…Having actually celebrated the first one in 1970!

Today, April 22, 2009, is the 39th annual Earth Day. It conjures up many thoughts, and concerns, in my mind … just as it did in 1970, yet with a much greater sense of urgency.

Next April will be the 40th anniversary. Most importantly, between now and then, will be the December 2009 international negotiations meeting in Denmark to substantively address global climate change. The clock is still ticking, and this important meeting may be our last best chance to substantively do something lasting about the environmental threats to our planet. There is something each of us can do to help insure the success of that summit meeting … more about that later.

The good news is that the U.S. population, in large part, is finally accepting the fact that human activity is truly trashing the fragile balance of life on our planet. The not-so-good news is that there was enough scientific evidence available upon which to get the word out to all Americans via the first Earth Day in April of 1970 … yet it was at that time, and remained so for over three decades, largely ignored by the average citizen, and more importantly, most of the country's legislators, policy makers and business leaders.

The early environmentalists of the '60s and '70s (and I count myself as one of them) were seen simply as irritants who were prone to "crying wolf" about the growing problems caused by human disregard for our impact on the land, air and water around us. Our ever-increasing fossil fuel-dependent "progress" as a species continues to be the major culprit, but certainly not the only one.

The growing problems seemed pretty clear to me in the spring of 1970, so I decided to do something about it. I was in my second year of teaching high school biology and middle school life science and coaching the high school baseball team in the small western Minnesota town of Madison (before the U.S. Army cut short my teaching career with an offer that I really, really, could not refuse). It was, and I'm sure still is, a small Scandinavian farming community near the South Dakota border.

I had been quite active in the school drumming up interest in, and understanding the goals of, the upcoming first ever Earth Day, especially with my biology and life science students. We planned an "awareness" ceremony before classes began on Earth Day, April 22. It was to be held in the outside courtyard in the middle of the school building.

I remember the names of but a handful of students that I had in my classes in Madison. One that I do remember is that of Kitt Hanson, a bright and enthusiastic seventh grader who was as charming as her name. Her mother was a single mom who worked as a waitress in a small restaurant in town. There was no question in my mind from whom Kitt had inherited her many positive attributes. Mrs. Hanson was one of the few parents who really "got it" when their sons and daughters came home and talked up this new environmental stuff.

Among Mrs. Hanson's many talents was that of a skilled seamstress. I had been using pictures of an "Ecology Flag" in the run-up to our Earth Day ceremony. A couple of days beforehand, she came to my biology classroom before the start of the school day to show me something. Kitt was beaming as her mother opened a box and pulled out a beautifully stitched, full size Ecology Flag. We raised it on the courtyard flagpole where it flew all day beneath the stars and stripes.

My guess is that few, if any, of you have any idea what an ecology flag looks like. They haven't been seen on many flag poles since the early 70s. And on Earth Day, a year later, an official "Earth Day Flag" was introduced that is still used today to help bring attention to the Earth Day message. It features the iconic image of our blue planet as photographed by the first astronauts who walked on the moon in July 1969. Nice flag, but not yet in existence as we prepared for our April 22, 1970 event.

The Ecology Flag, as shown with this column, was created in 1969. I had a decal of the flag in the back window of my '67 Volkswagen for a number of years. The stripes are green and white, and the yellow Greek omega symbol on a green background is actually a combination of the letters e and o, representing "environment" and "organism."

In the 60s, the term "ecology" was not the household term it is today. It was a relatively new and emerging field of study. In fact, I recall having to look up its definition before registering for the Introduction to Ecology course as an undergraduate in the mid-60s … and I was a biology major! It is defined as the subspecialty of biology that deals with the relationships and interactions between organisms and their environment… which, of course, includes other organisms.

Insofar as Earth Day itself is concerned, it was the brainchild of Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin. He was certainly well ahead of his time in terms of environmentally enlightened thinking with respect to the politicians of his day…and unfortunately, his environmental awareness in the sixties is still well ahead of many of politicians in the 21st century. Thank goodness our new president plans to make environmental and health-related decisions based on science rather than politics.

Senator Nelson had been speaking to many groups about environmental issues since the early 60s. In 1969, the idea for an "Earth Day" came to him. He was inspired by the "teach-ins" that were happening on college campuses across the country. They were primarily anti-Vietnam War demonstrations and they were becoming very effective.

The senator felt that if the new, yet growing, environmental concerns of the general public could be infused with the student anti-war energy, a large demonstration could be generated that would force this issue onto the political agenda. That it did, but it has been a very slow rolling momentum that has only recently gained much steam, thanks to general apathy and indifference, and the opposition of many self-serving and powerful special interests in Washington, D.C., and the state capitols.

It is very easy not to fully appreciate the environmental degradation that is going on worldwide when you live in a sparsely populated and relatively healthy environment (so far) like our own western Maine mountains. Yet, if one is willing to look at the sound, peer-reviewed scientific evidence that is accumulating almost as fast as the environmental threats, it is easy to see that we are running out of time. This is not "crying wolf"… this is scientific evidence.

There have been many impressive individuals who contributed to our understanding of, and appreciation for, our natural environment. Certainly New England's own Henry Thoreau is among the first. John Muir is another —a Midwesterner who eventually found himself in the High Sierras of California and fought hard to protect its environment over a hundred years ago. Among other things, he founded the Sierra Club, an organization that has often stood alone in the fight against environmental threats. Perhaps it was seeing and appreciating what inspired Muir that has led to my four backpacking trips in those majestic mountains. I hope someday there will be another to follow my most recent three years ago this summer.

Today, among others, we have author John McKibbon who has made environmental science and the global threats understandable to most. He was among the first to explain "the greenhouse effect" in the early 90s. It is what we know as global warming today. I had the privilege to be among the crowd assembled about a month ago at the University of Maine, Farmington to hear him speak about the mounting environmental threats caused primarily by the global addiction to fossil fuels.

McKibbon, and others, have a plan whereby all of us can help make an impression on the world leaders who will assemble at the environmental summit in December. They are designating Oct. 24, as the International Day of Climate Action, whereby concerned citizens around the world will stand together as one planet to call for a fair global climate treaty in December. This will be accomplished by thousands of groups around the world carrying out an event, or "action" on that day to demonstrate the concerns of the earth's peoples about the urgency.

You will hear more from me in a later column about what we can do in this area to help send this global message. In the meantime, I ask you to go to the Web site www.350.org to learn more … and to learn the significance of the number 350 as it applies to the future wellbeing of our planet, its people, and yes… its economic future.

I will end this Earth Day column with a statement by the noted anthropologist Margaret Mead who said in 1977, at the age of 76:

"The Earth Flag (and Earth Day) are my symbols of the task before us all. Only in the last quarter of my life have we come to know what it means to be custodians of the future of the Earth… to know that unless we care, unless we check the rapacious exploitations of our Earth and protect it, we are endangering the future of our children and our children's children. We did not know this before, except in little pieces. People knew that they had to take care of their own… but it was not until we saw the picture of the Earth from the moon, that we realized how small and how helpless this planet is… something that we must hold in our arms and care for."

We need to write, otherwise nobody will know who we are. —Garrison Keillor

Per usual, your thoughts and comments are welcome. Write them down, and place them inside a first edition copy of Henry Thoreau's book "The Maine Woods," and place it gently inside the log door of our mudroom on the west shore of Gull Pond, or simply send an email to allenwicken@yahoo.com.