This July 4th, we celebrate our country’s 233rd birthday. Now some would argue that the real birthday should be July 2nd when the Continental Congress voted to declare independence from Great Britain, not July 4th when they approved the final wording of the Declaration of Independence. Some might argue for August 2nd, the day a majority of the members of Congress actually signed the printed document. Some might choose September 17th, the date in 1787 that our Constitution was adopted and we officially became the United States of America. I suppose one could also pick May 29th, the date in 1790 that Rhode Island became the last of the thirteen original states to ratify the Constitution. But why quibble? Let’s get on with it. July 4th has been chosen, the hot dogs and fireworks have been purchased, and we have plenty to celebrate.
We indeed have been truly blessed by history. Our greatest legacy has been the Constitution itself, but we have also been richly endowed by nature. Where would California be today without gold? Where would the mid-western states be without the amber waves of grain? Where would Texas be without oil? And where would St. Tammany Parish be without … hmm … ozone???
If our local public relations efforts over the last century are any indication, ozone is our greatest, most attractive and valuable natural resource. We are the “Heart of the Ozone Belt” after all! As far as I know, this claim has gone unchallenged by any other area of the country over the years, and perhaps for good reason. I was thinking about this the other day as I watched the Weather Channel and noted that the principal atmospheric pollutant to worry about was … you guessed it … ozone.
What’s going on here? Is ozone a good thing or a bad thing? Well, it’s actually both. You might remember from high school chemistry that ozone is really just oxygen with an attitude. Instead of containing two atoms of oxygen like the oxygen molecule in the air we breathe, ozone contains three oxygen atoms and is much more reactive. Whereas normal oxygen is necessary for combustion in our life processes, ozone burns things that should ideally go unburned, like your lungs and eyes. So, ozone is in fact a danger to humans and other animals.
On the other hand, without ozone there probably would never have been any higher life forms on earth at all. Processes involving the conversion of oxygen to ozone (and vice versa) in a region many miles above the earth’s surface known as the “ozone layer” protect us from the sun’s high-energy and dangerous ultraviolet rays. Without this protection, our predecessors would never have crawled out of the ocean to begin with, and we would be fried today. Thus the concerns about holes in the ozone layer that periodically appear. So, ozone is in fact a boon to humankind.
With ozone, as with almost everything else in St. Tammany Parish, location is everything. If it’s five miles above your head, it’s good. If it’s a ground level, it’s bad. And that’s where the “pollutant” ozone reported by the Weather Channel is. It’s there because of chemical reactions associated with automobile and industrial emissions.
None of this, however, explains the long-trumpeted health benefits of living in the ozone piney woods of St. Tammany (such benefits presumably occurring at ground level rather than in the stratosphere). As a 1926 newspaper article exulted, “There is something so invigorating about this ‘Heart of the Ozone Belt’ that puts new life and vigor into one immediately. The fresh, piney air, breathed into the atmosphere by millions upon millions of pine trees. The tang of salt from the lake, and the delicious perfume wafted from thousands of flowers and trees. Is there any wonder that doctors all over the United States recommend St. Tammany Parish to their patients!”
Another entrepreneur of the time sold a product he referred to as “bottled ozone,” claiming that he had extracted the ozone from pine trees and that “this substance was a powerful germicide as well as an effective healing agent; that it spread an atmosphere around the body when rubbed on it that produced the same effect as the ozone in the pine-wooded forests of St. Tammany.”
One might chuckle at these claims today, but you must remember that these were relatively unsophisticated times … in the days before reality TV shows involving large numbers of incompatible people living together and squabbling … before Japanese game shows involving pain, humiliation and lots of mud. That’s a shame in some sense, as “bottled ozone” would probably have made a great infomercial.
Still, although we now know that ozone is a pollutant and not the miracle substance it was once thought to be, there must have been some basis for the long-held belief in the health-giving properties of our “Ozone Belt.” The mythology of such a zone, I believe, stems from our great pine forests of the past. Our woods and waterways did create a wonderful environment, and St. Tammany Parish always rightfully enjoyed a reputation as a healthy place to visit and live.
It also just so happens that meteorological conditions have conspired to make St. Tammany Parish, and a swath stretching to the Florida Panhandle, one of the zones of highest lightning strike frequency in the country. Only a few areas on the Florida peninsula experience more lightning annually. It also happens that lightning particularly likes to strike tall objects such as pine trees. And it has also been known for some time that ozone can be produced by high energy electrical discharges like lightning, although this is thought to happen high up in thunderstorms and not at ground level.
It’s not too hard to imagine a Chamber of Commerce employee walking in our woods long ago witnessing the awesome sounds and sights of lightning striking the pine trees, smelling the burning bark and resin, and connecting all of this with ozone and the known healthy environment the area enjoyed. “Hmmmm, the “Ozone Belt,” he mused. “That’s got marketing promise. If we could bottle this stuff, we’d make a killing.”
So, maybe there is no “Ozone Belt,” and maybe the old timers added two and two together and got five. They still got the right answer. St. Tammany is a wonderful, healthy place to visit and live.