Looking Back on Previous Earth Days
I love that there is an internationally recognized holiday dedicated to the celebration of our Earth and its health. Although people should be more aware of environmental issues year-round, having such an event as Earth Day allows people who may not usually be exposed to those issues to be enlightened and learn better ways to extrapolate "Earth Day practices”, such as recycling, planting trees and picking up litter, throughout their lives.
The History
The idea of Earth Day came to founder Gaylord Nelson, at the time a US Senator of Wisconsin, after witnessing the devastating 1969 massive oil spill in Santa Barbara, CA. Inspired by the student anti-war movement, he realized that if he could infuse that energy with an emerging public consciousness about air and water pollution, it would force environmental protection onto the national political agenda. Senator Nelson announced the idea for a "national teach-in on the environment" to the national media.
As a result, on April 22, 1970, 20 million Americans took to the streets, parks, and auditoriums to demonstrate for a healthy, sustainable environment in massive coast-to-coast rallies. Thousands of colleges and universities organized protests against the deterioration of the environment. Groups that had been fighting against oil spills, polluting factories and power plants, raw sewage, toxic dumps, pesticides, freeways, the loss of wilderness, and the extinction of wildlife suddenly realized they shared common values.
Earth Day 1970 achieved a rare political alignment, enlisting support from Republicans and Democrats rich and poor, city slickers and farmers, tycoons and labor leaders. The first Earth Day led to the creation of the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water, and Endangered Species Acts. "It was a gamble," Gaylord recalled, "but it worked."
Much like 1970, Earth Day 2010 came at a time of great challenge for the environmental community. Climate change deniers, well-funded oil lobbyists, reticent politicians, a disinterested public, and a divided environmental community all contributed to a strong narrative that overshadowed the cause of progress and change. In spite of the challenge, for its 40th anniversary, Earth Day Network reestablished Earth Day as a powerful focal point around which people could demonstrate their commitment. Earth Day Network brought 225,000 people to the National Mall for a Climate Rally and launched an international, 1-million tree planting initiative with Avatar director James Cameron and tripled its online base to over 900,000 community members.
The fight for a clean environment continues in a climate of increasing urgency, as the ravages of climate change become more manifest every day. We invite everyone to be a part of Earth Day and help write many more victories and successes to Earth Day's history. Discover energy you didn't know you had. Feel it rumble through the grassroots under your feet and the technology at your fingers. Channel it into building a clean, healthy, diverse world for generations to come.
A Day of Adventure
There are many ways to celebrate Earth Day. We could recycle more and reduce the amount of energy we use (which also saves us money, as an added incentive). We could also reuse things that break, like using pieces from a shattered pot to make a mosaic picture frame, or re-purposing ripped jeans into doll clothes, shorts, or a chic denim pocketbook.
Looking back, how I celebrated Earth Day back in 2012 was fun and interesting. As my first organized event as the Environmental Commissioner for my college dorm, I hosted a Clean Our Lakes initiative, where we walked around the two lakes on campus wearing latex gloves and carrying garbage bags, picking up litter as we went. I set up this event because our lakes are absolutely stunning and yet I had always noticed litter whenever I visited. Even though I expected to find a substantial amount of litter that day, I was not prepared for the sheer multitude of trash per square foot. It is one thing to walk past litter and think, "It is terrible that someone would leave their trash on the ground; someone should pick it up", but it is another thing to actually go through with the task of picking up that litter you come across.
The funny thing was that when my friend and I were picking up litter around the lakes, one of the resident Canadian geese came over to see what we were doing and began to follow us. I thought it was cute that he was swimming alongside us in the lake while we were on shore cleaning up, but when the goose left the water we calmly kept on walking. He seemed bent on bothering us, and when he caught up to us (I had stopped to take a picture of a box turtle), he hissed to let us know we were unwelcome. We kept picking up litter, but now with one eye on the goose trailing us, and ears aware to other signs of geese activity.
Looking Forward
No matter what you do to celebrate Earth Day, it should be something that you find fun and that fits with your lifestyle. If you enjoy what you do, then you are more likely to be good at it and to do it well. On a side note, I have also put bird seed outside my window for the local birds every Saturday, so as an extra Earth Day treat, I put more out that day.
Earth Day is a special time to celebrate and protect our planet. Since the first Earth Day in 1970, there has been success but there is still much more to do. We can all help in many ways: picking up litter, planting trees, and saving energy. Tomorrow, I will be visiting natural places in my city and attending certain events; another post to follow with how those go…
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