On Wednesday, April 22, Earth Day will mark its 45th anniversary. While many environmental issues remain high profile and controversial the environmental movement has seen many victories over the last four-and-a-half decades.
The first Earth Day, on April 22, 1970 saw 20 million Americans take to the streets to demand better environmental protections. Hundreds of communities across the country were involved, in addition to 2,000 universities and 10,000 primary and secondary schools. Since that time it has grown into an international movement, organized by the Earth Day Network and celebrated in 192 countries.
The mastermind behind the birth of the holiday was Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson, who had observed the rise of the anti-war movement against American Involvement in Vietnam. Nelson wondered if the same formula and tactics could be used to move the environmental movement into the mainstream.
“I was satisfied that if we could tap into the environmental concerns of the public and infuse the student anti-war energy into the environmental cause, we could generate a demonstration that would force this issue onto the national political agenda,” Nelson later recalled according to MSNBC.
While many Americans had noticed and had grown concerned about pollution, the movement for reform was boosted by a report on pollution in the Cuyahoga River, which had caught fire because of oil and other pollution in the water. At the same time the smog crisis in American cities had reached critical proportions, with the Los Angeles Times claiming that breathing the air was the same as smoking two packs of cigarettes a day.
According to the New York Times however the “ecological shot heard round the world” was the explosion of an oil rig off Santa Barbara California which covered many of the states best beaches in crude.
Within five years of the first Earth Day, the United States saw the passage of the National Environmental Protection Act and the creation of the Environmental Protection Act. The Clean Air Act, the Endangered Species Act, the Clean Water Act and the Occupational Safety and Health Act were also passed and signed by President Richard Nixon who was considered a conservative by the standards of the time.
Over the last 45 years, environmental issues, including climate change, ocean pollution and endangered species remain hot button topics in the national and international debate. However, Earth Day and the environmental movement have made environmental issues and sustainability a daily part of the conversation at every level of government.
For its 45th anniversary, the Earth Day Network has been staging events all month. According to a statement, more than 1 billion people in 192 countries are expected to participate in events this year.
On April 18, a free concert hosted by will.i.am featuring No Doubt with Gwen Stefani, Mary J. Blige, Usher, My Morning Jacket, Train, Fall Out Boy, Common and Train near the Washington Monument drew an estimated 300,000 people.
A climate change edition of Angry Birds has also racked up an estimated 2.8 billion downloads.
Among the other events and ongoing campaigns being promoted are Green Cities, which calls on cities to o 100 percent renewble but 2050; Climate Education Week for K-12 students which runs April 18-25; MubilizeU, a campaign for higher education institutions; The Canopy Project which aims to plant 10 million trees and a Billion Acts of Green which encourages citizens to take small Earth-friendly actions.
Information about local events can be found at Earthday.org.
