband Philip’s wedding, September 30, 2023
“You could always count on Marty for helping with environmental causes of every stripe. We all loved the incredible blend from his Hop Kiln Winery “MARTY’s BIG RED”!, which blessed Project Coyote fundraisers and events In between- from the Russian River to the Golden Gate National Recreation Area events! I was truly honored to have had Marty as a mentor and friend for almost 40 years.”
~ Larry Fahn, Project Coyote Advisory Board and past president of national Sierra Club
“I met Marty at Project Coyote’s 10th Anniversary Gala in 2019. He was excited when he learned I edited the video, ‘A Portrait of Marty Griffin’ that was shown when he received his award at the Gala. Marty’s patience with the slow steps toward environmental justice, positivity and compassion were evident in his interview with Camilla Fox that we used in the video. I was drawn to those qualities which shine uniquely in some people. Marty’s instructions to current and future generations, to ‘do everything you can to protect what you’re seeing here’ are words this world desperately needs. Marty’s wisdom as a history-changing elder will be greatly missed, while I know the gifts of his hard work and foresight continue to be enjoyed by many different species in the wild spaces he helped preserve.”
~ Sarah Gorsline, Project Coyote Vermont Representative & Multimedia Associate
Marty at Camilla and Philip’s wedding surrounded by his many admirers: Longtime Project Coyote supporter Ruth Feldman, Camilla, Project Coyote Advisory Board member Gina Farr, his wife Joyce (and dog Sophie), and Project Coyote Michigan Representative Carol Misseldine
Marty gives Camilla a hug at her wedding, September 30, 2023
L. MARTIN GRIFFIN BIOGRAPHY
Loyal Martin Griffin, Jr., MD, MPH, was born in Ogden, Utah, in 1920. His parents had a mountain cabin on the banks of the Ogden River. He often shared a memory from age three of smells and sounds: the scent of sage, willows, and trout, the noise of the river over which floated, almost too idyllically, the music of his father’s mandolin.
During the Depression, the family moved around the west, living in Portland and Los Angeles, and finally Oakland. Griffin remembered Southern California as “still a beautiful Mediterranean paradise.”
In Oakland, California, he became an Eagle Scout and attended Oakland Technical High School. He graduated from the University of California in Berkeley in 1942 with a degree in zoology. After working in the Richmond shipyards on night shifts, he made enough money to enroll at Stanford Medical School, where he received his medical degree in 1946. He served as a captain in the US Army Medical Corps during World War II.
Dr. Griffin interned at Stanford Hospital in San Francisco and practiced in Marin County for seventeen years. There he helped start the Ross Valley Clinic, Ross General Hospital, Kentfield Psychiatric Hospital, and The Tamalpais retirement center. He served as chief of medicine at both Marin General and Ross Hospitals and was certified as a diplomate of the American Board of Internal Medicine in 1953.
In 1961, under Griffin’s leadership, Audubon Canyon Ranch was founded and grew in 54 years to include 5,000 acres of wildlife sanctuaries on the watersheds of Bolinas Lagoon, the San Francisco Bay, Tomales Bay, and Sonoma Creek, and the Russian and Eel Rivers. In July 2010, the ACR Board of Directors formally renamed the 1,000-acre preserve on Bolinas Lagoon the Martin Griffin Preserve in honor of L. Martin “Marty” Griffin’s lifelong commitment to the environment. Griffin was instrumental in ranch purchases of key parcels which prevented the construction of a four-lane freeway and helped protect the wild watersheds surrounding the Point Reyes National Seashore from development. Griffin was a co-founder of the Environmental Forum of Marin and also helped establish a 20,000-acre wildlife preserve as part of the Haleakala National Park in Kipahulu, Maui.
In 1973, he was elected a director of the Marin Municipal Water District where he was able to help prevent a coastal aqueduct from the Russian River and disposal of watershed lands by future boards, preserving 22,000 acres of watershed and native plant habitats. Wildlife work in Nepal whetted his interest in public health, and he returned to UC School of Public Health for a master’s degree in 1972. Dr. Griffin served for 15 years as Public Health Director at the Sonoma State Hospital for developmental disorders in Glen Ellen. In 1984, he was appointed Chief of the Hepatitis B, and later AIDS, Task Force for the 11 State Hospitals. Upon his retirement, he was given the Governor’s Award for his successful Hepatitis B Immunization Program.
In 1975, Dr. Griffin founded Hop Kiln Winery on the Russian River. To protect the river and to encourage watershed management plans for all of California’s rivers, he founded the Russian River Task Force in 1990, the Russian River Environmental Forum, and co-founded Friends of the Russian River, now the Russian RiverKeeper. He and his wife Joyce gave the 45-acre Griffin Russian River Riparian Preserve to the Sonoma Land Trust; and together gave the 26-acre “Gina’s Orchard” to the Bishop’s Ranch in memory of his granddaughter, who lost her battle with leukemia at age 15.
Dr. “Marty” Griffin long combined his passion for wildlife and the environment with his skills in medicine and epidemiology. In numerous articles about his career, he was called the “environmental physician,” “the nature doctor,” and “the doctor with mud on his shoes.”