Tomorrow is Earth Day. The holiday was founded in 1970 and this year will mark the fortieth observance. So what was the original Earth Day all about? The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration explains the catalyst this way:
That's right. A river caught fire. A river. It was so polluted it was actually inflammable. I distinctly remember this event, along with political cartoons joking that Lake Erie was so polluted you could walk across it; a joke that was only barely untrue. I was just seven, but things like water being on fire tend to stick with you. It's the sort of weird, real-world contradiction that kids -- OK, maybe only kids like me -- find fascinating.
Apparently though, the NOAA and myself remember everything wrong. And even the late Gaylord Nelson himself -- Earth Day's founder -- remembered it incorrectly. Earth Day wasn't about what an environmental nightmare the United States had become by the late sixties and early seventies. It was all about some crazy idea every scientist on the planet had called "global cooling."... [CLICK TO READ FULL POST]
On June 22, 1969, the Cuyahoga River on the southern shores of Lake Erie caught fire as oil, chemicals, and other materials, which had oozed into the lake, somehow ignited. The fire captured national attention and made the people of the United States aware of the many insults that had been heaped upon the environment of our nation and of our planet. It also helped lay the foundation of NOAA's major coastal resource management responsibilities and usher in the environmental protection or green side of NOAA.
As a result of the Cuyahoga River fire and other horrendous environmental insults -- the decline of the bald eagle from the pesticide DDT, whales hunted to near extinction, and the Santa Barbara oil spil -- Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson (1916-2005) began planning in September 1969 for an environmental teach-in known as Earth Day...
That's right. A river caught fire. A river. It was so polluted it was actually inflammable. I distinctly remember this event, along with political cartoons joking that Lake Erie was so polluted you could walk across it; a joke that was only barely untrue. I was just seven, but things like water being on fire tend to stick with you. It's the sort of weird, real-world contradiction that kids -- OK, maybe only kids like me -- find fascinating.
Apparently though, the NOAA and myself remember everything wrong. And even the late Gaylord Nelson himself -- Earth Day's founder -- remembered it incorrectly. Earth Day wasn't about what an environmental nightmare the United States had become by the late sixties and early seventies. It was all about some crazy idea every scientist on the planet had called "global cooling."... [CLICK TO READ FULL POST]
