Transcript Environmental History of the US: Some Important Thinkers

Environmental History of the US:
Some Important Thinkers
From Frontier Worldview to the Environmental Movement
Names to Know:
Henry David Thoreau
John Muir
Theodore Roosevelt
Rachel Carson
Aldo Leopold
The Frontier Era (1607-1890)
• Frontier Environmental Worldview:
– Vast & “Inexhaustible” Resources
– Hostile, Dangerous Wilderness to Be
Conquered
• 1890 – Frontier “Closed” – no longer a
line where the population density was less
than 2 people per square mile
American Bison/American Buffalo – hunted almost to extinction during the 1800’s.
Early Alarms (1832-1870)
• Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862)
– Concerned with Species Loss in E. Massachusetts.
– Life in the Woods (1854)
• George Perkins Marsh (1801-1882)
– Scientist, Member of Congress from Vt.
– Man and Nature (1864) – deforestation ->
desertification, Earth will look like the moon.
– Used Science, Case Studies (Mediterranean)
– Need for Resource Conservation
Government and Citizen
Involvement (1870-1930)
• Forest Reserve Act, 1891
– Fed Gov’t Responsible for Protecting Public Lands
(Harrison, Cleveland, McKinley) – Forest Lands
• John Muir (1838-1914)
– Founded Sierra Club
– Forest Preservation
– Yosemite (1890) and Sequoia National Park, Muir
Woods
– Proposed National Park System
Government and Citizen
Involvement (1870-1930)
• Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919)
– President 1901-1909
– Gained Power to Designate Public Lands as Wildlife
Refuges.
– Tripled Size of National Forest Reserves.
– 1905: US Forest Service (193 mil acres forests and
grasslands)
– 1906: Antiquities (ruins and artifacts)
– Act -> Grand Canyon (protect public lands from
destruction, excavation, etc)
– Later:
– 1916: National Park Service (manages all parks,
monuments and historical properties)
Great Depression and War (1930-1960)
• Franklin D. Roosevelt
– Land Purchases From Private Owners
– Jobs Programs 1930s
– Civilian Conservation Corps (1933)
• Unemployed work planting trees
• Developing/maintaining parks
• Waterways, dams
Environmental Awakening (1960-1980)
• Rachel Carson (1907-1964)
– Biologist
– Sea Around Us, 1951
– Silent Spring, 1962
• Effects of Widespread DDT Use
– Beginning of Modern Environmental
Movement in US
Environmental Awakening (1960-1980)
• Wilderness Act (1964)
– Muir Idea
– Undeveloped Land to be Protected
• Earth Day April 20, 1970
• Environmental Protection Agency (1970)
• Endangered Species Act (1973)
– Protection for species and habitats
Environmental Awakening (1960-1980)
• Bureau of Land Management (1978)
–
–
–
–
Restricts Uses of Public Land
Maintain health, diversity and productivity
Creates Friction (regulations of use, population growth)
Push Back – Wise Use Movement (1988) (more private, less
government control)
• Department of Energy (1977)
– Develop Long Range Energy Strategy
• Superfund (1980)
– Task of Cleaning Up Abandoned Waste Sites
Recent Past
• Less Large Scale (really? 2010) Big Idea
Activities
• Kyoto Protocol (1997)
– Objective to Slow Global Warming
– US Withdraws 2001
Aldo Leopold (1887-1948)
• Professor
• Sand County Almanac (1949)
• Land Ethics, Environmental Ethics,
Nature and Wildlife Preservation
All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that
the individual is a member of a community of
interdependent parts.
That land is a community is the basic concept of ecology,
but that land is to be loved and respected is an extension
of ethics.
The land ethic changes the role of Homo Sapiens from
conqueror of the land-community to plain member and
citizen of it.
We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity
belonging to us. When we see land as a commodity to
which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and
respect.
Anything is right when it tends to preserve the integrity,
stability, and beauty of the biotic community.
It is wrong when it tends otherwise.