L. Martin Griffin (born July 23, 1920), widely known as Marty Griffin, is an American environmentalist and conservationist in Northern California and author of the book Saving the Marin–Sonoma Coast. He has also been a doctor, director of the Sonoma Developmental Center, head of the Marin Audubon Society, board member of the Marin Municipal Water District, and owner of Hop Kiln Winery in Sonoma County.
Griffin has been widely honored for his decades of environmental work in helping to preserve numerous sensitive wildlife habitats in Sonoma and Marin County. He lives in Belvedere, California, and turned 100 in July 2020.
Childhood and education
Griffin was born in Ogden, Utah, and his family moved to California in his youth. Exposure to nature as a Boy Scout gave him a love of wild places and fly fishing. He studied medicine and graduated from Stanford University, subsequently setting up medical practice as an internist in Marin County.
Environmental activism
Influences
Griffin has stated his environmental heroes include John Muir, Teddy Roosevelt and Congressman William Kent, the latter of whom helped establish Marin’s Muir Woods National Monument, the Marin Municipal Water District watershed, and started the movement to preserve Mount Tamalpais and West Marin. Griffin has also noted the influence of Caroline S. Livermore, a founder of the Marin Conservation League.
Richardson Bay and Bolinas Lagoon
After being contacted by activist Elizabeth Terwilliger, Griffin played a substantial part in establishing wildlife sanctuaries along Richardson Bay, working with and learning from environmentalist Caroline Livermore. Their work helped prevent the filling in of the bay and tidelands for a housing development. Griffin took note of Livermore's strategy of raising money to purchase sensitive areas threatened by construction. Using the same tactics, Griffin worked to prevent development in and around Bolinas Lagoon. In 1962 Griffin wrote a personal check for one thousand dollars (which he was unsure he had the funds to cover) to put a hold on the key property called the Canyon Ranch (now Audubon Canyon Ranch) that was for sale for $337,000. He then solicited help from chapters of the Audubon Society to raise the rest of the cash.
In later years, as the local Audubon chapter's acquisition manager, he played a major role in the effort to buy additional property around the lagoon and at Tomales Bay, where a city was planned on the bay's east side.
Noting the need for secrecy in preventing development, Griffin observed in 2010 that "We had to keep all the operations very secretive because once someone else found out what you were up to it was trouble."
Stopping a freeway and a nuclear power plant
Griffin also helped stop a planned freeway from the Golden Gate Bridge through West Marin to Sonoma County, which would have enabled construction along its route. The freeway was touted by then California Governor Edmund G. Brown as part of a plan to locate 150,000 new residents on the Northern California coast, including substantial housing development in what was to eventually become Point Reyes National Seashore.
He also helped to derail the planned Bodega Bay Nuclear Power Plant at Bodega Bay on the Sonoma coast. The plant, to be located atop the San Andreas Fault, was in the first stages of construction on Bodega Head when it was halted. Griffin also worked to stop a proposed water pipeline from the Russian River to Marin.
The executive director of Audubon Canyon Ranch, Scott Feierabend, commented in July 2010 that Griffin's work to save the coastal areas of Marin and Sonoma Counties was crucial, stating to the Marin Independent Journal "He saw that the whole coastlines of Marin and Sonoma were such a treasure. He understood if he could acquire keystone properties along the coastline they would be impediments to any linear construction."
"I went to a meeting [in the late 1950s] on the proposed large freeway going from the Golden Gate Bridge to West Marin and up the Sonoma Coast. I picked up a brochure and was horrified when I saw the maps. The freeway was going to destroy Bolinas Lagoon and Tomales Bay. I knew we needed to save this.” - Dr. L. Martin 'Marty' Griffin Jr., interviewed in 2010 regarding his role in stopping development on the Marin and Sonoma County coastline.