By Rick LoBello

You know his voice from popular Christmas songs like A Holly Jolly Christmas, Frosty the Snowman and the animated movie about Rudolph the Reindeer, but did you know that Burl Ives narrated a documentary about the Chihuahuan Desert?  

Here at the El Paso Zoo and Botanical Gardens we have the world’s best Chihuahuan Desert Exhibit in the world.  As a result, some of our most important conservation education messages focus on the Chihuahuan Desert and our big backyard. 

Although I never met Burl Ives I was living not far from the location where he acted in the  western-comedy movie “Uphill All The Way” (1986) near Big Bend National Park when I was Executive Director of the Big Bend Natural History Association.   Because of Burl Ives’s love for nature my good friend Harry Gordon was able to arrange for Burl Ives to narrate his documentary “The Spiral Dance: Reflections on Big Bend National Park”. This 28-minute vintage film is a work of art and still beautifully evokes a sense of place that is the Big Bend.  Burl Ives was a beloved folk singer and actor who had a deep connection to nature which was evident in his folk music (songs of sea, land, and travel), his personal lifestyle (living in scenic places like Washington State’s Puget Sound and New Mexico), and his philanthropic support for environmental causes.

The Spiral Dance is the first film with a sound documentary on Big Bend National Park.  When I realized that the VHS copy of the film and several others would soon disappear, using my home computer and a video cassette player I digitized all four of his Chihuahuan Desert documentaries and uploaded them to YouTube.

Sit back with your computer or on your TV and watch this great piece of art that features many of the wildlife and plant species we have at the Zoo and across the Chihuahuan Desert including javelina, tarantulas, vinegaroons and century plants (agave).  I especially enjoy the segment on the century plant that when I was a Park Ranger, we called the cafeteria plant of the desert.   You will understand why when you watch the film.

I met Harry at an evening program in the Chisos Basin at the campground amphitheater when I was a ranger naturalist working for the National Park Service in Big Bend National Park during the late 1970s. Harry told me about the Chihuahuan Desert Trilogy project he was working on and we spent many hours over the years visiting good locations to film different animals and sequences. I helped him film some of the scenes he needed to complete the project.

Harry inspired me years later to coordinate the production of Big Bend’s first comprehensive documentary that included comments from yours truly and commentary from many of the park rangers I worked with in 1990.  You can also watch it on YouTube.

Photos
Cover – Mockingbird by Rick LoBello
Feature – Andrew P. Yanchus, Wikimedia Creative Commons
Top – Bureau of Land Management, Wikimedia Creative Commons
Javelina by Rick LoBello
Basin Amphitheater by Rick LoBello
Bottom – Bureau of Land Management, Wikimedia Creative Commons