Petey Brucker: The River Runs Through Him
October 15,1952 - April 22, 2024

Peter (Petey) Daniel Brucker passed away peacefully, in the arms of his loved ones. As the sun rose at 6:37 a.m. on Earth Day, April 22, 2024, he took his last breath at his home on the Salmon River in Northern California.

Petey and Geba Greenberg, his partner of 47 years, spent his last two years in Arcata due to his disabling neurological disease, Progressive Supranuclear Palsy. As Petey felt his life ending, he asked to return to his high mountain home at Godfrey Ranch. He had five final wondrous days with his family by his side, and friends visiting who shared the vista, a toke and music-making. Among those singing were his two daughters, Karuna Greenberg and Allegra Brucker, and his lifelong friend and music partner, Rex Richardson.

Born in Nyack, New York, on October 15,1952, the son of Mildred and Daniel Brucker, Petey was known as a loving and wily child who would do whatever he could to stay out of school. He always had a sense of connection to the earth that was nurtured by summers spent with his family at Camp Kanawauke in Bear Mountain State Park, New York. There he swam, canoed, and romped in the woods and brooks with his pals. He was a long-distance swimmer who could hold his breath for three minutes underwater, disappearing into the dark and popping up on the far side of the lake, or way upstream.

In the spring of 1975, just before turning 23, Petey followed his older brother Phil to the Salmon River. His sister Donna soon joined them. He met Geba Greenberg on the Winter Solstice in 1977 at Black Bear Ranch and spent the rest of his life with her. As a husband, father, friend, mountain man, musician and activist, Petey showed love in everything he did. He loved his community and watershed, expressing his spirituality through music and caring for the earth.

Petey was generous, eager to give someone in need the shirt off his back, or the dollars in his pocket. He was famous for stopping to talk to those he passed on the Salmon River Road, saying this was how a community stays connected. He was known for spending hours in the evening at the Beer Tree in Forks of Salmon with the likes of Hoss Bennett and Jim Hensher. If there was anyone at the tree, he said it was disrespectful to pass by without stopping. He made friends with everyone, no matter where they lived or what they believed. Petey broke down fences and barriers. The name Brucker means bridge-keeper, and Petey built bridges.

Petey loved babies and engaged children in theater projects at local schools. He was an adept musician with an impeccable ear, a singer, songwriter, a master of the guitar and mandolin who also played piano and bass. Over the years he was in many bands on the river including Loose Gravel, Quick Cabbage, The Super Fines, The Salmon River Snipers, and often in a duo with Rex Richardson. His sister Donna accompanied him in many musical endeavors. His music was a soundtrack of the Salmon River.

While on tour in 1990 with a giant old growth Douglas Fir Log to raise awareness about logging practices in the West, he opened for Pete Seeger in Washington D.C. on Earth Day. He attended Woodstock in 1969, Bob Marley in 1979, and later, many Humboldt ‘Reggae on the River’ festivals. Whenever asked, Petey played weddings, funerals, graduations, and holidays. He wrote songs as tributes to friends and family who had passed. He rarely listened to recorded music, and if he did, it was Stevie Wonder, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Marley, or his own tunes. You can listen to his music on SoundCloud: Petey’s Songs

Petey was a hard worker and especially loved digging in the earth. He could out-dig three people in the garden and was an early creative in guerrilla cultivation technologies. He would say that his favorite job was ditch-digging and spoke highly of having been a grave digger for a short time as a teenager.

Petey was an instrumental character through the decade he lived at Black Bear Ranch. After Geba, their daughters and he moved to Godfrey, they continued to steward Black Bear until his body no longer allowed it.

The only novel Petey read as an adult was “The Mists of Avalon,” but he read thousands of pages of environmental government documents. He was self-educated, saying he attended the U of Me. His infectious sense of humor remained until the day he died. Though he could barely speak the last few years of his life, he never lost his capacity to laugh. Petey’s relationship with marijuana as good medicine ran deep. His condition caused him to give up smoking, but when he resumed in the last months of his life, it made it easier for him to swallow and sleep.

Living in the remote wilderness community of Forks of Salmon, Petey dedicated his life to protecting this extraordinary watershed. He inventoried and measured the damage done by the extractive mining and logging industries, then devised strategies for repair.

As fish populations plummeted, and fires ravaged the landscape, Petey was determined to restore healthy forests and rivers. Agent Orange was repurposed after the Vietnam War as an aerial herbicide. After clearcutting, It was sprayed on tree plantations to ensure profitable timber sales, but it damaged human health, wildlife, and the forest itself. In response, Petey banded together with others to found ‘Salmon River Concerned Citizens’ to raise awareness and organize to stop aerial herbicide spraying.

Petey studied the ecological impacts of forest practices, thinking hard about the consequences of logging and fire suppression. As the watershed was shaped by wildfires, so was Petey. He lost his home twice to catastrophic fire, in 1977 and 1987, and volunteered as a renegade fire fighter in both fires. He participated in developing fuels management and fire protection strategies, and Indigenous-led controlled and prescribed burn practices. He became the first Community Fire Liaison, an official role he conceived to link the government fire command group with local community members by establishing clear communication between them.

In the late 1980s, when the Forest Service was kicking people out of mining claims, then burning their homes, Petey helped start ‘Siskiyou Citizens For Housing Reform’ and the ‘Salmon River Mining Council’ to protect residents of the Salmon River. After his brother Phil was killed on his motorcycle by a logging truck, Petey helped found the Salmon River Volunteer Fire and Rescue so that life-saving emergency medical care was available.

In 1989, Petey, with Felice Pace and a handful of others, founded the Klamath Forest Alliance (KFA) to mitigate harm from forest management practices like clear-cut logging and old growth liquidation. Petey led with science-based forestry analysis, reworking proposed timber sales through dialogue, litigation, and appeals. Klamath Forest Alliance

Petey saw possibilities for more than harm reduction, devising creative restoration solutions, and in 1992 co-founded the Salmon River Restoration Council (SRRC) with Jim Villeponteaux. SRRC programs included fisheries and water quality monitoring; instream habitat restoration; noxious weed removal; fire and fuels management, including prescribed burning; watershed education; and river cleanup. His daughter Karuna Greenberg is now Co-Director of the Salmon River Restoration Council, ensuring that this work continues to grow and thrive. https://srrc.org

After the noxious Spotted Knapweed was discovered on Salmon River bars, the Forest Service proposed spraying Round-Up to control it. Petey initiated the bold plan of manual removal of noxious invasive plants as an alternative toxic herbicide, persuading land management agencies that removal could be managed by SRRC by recruiting volunteers and employees to pull noxious species and plant natives in their stead. This project had record breaking volunteer hours, including thousands by Petey himself; and over time proved to be incredibly effective.

Petey felt a responsibility to the Indigenous people of this place. He knew our future depended on reckoning with our past by honoring native people not only in our thoughts, but also in words and actions. When it seemed like an unfathomable feat, Petey put his shoulder to the wheel to support Karuk, Yurok and Hoopa tribal members in kicking off the movement to remove Klamath River Dams and revive the salmon.

That meant tireless lobbying over two decades, driving long distances to meetings, organizing rallies and protests. During high stakes meetings, when tensions ran high, Petey brought out his guitar. Representatives from both congress and the tribes asked Petey to open meetings with a song. With good humor, Petey could cajole negotiators back to the table after they’d walked away. It was a gift for Petey to know that the salmon could now return.

Petey, Geba and Allegra were able to join Leaf Hillman, Ron Reed, Molli White, Frankie Myers, Sammy Gensaw, Mike Belchik, Craig Tucker, and others in witnessing the final draw down of the Copco Dam on January 23, 2024. He shed tears of joy as he watched the river run free for the first time in nearly a century. Here is a link to Petey’s song “Tear Down the Iron Gate Dam” with photos of the many years of protests. Iron Gate Dam Song - Petey Brucker & Arcata Interfaith Gospel Choir

Petey acted from his belief that stewardship is our responsibility and that working together is the path to achieve lasting change. His organizing style was to listen so that each voice is heard, and lift people up. With kindness, joy, persuasion, and litigation, he held agencies accountable for best forest practices.

Petey was awarded the Unsung Hero Award by the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services in 2017 for his work in environmental conservation and disaster response. In 2023, he was honored by EPIC with a wonderful event and the Sempervirens Lifetime Achievement Award. Here is his dear friend and brother Ron Reed speaking about Petey at that event.

• Ron Reed honoring Petey Brucker 7/15/2023
• EPICH honors Petey Brucker 2023 Sempervirens Lifetime Achievement Award

Petey’s imagination, perseverance, and collaborative skills as well as his passion for ecological activism have inspired the next generation to protect forests, rivers, and wildlife along the Klamath and Salmon Rivers. Petey showed by example how one changemaker can cause a cascade of good downstream.

The remarkable love Petey and Geba shared with each other was an honor to witness. The commitment, sacrifices, and tenderness with which Geba cared for Petey in this last decade should not go unmentioned. Over the years, their sweetness for each other held.

Petey was a father and mentor to many, one of whom is his nephew, Waylen Brucker. They shared a special closeness after both losing Phil Brucker. Waylen is a skillful nurse who was an indispensable part of Petey’s care team. Brian Sharkey was Petey’s mobility angel, providing wheelchairs, lifts, ramps, walkers, and grab bars. At every step of his decline, Brian’s innovation and generosity delivered the next piece of equipment needed.

The family thanks Hospice of Humboldt County, UCSF David Soleimani-Meigooni, Life on Wheels, and Erin Fowler for their part on Team Petey, and kind-hearted caregivers Jan Pfaff, Dennis Meade, Amanda Howard, Omar Green, Phillip Meshekey, Betty Ann and Creek Hanauer, and Jessie Peck, who guided Petey and family toward a beautiful final chapter.

Petey is survived by partner Geba Greenberg, daughters Karuna Greenberg and Allegra Brucker, sister Donna Brucker, and cherished grandsons Phoenix and Zephyr O’Hare. Petey joins his parents Millie and Dan Brucker, beloved brother Phil Brucker, and many dear friends, including Melvin Berry, Jim Hensher and Jim Jennings, as well as fellow Earth Warriors Jim Villeponteaux, Les Harling, Freeman House, Florence Conrad, Brian D. Tripp, Ronnie Pierce, Troy Fletcher, Tim McKay, and Judy Bari.

If so moved, donations in memory of Petey Brucker to the Salmon River Restoration Council https://srrc.org/give/

Celebration of Life

Saturday June 22, 2024 @ 2 PM

Forks of Salmon Community Club

Info or RSVP: celebratepetey@gmail.com

Share stories, photos, videos and recordings of Petey to the Google Drive Petey Brucker Memories or email celebratepetey@gmail.com Email us if you’d like to learn one of Petey’s original songs to play at the celebration, or play one of your own celebratepetey@gmail.com

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(Listen to his song The River here)

The River
By Petey Brucker

The river is running through
It’s flowing through me and you
We find it in everything we do
The river is running through

It’s what delivers and takes us away
It’s working in each and every day
With a love that’s new
A love that’s true
It’s a love that’s you

The path is waiting to be walked
The thought is thinking to be talked
I think of you and I start to cry
But now you shine so bright up in the sky

It’s what delivers and takes us away
It’s working in each and every day
With a love that’s new
A love that’s true
It’s a love that’s you

The light will always be aglow
If you look deep deep down in your soul
You’ll find a love waiting for you there
Sometimes it tires but it always cares

It’s what delivers and takes us away
And it’s working in each and every day
With a love that’s new
A love that’s true
It’s a love that’s you
It’s a love that
It’s a love that’s you

Sometimes this life it seems too short
Much too soon our ship came into port
But like a boat that’s tossed upon the sea
We are born, live life, and then we’re free

It’s what delivers and takes us away
And it’s working in each and every day

With a love that’s new
A love that’s true
It’s a love that’s you
It’s a love that, it’s a love that,
It’s a love that’s you

The river is running through
It’s flowing through me and you
We find it in everything we do
The river is running through
The river is running through
The river is running
The river is running
The river
The river