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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact for additional information:
Damara Ross
175 East Delaware Place, Suite 4921
Chicago, IL 60611
Phone: 312.259.9744
Chief Scientist
for Contaminated Lake Erie Dies
Chicago, IL-- July 12, 2006
-- Curtis Ross, retired scientist and former Director of the Environmental
Protection Agency, Central Regional Laboratory, died in hospital on
Friday, June 23, 2006. Ross, who battled cancer, was 68 years
old. He resided in Chicago.
Ross worked for the Environmental
Protection Agency for over three decades. Concern for the environment
and the impact of chemicals and pollutants on the land and water was
his singular focus. Under his leadership, a group of scientists
from the United States collaborated with Canadian scientists in 1968
to study the effects of pollutants on a dying Lake Erie. This
consortium discovered the catastrophic and damaging, yet reversible
effects of phosphates on the proliferation of algae and its slow suffocation
of the lake. Under his guidance, Ross advocated the removal of
phosphates from everyday household items, especially laundry detergents,
as seen in a national interview with Walter Cronkite in 1971.
These critical facts saved Lake Erie from a permanent demise, and also
saved other water sources from similar hazardous conditions. This
study, Project Hypo, led to the ban of phosphates on an international
scale in all products, and is still enforced today. Details of
the study are located at www.projecthypo.com.
Noel Burns, the scientist leading
the Canadian contingent of Project Hypo, currently resides in New Zealand
and remained lifelong friends with Ross. Burns, who currently
owns an environmental consulting firm, said of Ross, "Curtis, the
scientist was a great investigator and colleague. Together, as American
and Canadian co-leaders, we led an environmental investigation that
ended in the signing of the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement - the
best thing that ever happened to the Great Lakes. Curtis, the man was a
true friend of 35 years, and with his wife Doris was always a wonderful
host. Among many things, I will miss his wry sense of humor."
In 1990, Ross returned to his
Alma Mater, Talladega College in Alabama, to mentor students, and he
created the Science Drop-In-Center for students majoring in the sciences.
The Science Drop-In-Center was one of the first of its kind, and its
concept is replicated at several other Historically Black Colleges.
Born in Gadsden, Alabama, Ross
received his undergraduate education at Talladega College in Talladega,
Alabama. Later, he also received his Masters in Public Policy
from Governors State University in University Park, Illinois.
He is survived by his wife,
Doris Washington; a son, Curtis; and six daughters, Bridget, Nicolette,
Damara, Jennifer, Michelle, and Valerie. He also is survived by three
grandchildren; two grandsons, Xavier and Bishop and one baby granddaughter,
Jacinda. Also surviving are his brothers, Olin and Willie James;
and his sisters, Doris Jean Pumphrey and Esteola Sansky.
The Ross family held a memorial
service on June 25, 2006 at the Brookins Funeral Home in Chicago, and
they held the funeral on Saturday, July 2, 2006 in Gadsden, Alabama.