Restore Pennsylvania’s polluted rivers and streams
A River Reborn
The dramatic, true story of “seven deadly discharges” into a western Pennsylvania river, which had been considered too polluted to recover.
Trailer
The film shines a light on how mining has contaminated the river for decades, and how a courtroom victory combined with the unrelenting imagination of Pennsylvanians who live nearby helped bring this waterway back to life. Watch the trailer!
Produced and Directed by Ben Kalina
Edited by Bruce James
A Mangrove Media Production
Photo by Mangrove Media | Used by permission
As the Little Conemaugh River winds through Pennsylvania’s Allegheny Mountains it forms the backbone of a region with a legacy of industrial might. Like an old fighter, the river bears the scars of that history. Mile after mile runs empty of life, poisoned by toxic pollution from countless abandoned coal mines.
Photo by Mangrove Media | Used by permission
Generations of residents have turned their back on the river, scolding their children for playing in its orange waters and believing the damage to be irreversible. But a decade-long effort from a coalition of local groups has begun to suggest a different future for the Little Conemaugh and for other rivers in Pennsylvania.
Photo by Mangrove Media | Used by permission
Long written off as a casualty of the coal and steel industries, they’ve shown that with help, these rivers and the life and communities they support can rebound. A River Reborn tells the story of the Little Conemaugh and what it reveals about our ability to fix what might have been lost forever.
Photo by Mangrove Media | Used by permission
