Margaret Nygard | |
|---|---|
 Nygard on the Eno River in 1982 | |
| Born | Margaret Jacqueline Cruden Rodger 25 January 1925 |
| Died | 5 November 1995 (aged 70) Durham, North Carolina, U.S. |
| Other names | Margaret Cruden Rodger Nygard, Margaret C. Nygard |
| Occupation(s) | Environmentalist, conservationist |
| Years active | 1963–1995 |
| Known for | Eno River conservation project |
Margaret Nygard (25 January 1925 – 5 November 1995) was a British-American environmentalist and conservationist. Born in British India to a civil servant, she was educated in both India and Britain. During the 1940 and 1941 bombing campaign against Britain, her school was relocated to British Columbia, Canada. Nygard studied English at the University of British Columbia and after her graduation in 1944 briefly became a teacher at the university. She went on to earn a master's degree and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. In 1962, she and her family moved to Durham, North Carolina, and became aware of environmental threats to the Eno River. She founded the Eno River Association in 1965, becoming its first president. She naturalised as a United States citizen in 1993.
Spearheading the group, Nygard and the association pressed for the creation of the Eno River State Park, the City of Durham's West Point on the Eno, and the federally-owned Penny's Bend Nature Preserve, as well as a green belt linking local, state, and federal lands along the Eno River. Taking actions to increase awareness of conservation and stop developers, they defeated plans to build a dam and reservoir, to construct high rise dwellings and housing tracts, and to locate a sewerage system, a major highway, and a landfill along the river. On their own initiative, the Eno River Association, established ties with The Nature Conservancy, creating its the first conservancy project in the state. During her work to prevent development on the Eno River, Nygard discovered the negatives of the photographer Hugh Mangum in a barn and worked with his family to donate his work for preservation to Duke University.
Nygard was the first recipient of both the Bartlett L. Durham Award of the Durham Historic Preservation Society and the Alexander Calder Conservation Award of The Conservation Fund for her work in preserving the wetlands and wildlife along the Eno. The Eno River Association which she founded and led until her death has continued its work on the river, adding three additional parks and nature preserves to the green belt since her death. The model Nygard developed has been replicated by other organizations in their attempts to preserve river habitats. She was posthumously awarded one of North Carolina's highest civilian honors, the Order of the Long Leaf Pine.