Robert Redford - Michael Feeney Callan [152]
With Andrus, Redford sketched out a potential National Academy of Resources. In 1978 he laid it out for the Los Angeles Herald Examiner. The academy would be
a specialized institution for the higher studies of our natural resources and wouldn’t specialize only in environmental preservation. The academy would be all-inclusive in respect of the various disciplines that guide our use of resources, including biology, zoology, oceanography, geomorphology and environmental law. It would be a defense academy of our resources in much the same way that West Point, Annapolis, and the Air Force Academy exist for our armed defenses. The resource academy would be designed to educate people about the nature of our resources and to establish guidelines for which resources should be preserved intact, and which should be developed in the safest, cleanest, most efficient way. The academy would be funded by the Department of the Interior and therefore would be able to utilize its facilities around the country, such as the national parks.
The academy went down like Hollywood CAN. “It failed,” says Redford, “partly because it had to get past Energy Secretary James R. Schlesinger, who was well intentioned but just about the worst person to take Carter’s policies to the public. It really annoyed me, but I didn’t quit.”
If the government wouldn’t produce the working model, he resolved to do it himself.
It was one thing to preach conservation and energy restraint, another to practice it.
After Redford decided on a sabbatical from film, two priorities took precedence beyond politics: family and reordering Sundance as a model of self-sufficient eco-friendliness. The previous fall he had started planning a radical new home just up the meadow from the A-frame that would encompass cutting-edge design techniques and energy-saving devices. To develop it, he sought out the innovative architect Abe Christensen, who was currently exploring uses of solar and alternative sources in design. Construction of the house, affectionately tagged the Big House, would serve as a model for a scheme Christensen and Redford agreed on to build moderately priced solar-heated homes throughout Utah. In tandem with the new house, Redford decided to expand Sundance business into farming and horse breeding, nonpolluting initiatives long native to the area that would help fund the ailing resort.
As building commenced, Redford sent out the word about suitable new farmland. Brent Beck found a fifty-six-acre farm called Spanish Fork at the mouth of the canyon and, on a cross-country flight, Redford told Gary Hendler he wanted to buy it. Hendler said it made no commercial sense. “That was a blessing,” says Redford, “because I could then say to Gary, ‘Okay, let’s make changes: from now on you guide my tax affairs. I do not want guidance in my arts work or my businesses.’ ” The next day, Hendler called from Los Angeles to recommend a new adviser, his mild-mannered office manager, Reg Gipson. Gipson, a lawyer in his early thirties, was the Idaho-born son of a missionary who had reared his family in rural India. He recalls Hendler summoning him in some confusion: “Gary assumed that I’d have some agricultural experience, since I grew up on a mission settlement. I didn’t. But I did know you don’t buy a ranch from the comforts of an urban office. I flew to Utah to check out the water rights, sorted it and bought the ranch. So began Bob’s next phase of experiment with Sundance.”
Spanish Fork, rechristened Diamond Fork Ranch, became the base for breeding Arabian and quarter horses, an operation that ran for ten years until another farm, Charleston, replaced it and Redford started growing crops. Acres of corn,