Michael Wolf Straus was the Commissioner of the United States Bureau of Reclamation from 1945 until 1953.

Biography

Straus was born in Chicago in 1897. He pursued a career as a newspaperman, serving as managing editor of the Chicago Evening Post

Chicago Evening Post

The Chicago Evening Post was a daily newspaper published in Chicago from March 1, 1886 until 1932. The newspaper was founded as a penny paper during the technological paradigm-shift created by the invention of linotype technology, and failed during the Great Depression...

 and rising to the position of Washington, D.C. bureau chief of the International News Service

International News Service

International News Service was a U.S.-based news agency founded by newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst in 1909.Established two years after the Scripps family founded the United Press Association, INS scrapped among the newswires...

. In 1933, Harold L. Ickes

Harold L. Ickes

Harold LeClair Ickes was a United States administrator and politician. He served as United States Secretary of the Interior for 13 years, from 1933 to 1946, the longest tenure of anyone to hold the office, and the second longest serving Cabinet member in U.S. history next to James Wilson. Ickes...

, the newly-appointed Secretary of the United States Department of the Interior

United States Department of the Interior

The United States Department of the Interior is the United States federal executive department of the U.S. government responsible for the management and conservation of most federal land and natural resources, and the administration of programs relating to Native Americans, Alaska Natives, Native...

, selected Straus as a personal aide and handler of the Cabinet secretary's press relations.

Straus served at Ickes's side during his chief's tenure at the Interior Department, rising to the position of First Assistant Secretary of the Department in March 1943. In 1946, soon after the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt , also known by his initials, FDR, was the 32nd President of the United States and a central figure in world events during the mid-20th century, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war...

, Ickes resigned from the Cabinet. Straus continued as part of the new Truman Administration

Harry S. Truman

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States . As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States , he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his...

, moving laterally in December 1945 to the position of Commissioner of the Bureau of Reclamation within the Interior Department.

Straus's tenure at Reclamation during the late 1940s coincided with one of the Bureau's most intensive period of concrete dam-building, with numerous structures built in the Columbia River

Columbia River

The Columbia River is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river rises in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, Canada, flows northwest and then south into the U.S. state of Washington, then turns west to form most of the border between Washington and the state...

, the Colorado River

Colorado River

The Colorado River , is a river in the Southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico, approximately long, draining a part of the arid regions on the western slope of the Rocky Mountains. The watershed of the Colorado River covers in parts of seven U.S. states and two Mexican states...

 drainage, and other major watersheds across the American West. Straus presided over the construction and dedication of dams such as Hungry Horse Dam

Hungry Horse Dam

Hungry Horse Dam is an arch dam on the South Fork Flathead River in the Rocky Mountains of the U.S. state of Montana. It is located in Flathead National Forest, in Flathead County, about south of the west entrance to Glacier National Park, southeast of Columbia Falls, and northeast of Kalispell...

 in Montana

Montana

Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...

. He left his position in 1953 soon after the inauguration of President Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight D. Eisenhower

Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...

.

Criticism

The Bureau of Reclamation has been severely criticized for the permanent alterations it made to natural waterflows throughout the western United States. Works like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (novel)

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest is a novel written by Ken Kesey. Set in an Oregon asylum, the narrative serves as a study of the institutional process and the human mind, as well as a critique of Behaviorism and a celebration of humanistic principles. Written in 1959, the novel was adapted into a...

, by novelist Ken Kesey

Ken Kesey

Kenneth Elton "Ken" Kesey was an American author, best known for his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , and as a counter-cultural figure who considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. "I was too young to be a beatnik, and too old to be a...

, lament what they see as the destruction caused by the dams and reservoirs constructed by the Bureau of Reclamation during this period. On the other hand, the electrical power generated by the Bureau of Reclamation dams constructed duiring this period has become an essential element in the lives of millions of people in Idaho

Idaho

Idaho is a state in the Rocky Mountain area of the United States. The state's largest city and capital is Boise. Residents are called "Idahoans". Idaho was admitted to the Union on July 3, 1890, as the 43rd state....

, Oregon

Oregon

Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

, Washington, and neighboring states.

Later life

Michael W. Straus lived in retirement with his wife Nancy Porter Straus in Washington, D.C., until dying on August 9, 1970. Through Nancy he was a brother-in-law of photographer Eliot Porter

Eliot Porter

Eliot Furness Porter was an American photographer best known for his color photographs of nature.-Early life:...

 and painter Fairfield Porter

Fairfield Porter

Fairfield Porter was an American painter and art critic. He was the brother of photographer Eliot Porter and the brother-in-law of federal Reclamation Commissioner Michael W. Straus....

.

External links

• Bureau of Reclamation photo and biography