Earth Day turns 55

#MiddleburyCT #EarthDay #MiddleburyLandTrust

This image of a hand holding our planet Earth reminds us that we are responsible for its health. Join Middlebury’s Earth Day cleanup April 26 and help tidy up our little corner of the planet. (Pixabay photo)

By JANINE SULLIVAN–WILEY

This year marks the 55th anniversary of Earth Day, begun in 1970 and held worldwide on April 22 every year. But, as with many holidays (past president birthdays included), there is often an “observed day” for some events. For Middlebury, that will be on Saturday, April 26.

That Saturday includes another anniversary – the 20th year that Middlebury has held the annual town-wide and Greenway cleanup. The now disbanded Middlebury Women’s Club and the town’s Parks & Recreation department, which supplied gloves and bags, collaborated to begin the event in 2005. The town will again distribute gloves and garbage bags from the pavilion at Meadowview Park this April 26 from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. People can choose the section of Greenway, or park, or area of their own neighborhood to collect trash. The town will provide instructions for having the full bags picked up. Get details when you pick up your bags.

In another event that day, new for Middlebury this year, Janine Sullivan-Wiley will present a program on wildlife for children of all ages at 1 p.m. followed by a scavenger hunt, both at Lake Elise. She did this at Woodbury’s Earth Day last year and decided to “bring it home” to Middlebury this year. Children will see photos of and learn about a variety of local wildlife. The Scavenger Hunt will include sheets of plants, natural features and more to be found around the lake and include how to identify – and avoid – poison ivy that can be seen along that path.

Getting back to Earth Day itself, it may be hard to believe it now, but before 1970 and that first Earth Day, it was perfectly legal for factories to spew black, toxic smoke into the air, or dump toxins into our rivers and streams. There was no Environmental Protection Agency and no Clean Air Act or Clean Water Act.

It was, however, a time of anti-war protests with a sense that people could band together and change the way things were. Earth Day began as a “teach-in” at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and spread to the whole town. Its events spread over days and included celebrities such as Gordon Lightfoot and the cast of the musical, “Hair.”

Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin was involved, having been appalled by a giant oil spill in California. He recruited a young student activist, Denis Hayes, to help organize the students on college campuses, and then persuaded a Republican congressman, Pete McCloskey, to serve as his co-chair. Together they developed the idea for and planned that first Earth Day. It grew and resulted in 20 million Americans demonstrating in cities across the country.

The environmental movement was born! In December of 1970, Congress authorized the creation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Today, Earth Day is celebrated in over 192 countries and is an annual reminder of the value of maintaining the health of our planet.

For questions or comments, contact this writer at jswspotlight@gmail.com. You can visit the Middlebury Land Trust on Facebook or the website at middleburylandtrust.org to find plenty of great outdoor spaces to explore and information about upcoming events. Happy hiking!