APPLETON Milly Rugland remembers watching the Fox River when she was a child as ribbons of colored foam drifted past,green, pink and yellow.
Back then, it was an industrial river traversed by coal barges, polluted by paper mills and farm runoff.
There were no fish, other than resilient carp, and mothers would tell their children not to put even their feet in the water. One industry leader in the 1960s called it nothing more than a high-class sewer.
Most people dont realize how polluted the waters were, Rugland said. They dont remember foam and coal barges, dead fish floating in Lake Winnebago, but it was really nasty.
Ruglands father, Gordon Bubolz, a prominent businessman in the Fox Cities and conservative state senator, saw value in the states natural resources and used his position to help clean up the waters. A conservationist at heart, Bubolz often said he felt the need to preserve the waters and land because God doesnt make it anymore.
He was in business circles with people who were running the paper mills, but he was very vocal about the fact that the paper mills polluted the Fox River, and something needed to be done, said Dave Horst, a nature columnist and environmental grant writer for the Community Foundation for the Fox Valley Region.
The Wisconsin Conservation Hall of Fame will posthumously honor Bubolz, who died in 1990, with a virtual induction ceremony for his contributions to restore the river and for raising funds to preserve more than 4,600 acres of public land across the state. Hell join Alren Christenson and Kathleen Falk as 2022 inductees.
Horst, who wrote the nomination for Bubolz, said he was drawn to research the man because of the opposing forces he represented. He was a businessman and a conservative, and he was known to work with liberal politicians likeSen. Gaylord Nelson, who created Earth Day, and conservative Wisconsin governor Warren Knowles.
Party positions or party membership didnt matter to him, said his son, John Bubolz. It was about who people were, what their beliefs were and ideas they had in common.
Bubolz was so outspoken in his desire to restore the Fox River that he had to send his daughter to school with a police escort. Rugland said she wasnt exactly sure what was going on at the time, but she remembers people felt strongly that environmental regulations would be the death knell for the paper industry.
I was 10, and I remember one morning my parents came to me and said, 'Youre going to get a special ride to school today,' Rugland said. It was unmarked cars, and it didnt last very long, but there were definitely threats made against our family.
Bubolz was born in 1905 and grew up on a farm in northeast Wisconsin with five brothers and six sisters. His father started an insurance company in 1900 after a devastating windstorm hit the state in 1899.
Bubolz graduated from Lawrence University, studied business and insurance in Ohio and Pennsylvania and earned a law degree from the University of Wisconsin. He would go on to succeed his father as head of the insurance company, which is now called Secura.
John Bubolz said he believes his fathers passion for conservation came from his early life on the farm.
He knew the importance of the land and the need to preserve it, he said. Especially land that was in jeopardy of being developed.
Bubolz served as a state senator from 1945 to 1953, during which he was on the state Conservation Commission and chaired the advisory council of the Department of Resource Development. It provided oversight for the predecessors of the DNR.
He also served on the Legislatures Joint Water Resource Committee and co-authored legislation to implement in Wisconsins provisions of the federal Water Pollution Control Act of 1948. He was the first to chair what is now called the East Central Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission.
Rugland said her father was like a sponge, absorbing information on environmental causes. He believed that living things were interconnected, and he was excited to learn how things affect one another. Rugland remembers her father working with University of Wisconsin scientists to study how wetlands would impact future generations.
He walked in and said, Do you know what wetlands are? Theyre natures sponges do you know what they do? Rugland said. It was like telling a kid they could raid a candy shop. He was so excited, and he was excited about everything he tried to do.
Following his work in the state Senate, Bubolz started a nonprofitcalled Natural Areas Preservation Incorporated, or NAPI, which found areas with ecological significance to educate the public about conservation.
In 1990, hewas recognizedas a key fundraiser and organizer for the state to create four nature centers, three wildlife areas, two county parks and High Cliff State Park.
Bubolzs son and daughter agree their father wasnt a man who sought recognition. However, his induction to the conservation hall of famebrings to life a quote that he often referred to.
"That which we do for ourselves dies with us. That which we do for others lives on.
Bubolz worked to preservemore than 4,600 acres of public land. Below is a list of the properties Bubolz helped establish. The information was compiled by Horst for the Wisconsin Conservation Hall of Fame.
Contact Jake Prinsen at jprinsen@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter at @PrinsenJake.
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