Chrysler’s road started in Iowa

The road that led to Chrysler Corp., the once-mighty automaker that filed for bankruptcy April 30, started in Oelwein.

Walter Chrysler, a mechanic and foreman from Kansas, developed a passion for automobiles in 1908 while working for the Chicago Great Western railroad in Oelwein.  His infatuation eventually led him to Detroit and to the founding of the company that bears his name.

Chrysler, who was superintendent of locomotive power for the CGW’s shops in Oelwein, saw his first Locomobile in Chicago while on a business trip in 1908. It was love at first sight. He borrowed $4,300 and threw in his live savings of $700 to buy the beauty.

Back in Oelwein, he spent his free time in the barn by his house, taking the car apart, examining how things worked and then putting it back together, according to Cedar Rapids Gazette archives.

Once he’d finished three reassemblies, he finally took it for a spin.  Unfortunately, he did not know how to drive it. The car ended up in a garden and had to be pulled out by horses.

Although steering proved to be a problem, the auto was a turning point in Chrysler’s life.

After a run-in with his boss over a late train, Chrysler erupted in anger and walked out. By 1912, he was in Detroit as plant manager for Buick, a General Motors division, and quickly rose to the rank of division president.  Meddling by his boss prompted him in 1920 to quit yet another job in anger.

But he did not leave with empty pockets. He reportedly had $10 million in stock by the time he left the company.

He invested that money in auto engineering and research, and in 1925 formed Chrysler Corp., serving as president.

Chrysler ran the company until 1935 and died in 1940.

In 1998, Oelwein renamed a park in honor of Chrysler and put up two plaques telling of the “barnyard beginnings” of the Chrysler automobile.

Another Chrysler in Oelwein

Walter Chrysler Jr.  was born in Oelwein in 1909. The younger Chrysler founded a Chrysler division that developed the first air-conditioning system on wheels. He also was president of the Chrysler Building. He died in 1988.

Happy birthday, Cloris Leachman!

Oscar- and Emmy Award-winning actress Cloris Leachman/AP photo

Cloris Leachman, the Energizer Bunny of  Hollywood octogenarians, celebrates her 83rd birthday Thursday, April 30.

Leachman, whose autobiography, “Cloris”, was released March 31, is a native of  Des Moines.

In her book, Leachman mentions encounters with two other stars who passed through Des Moines on their way to fame:

• When she was in her teens, Leachman worked at the same radio station as sportscaster Ronald “Dutch” Reagan. At the time, she thought he was a square. Years later, when they worked together in New York, she found him to be quite gallant.
• She’s known singer Andy Williams, an Iowa native, since they were 8. In fact, his aunt was her piano teacher.

Leachman coming to Des Moines

Leachman will present her stage show, “Cloris!”, at 4 p.m. Sunday, May 10, at the Greater Civic Center of Des Moines, 221 Walnut St. Tickets are $47.50 and $62.50 through Civic Center Ticket Office, (515) 246-2300, or www.civiccenter.org

Fun fact

Leachman’s mother-in-law was actress Mabel Albertson, who played Darrin’s mother on “Bewitched.”

Iowa connection found on ‘Lost’

Jeremy Davies plays Daniel Faraday on "Lost." (AP photo, ABC)

“Lost,”  which airs its 100^th episode on Wednesday, April 29, has two well-documented Iowa connections:  Kate (played by Evangeline Lilly) is from the Hawkeye State (cue the twangy country music that ALWAYS plays in her flashbacks), and Michael Emerson, who plays Ben, was born in Cedar Rapids and grew up in Toledo.

But there is a third, not-so-well-known connection:  Jeremy Davies, who portrays physicist Daniel Faraday, the only person on the island who apparently has a clue about time travel, lived briefly in Iowa in the 1980s, during his late teens.

Davies, 39, is the son of children’s author and educator Mel Boring.  (Davies is the actor’s mother’s maiden name.) Jeremy’s parents divorced when he was young, and he lived with his mother in Kansas. After she died in the 1970s, he went to live with his father in California. In 1986, the Borings moved to Rockford, Iowa, which is about 10 miles southeast of Mason City.

According to biographies, he graduated from high school while living in Iowa and was manager of the school’s 1988 basketball team.

Once out of high school, he moved to California, attended the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in Pasadena, and worked his way up through TV commercials and bit parts on TV.

See the TV commercial for Subaru that put him on the road to success here.

Until “Lost,” he was perhaps best known for his role as Cpl. Timothy Upham, the interpreter, in “Saving Private Ryan.” And if you think that scruffy beard and haunting eyes make him look like Charles Manson, you aren’t the only one:  He was cast as Manson in a TV production of “Helter Skelter” in 2004. 

Oh, by the way, he’s hot. That’s the consensus of a video and musical tribute you can see here.

  

More about his dad

• Davies’ father had a public presence in Iowa that extended beyond his non-fiction children’s books and author visits to schools, where he was known to dress up as the Cat in the Hat.
• In 1992, Boring ran as an independent in an unsuccessful attempt to unseat U.S. Sen. Charles Grassley, a Republican.
• In 2004, according to the Mason City Globe Gazette, Boring bought his first television set so he could watch his son in “Helter Skelter.”
• Boring and his second wife lived in Rockford for 20 years and then moved to Washington state. He died in September 2008.

By Dave Rasdal
The Gazette

CEDAR RAPIDS — In a couple of weeks, Jon Reynolds will fly from Cedar Rapids to Bahrain to visit his good buddy Crown Prince Shaikh Salman Bin Hamad Al Khalifa. They’ll celebrate the 10th anniversary of the birth of an extraordinary college scholarship program.

Jon Reynolds of Cedar Rapids holds a magazine cover of his good friend, Salman Al Khalifa, the crown prince of Bahrain, whom Jon worked with to establish a unique college education program whereby Bahrain high school graduates can qualify for all-expense paid educations in the United States or the United Kingdom. Photo by Dave Rasdal.

“I call him Shaikh,” John says with a laugh. “I was the crown prince’s counselor. I knew him when he was 14.”

The crown prince is now 39, commander-in-chief of the Bahrain Defense Force and a genuine believer in the value of an excellent education for his country’s best students.

In fact, the crown prince’s International Scholarship Program spends $3 million annually to provide 10 new students per year all-expense-paid college educations for up to six years.

Figure it out. If 60 students are in the program at one time, that’s up to $50,000 per year per student for everything from tuition and books to living expenses and occasional trips back home.

“I think it’s the most wonderful program in the world,” Jon says.

But how did Jon, 72, who grew up in Sigourney and graduated from Cornell College in Mount Vernon, become friends with a crown prince and get the call to help set up such a program?

Well, that story goes back to 1964. Jon was teaching English, theater and speech in Jesup when he learned about overseas teaching opportunities through the University of Northern Iowa. That fall, he found himself in Dreux, France, as a houseparent at a boarding school operated by the U.S. Department of Defense.

For the next 40 years, Jon would live, teach and counsel students in France, Turkey, Spain and Bahrain. It was an unbelievable career for an Iowa boy who knows, firsthand, not only the value of his own education but the value of providing solid educations to young people.

In 1973, John returned to UNI for a break. That summer, as he counseled, researched and attended school, he met his wife, Jean, a Springville native and elementary teacher. They married that year and went to Turkey, Spain, and, in 1983, Bahrain, an Arabic island country in the Persian Gulf.

Jon had heard that defense department educators were being asked to staff a private international school for the Bahrain International School Association. It seemed the opportunity of a lifetime.

Jon became a counselor (middle-school students at first, later juniors and seniors) while Jean taught elementary students in one of the newest, most advanced schools in the world. Tuition ranges from $14,000 to $22,000 per year. Students representing 50 nationalities come from among the 400 wealthiest families in the world.

Jon, of course, counseled the crown prince. And in 1999, the crown prince called Jon to help formulate the college scholarship program.

Each year, maybe 300 students, all in the top 3 percent of their classes, apply. They are required to write essays, perform at least 20 hours of community service and complete a course in critical thinking.

“Students are not only encouraged, but pushed, to question everything and anything,” Jon says. “They don’t take anything for granted.”

Finalists are whittled down through tests and interviews in front of international panels until only the best of the best remain.

“It’s strictly based on merit,” Jon says. “That’s the beauty of it.”

The students attend the best universities in the United Kingdom and the United States, often Ivy League schools. One student graduated from Drake University in Des Moines with five majors.

Jon, since retiring in 2004 and returning to Eastern Iowa, remains active with the scholarship program. In fact, he hosts high school students who leave Bahrain to attend prep schools in the United States.

“Not only do I want to see the crown prince again,” Jon says of his upcoming trip. “The new student who’s coming to prep school in the United States will be there. I’ll be able to meet him and his parents.”

© Gazette Communications 2009

A circa 1945 parade passes the former J.C. Penney store at 109 Second St. SE in Cedar Rapids. The Three Sisters women’s clothing store is at left. Photo courtesy of Mark Stoffer Hunter

By Mark Stoffer Hunter
Cedar Rapids Historian

A few thoughts and observations this week on recent and ongoing changes in regard to Cedar Rapids history:

In downtown Cedar Rapids, the plastic has been removed from the three-story scaffolding that fronts the old J.C. Penney buildings in the 100 block of Second Street SE, across from the Blue Strawberry and LoDo’s Pizza. Visible again after many years are sections of a stone building facade, including some interesting architectural details first constructed in 1930.

The United Fire & Casualty Co. is remodeling the old Penney’s building for additional office space. The north section of the structure, at 109 Second St. SE, was built in 1930, replacing the old Farmers Insurance Building that had stood there since 1884. The Cedar Rapids J.C. Penney Department store, formerly in the 200 block of First Avenue SE, occupied the entire new structure.

By 1940, the old Magnus Block next door at 113-115 Second St. SE had been demolished and replaced by an addition to the new Penney’s store. Until the mid-1950s, the Three Sisters women’s clothing store operated out of the ground floor of the Penney’s addition. The Three Sisters shop moved to the new Town & Country Shopping Center in 1956.

Penney’s then “modernized” its 1930 and 1940 buildings on Second Street SE by covering up the decorative concrete facade on the upper floors with square metal panels. The building retained this look from 1957 until 1979, when Penney’s moved to the new Westdale Mall. Over the last 30 years, the old Penney’s building has housed a McDonald’s restaurant and financial offices.

 Demolitions continue

Demolitions continue in the flood-damaged neighborhoods of Cedar Rapids. To date, more than 160 properties (mostly houses) have disappeared from view since July. The wrecking of the 100- year-old Trinity Methodist Church at Third Avenue and Fifth Street SW on April 10 was especially dramatic and a permanent change to the west downtown area skyline.

Other recent demolitions of note include a very old brick residence at 217 Fourth Ave. SW in the old Kingston section of Cedar Rapids, a 1923 former neighborhood grocery store at 341 12th Ave. SW and a house dating to the 1870s at 1009 Third St. SE in the Bohemian Commercial Historic District.

This house at 112 Second St. SW will be demolished. Built in 1915, it was the longtime home of the Alois Hasek family of Cedar Rapids and most recently the Terra Cottage gift shop. Photo courtesy of Mark Stoffer Hunter

Coming down soon is an interesting former residence at 112 Second St. SW. At the time of the flood in June, it was the home of Terra Cottage, an antiques and gift shop. Built in 1915, it was the longtime home of members of the Alois Hasek family until the mid-1950s. Alois Hasek Sr. was a well-known dentist in Cedar Rapids, his office located in the old Hasek building that once stood at First Street and Second Avenue SE, where the Alliant Tower now stands.

Johnson remembered

The death of former Cedar Rapids Mayor Robert M.L. Johnson on April 13 brought recollections of the last time this city was facing major urban renewal issues.

Johnson was mayor from 1962 through 1967. During those years, planning for the new interstate highway and other downtown area improvement projects resulted in the removal of many old established neighborhoods and landmarks.

A key project that was implemented and completed during Johnson’s term was the massive rebuilding of the First, Second and Third Avenue bridges over the Cedar River from 1963 through 1966. The unique Memorial Plaza and underground parking on May’s Island were a part of that project.

As public safety commissioner in 1957, Johnson, with City Council approval, led the way in establishing the one- way street system for downtown Cedar Rapids.

I enjoyed the opportunity to meet and talk with Johnson at Cottage Grove Place. My condolences to his family. He will be missed.

© 2009, Gazette Communications

Dancers weave around a Maipole at the Festhalle barn during the 2007 Maifest celebration in Amana.

AMANA – The Amana Colonies’ Maifest celebration welcomes springtime and offers a variety of entertainment next weekend. The celebration, themed Hope Springs Eternal, will begin with a morning parade Saturday, May 2, through Amana.

It will be followed by Taste of Amana Colonies, featuring favorite German foods, in the Festhalle Barn. Polka music, Maipole dancers, games and tours also will be part of the celebration.

From 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday, May 2, author Jennifer Sandersfeld and illustrator Gordon Kellenberger will autograph copies of “Kolony Kinder Stories” at Catiri’s Art Oasis. The book is written from stories and songs told by older residents about communal times. Proceeds go to the Amana Arts Guild.

A barn dance with The Gilded Bats, featuring caller Nikki Herbst, is scheduled for 7 p.m. Saturday in Festhalle Barn. Admission is $5 per person; children 13 and younger are admitted for free.

Activities May 3 include a wine and beer walk and
Maipole dancing.

For more information about Maifest and a schedule of events for the festival, go to www.festivalsinamana.com

© Gazette Communications 2009

By George C. Ford
The Gazette

Silence is not always golden. Sometimes, it can be deadly.

Every year since 1998, between 30 and
47 children have died of hyperthermia after they were inadvertently left in vehicles by parents, grandparents or guardians. In many cases, the child was sleeping when the vehicle and the driver reached their destination.

Putting a stuffed animal in a child’s safety seat and placing it on the front seat next to the driver after the child is buckled into the seat is recommended as a way to remember they are in the vehicle. Illustration by Cliff Jette/The Gazette

“Forgotten baby syndrome” is another name for the official designation: “Death by hyperthermia.” It only takes a few minutes for the temperature in a closed vehicle to top 100 degrees on a moderately sunny, 60-degree day.

It has claimed the lives of children born to the rich, middle class and poor, those highly educated or barely literate, chronically absent-minded or fanatically organized. Fathers are just as likely as mothers to forget they have a child on board.

An otherwise attentive, loving parent gets busy, becomes distracted, or confused by a change in their daily routine, and just forgets a child in the back seat. Moving child safety seats to the back seat to avoid the front passenger-side air bag also may be a contributing factor, said Janette Fannell, president of Leawood, Kan., child safety advocate KidsandCars.org

Iowa is no stranger to children dying from heat exhaustion in a locked vehicle. Two incidents with decidedly different outcomes occurred in Mount Pleasant in the summer of 2005.

On June 20, 2005, Kent Davis of Olds left his 2-month-old daughter in his locked vehicle while he was shopping. He was getting the baby out of the car just as officers arrived after getting a call from passers-by.

The temperature was estimated to be 85 degrees. Davis’ daughter was treated at the Henry County Health Center and released.

Two months later, Danelle Stainbrook, 21, of Mount Pleasant, went to work at 6 a.m. in the food services department at the Henry County Health Center. She intended to drop her daughter, Peyton Burchett, at the baby sitter’s but was distracted and forgot.

When Stainbrook left work around 2:30 p.m., she found Peyton still strapped in the child seat in the vehicle’s back seat. The child had died of heat exposure on the 94-degree day, according to autopsy results.

Peyton’s death was ruled an accident by the Henry County medical examiner and no charges were filed.

The circumstances of Peyton’s death recalled an incident in June 2001 when Kari Engholm left her 7-month-old daughter, Clare, in a minivan as she went to work at Dallas County Hospital in Perry. Clare died inside the van on the nearly 90-degree day.

Engholm had been thinking about meetings she had scheduled and forgot to drop her daughter at day care. A judge later acquitted her of involuntary manslaughter and neglect of a dependent person.

In many cases of “forgotten baby syndrome,” stress, emotion, lack of sleep, distraction, or change of routine are common contributing factors, said David Diamond, a professor of molecular physiology at the University of South Florida.

Diamond says an alteration in brain function leads to often tragic results.

In situations involving familiar, routine motor skills, the primitive area of the brain, or “basal ganglia,” enables a person to operate subconsciously on “autopilot.”

While the basal ganglia is handling the driving, the conscious mind is processing multiple thoughts. It needs to be jogged – usually by a child crying or significant visual cue – to remind the driver of the baby in the back seat.

© Gazette Communications 2009

Yoon-Sook Jang of Korea correctly identifies a separator during English classes at First Mennonite Church in Iowa City. The class, offered through the International Women’s Club, teaches conversational English to women of all languages living in Iowa City. Photo by Meredith Hines-Dochterman

By Meredith Hines-Dochterman
The Gazette
IOWA CITY – Xu Yang pulls a cheese slicer from the brown paper bag. She laughs with a confused expression on her face. Rapid Chinese follows as she peeks inside the bag for an easier item to identify.

“You have to keep that,” Jerry Weir says with a smile.

Slowly, with the help of the 14 women in the room, Xu names the utensil in English. She identifies its purpose in the kitchen. Others share examples of how it might be used. Weir praises the class, then gestures for the next woman to pick an object from the bag.

The woman are members of the “A” and “B” English classes – conversational English classes led by the International Women’s Club.

The classes, held Tuesday and Thursday mornings at First Mennonite Church, are just one of several activities offered through the International Women’s Club. The club began to help women from different countries enjoy life in Iowa City.

“The club was founded to support wives of international faculty who come to Iowa to teach, study or work,” said Kathy Fait, a club board member.

Rather than leave the women to their devices, the International Women’s Club gives them the opportunity to meet others in the community and offers socialization activities.

“I was a lonely person with a new baby when I joined the club,” said Shelagh Hayreh, a Scotland native and the club’s president.

The club helped Hayreh make a connection with her new home. The organization works the same way for its American members.

“We learn so much from each other,” said Sharon Bender, the club’s secretary.

Fifty years have passed since the club began – a milestone members will recognize with an anniversary celebration at the Coralville Public Library.

“It’s mostly about inviting former members and current members to come together, reconnect and celebrate the fact that 50 years later we’re still here,” Hayreh said.

The event, which will be attended by about 100 past and present club members, will include live music and a photo slide show of club activities.

“We try to provide the widest possible variety of experiences,” said Betsy Riesz, a club board member.

The International Women’s Club sponsors morning coffee groups, morning cooking groups, a supper club, the “Lunch Bunch,” a craft group and an excursion group, in addition to English classes.

The club has about 140 members, representing 40 countries, from Algeria to Venezuela.

The annual membership fee is $10. Women who register for English classes are asked to pay an additional $10 per semester. Children are welcome at some activities; free child care is provided at others – with UI student volunteers watching the children – so women who might not be able to get out can.

“This club has had a positive impact on many members’ lives,” said Sonia Ettinger, a club board member and Australian native.

The organization has been a steppingstone for greater understanding among different cultures, as members have discussed everything from child rearing, the roles of women in society and customs.

“I strongly want to say that I couldn’t have had such wonderful memories without the help of the International Women’s Club,” former member Akemi Inouye of Japan wrote in a statement shared with club members at the 35th anniversary celebration. “Every Christmas, our Christmas tree is decorated with snowmen, which I made in the craft classes. At the discussion group, I could exchange information with many members.”

Inouye continued the experience in Japan, starting the Yamato International Association, which assists foreigners living in Japan.

“We got this idea from the attitudes of Americans working as volunteers whom I met in Iowa City,” Inouye wrote.

© 2009, Gazette Communications

For more information: http://iwc-iowa-city.com/

Laura Leighton vamps in ‘Melrose’ revamp

Laura Leighton revives villainous Sydney in the "Melrose Place" pilot.

Iowa City native Laura Leighton, who played the conniving vamp on “Melrose Place” on the Fox network, is reprising the role in a pilot for a new TV pilot for “Melrose Place” for the CW network.

That comes as a shock to many, who presumed Sydney died in the season five finale of the original “Melrose Place” when she was hit by a car.

In the TV pilot, Leighton’s Sydney is the landlord of the apartment complex, a role that Heather Locklear (Amanda) had in the original but reportedly passed on for the remake.

If the pilot is picked up by a network, Leighton would have a recurring role in the series, TV Guide reports.

Leighton, whose real name is Laura Miller, was born on July 24, 1968, in Iowa City. (Leighton is her grandfather’s surname.) She graduated from West High School in 1986.

She was slated to play Sydney on the original “Melrose Place” for only two episodes in 1992 but stayed for 100 more, until Sydney’s untimely presumed death in 1997.

The series went on two more seasons without Sydney.

Leighton is married to Doug Savant, who plays Tom Scavo, husband of Lynnette Scavo (Felicity Huffman), on “Desperate Housewives. Leighton and Savant met on “Melrose Place,” where he played Matt Fielding.

Married since 1998, Leighton and Savant have a son, born in 2000, and a daughter, born in 2005.

See video of Sydney’s “death” on “Melrose Place” here. www.youtube.com/watch?v=b81T-Z-grWo

Fun facts:

• Leighton’s high school is a Melrose place. It is located on Melrose Avenue in Iowa City.
• Leighton was a member of The Young Americans song and dance troupe for a year.

President Obama delivers Earth Day remarks at Trinity Structural Towers in Newton / AP Photo

Obama focuses on green energy in Newton stop

 By James Q. Lynch
Gazette Des Moines Bureau

On his first trip back to Iowa since becoming president, Obama reaffirmed his commitment to a comprehensive energy strategy to reduce dependence on foreign oil that leads to the depletion of the world’s oil reserves and growing climate disruption.

The choice the nation faces “is not between saving our environment and saving our economy – it’s a choice between prosperity and decline,” he said.

“The nation that leads the world in creating new sources of clean energy will be the nation that leads the 21st century global economy,” he said to an invitation only crowd of about 200 at Trinity Structural Towers that is housed in a former Maytag plant.

Obama saw symbolism in the plant being used to create components for renewable energy production to power the household appliance that had been built there by generations of Newton workers.

“It wasn’t too long ago that Maytag closed its operations in Newton. Hundreds of jobs were lost,” he said in remarks delivered from the factory floor. “Today, this facility is alive again with new industry. This community continues to struggle, and not everyone has been so fortunate as to be rehired, but more than one hundred people will now be employed at this plant, many the same folks who had lost their jobs when Maytag shut its doors.”

Jasper County Democratic Chairman Dan Kelley of Newton was pleased Obama recognized the changes the community has undergone from the days when Maytag employed about 4,000 people.

“It’s been a difficult situation and it’s not over,” he said. “But now we’re putting our efforts into clean energy.”

In fact, Obama said, they are “helping to lead the next energy revolution.”

That, Kelley said, will make the country stronger and the environment safer.

“I think he was here today to pat us on the back for a good job,” Kelley said, “and to push us to keep going.”

With Obama’s policies, there should be plenty for Newton workers to do, according to Vic Abate, vice president of GE Renewables, which buys all of the production from Trinity and TPI, a Newton wind turbine blade manufacturer

Abate called Obama’s vision “spot on” and urged the president and Congress to get economic stimulus money flowing to help maintain the momentum in the alternative energy industry.

“This plant is living off the terrific growth the industry saw in 2006, ‘07,’08,” Abate said. “There’s a significant backlog, but the urgency is now because new projects aren’t starting. To get those projects to started, the stimulus money needs to flow.”

Passage of a renewable energy standard would send a signal “that this country is going to go for 20 years building out its alternative energy, independent, carbon-free infrastructure.”

If Congress adopted a renewable energy standard to reach 20 percent of electricity from wind by 2030 – which Abate said is doable, “you’ll have to build one of these wind turbines every 15 minutes for like the next 20 years.”

America, Obama said, has led the world in producing and harnessing new forms of energy.

Obama used the visit to a wind energy factory to unveil a program to develop the renewable energy of another kind – producing electricity from wind, wave, and ocean currents on the Outer Continental Shelf. It will allow the nation, the first time ever, to tap into the ocean’s sustainable resources to generate clean energy in an environmentally sound and safe manner, he said.

Obama also spoke of his administration’s investment in advanced biofuels and ethanol, which he called a “transitional fuel to help us end our dependence on foreign oil while moving toward clean, homegrown sources of energy.” He also called for a global effort to address climate change and urged Americans to take simple steps – inflating their car tires and installing energy-efficient light bulbs – as ways they can be a part of the nation’s energy solution.

Conservation has to be a part of the nation’s effort, too, Obama said. Although the U.S. has led the global economy by developing new sources of energy, America has led in global energy consumption of that energy. The U.S. is less than five percent of the world’s population, but accounts for 25 percent of the demand for oil.

That appetite comes at a tremendous cost to the economy. Twenty percent of the nation’s spending is for imported oil, Obama said. It increases the country’s vulnerability to the volatile oil markets and contributing to shifting weather patterns that are already causing record-breaking droughts, unprecedented wildfires, and more intense storms, he said.

Given that, the nation that leads the world in creating new sources of clean energy will be the nation that leads the 21st century global economy, Obama said. “America can be that nation. America must be that nation.”

And finally, the U.S. must join nations in a global coalition to solve climate change.

“Our climate knows no boundaries; the decisions of any nation will affect every nation,” he said. Next week, he will meet with leaders of major economies to discuss how to work together to address this energy crisis.

“It is true that the United States has been slow to participate in this kind of a process,” Obama said. “But those days are now over. We are ready to engage.”

Still in the first 100 days of his administration, Obama said steps he has taken “represent perhaps more progress than we have achieved in three decades” and suggested green energy can be the American legacy.

“A legacy of vehicles powered by clean renewable energy traveling past newly opened factories; of burgeoning industries employing millions of Americans in the work of protecting our planet; of an economy exporting the energy of the future – instead of importing the energy of the past; of a nation once again leading the world to meet the challenges of our time,” he said.