Earth Day - Then And Now
April 22, 2012 will mark the 42nd anniversary of the Earth Day movement. Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson came up with the concept of a day dedicated to the environment after witnessing the destruction caused by a massive oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara, California in 1968.
Two years later, with the help of Republican Congressman Peter McCloskey and a staff of 85, the first Earth Day was celebrated by 20 million Americans
- Former Wisconsin Senator Garylord Nelson
in coast-to-coast rallies supporting environmental causes from cleaning up polluting factories and toxic dumps to preserving wildlife and natural habitats. At the time, Earth Day was a purely American celebration, and led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, as well as passage of the Clean Air, Clean Water and Endangered Species Acts.
Twenty years later, Earth Day went global, involving 200 million people in 141 countries, and greatly boosting worldwide recycling efforts. This celebration also paved the way for the United Nations Earth Summit, held in Rio De Janeiro, Brazil in 1992.
In 1995, then-President Bill Clinton awarded Senator Nelson the Presidential Medal Of Freedom – the highest civilian honor awarded in the US – for his part in the creation of Earth Day.
The year 2010 marked another major milestone for Earth Day. This 40th anniversary marked the beginning of a new initiative, dubbed A Billion Acts Of Green ©, in which people and groups committed to performing environmental service actions, with a goal of performing 1 billion such acts before the United Nations Conference On Sustainable Development takes place in Rio De Janiero in June of 2012. The Earth Day Network recently announced that they are more than halfway to that goal.
This year’s theme, “Mobilize The Earth” is designed to get more people than ever involved worldwide, and to promote more environmental service actions in pursuit of the Billion Acts Of Green © goal.
To learn more or get involved, please visit the Earth Day Network’s website at http://www.earthday.org/.
