Michele Zack, author of Southern California Story: Seeking the Better Life in Sierra Madre, was the featured speaker at the Sierra Madre Historical Preservation Society's annual program meeting on Thursday February 18^th at the Sierra Madre Playhouse.

The program, titled "The Battle for Sierra Madre Canyon," revisited the dawn of the Environmental Movement and Culture Wars in an illustrated talk.  How major social changes at the national level played out in Sierra Madre - through opposition to the US Army Corps of Engineers and National Forest Service plans to alter the Canyon's environment, creation of the Sierra Madre Mountain Conservancy, as well as in-town tensions over youth-oriented "Canyon Culture" was the focus of this talk.