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16 EPA J. 8 (1990)
The Spirit of the First Earth Day

handle is hein.journals/epajrnl16 and id is 9 raw text is: The Spirit of the First Earth Day by Jack Lewis April 22, 1970, a Wednesday, was a glorious spring day in most parts of the country. n the waning months of the 1960s, environmental problems were proliferating like a many-headed hydra, a monster no one could understand let alone tame or slay. Rampant air pollution was linked to disease and death in New York, Los Angeles, and elsewhere as noxious fumes, spewed out by cars and factories, made city life less and less bearable. In the wake of Rachel Carson's 1962 best-seller, Silent Spring, there was widespread concern over large-scale use of pesticides, often near densely populated communities. In addition, huge fish kills were reported on the Great Lakes, and the media carried the news that Lake Erie, one of America's largest bodies of fresh water, was in its death throes. Ohio had another jolt when Cleveland's Cuyahoga River, an artery inundated with oil and toxic chemicals, burst into flames by spontaneous combustion. In a response commensurate with the problem, an estimated 20 million Americans gathered together on April 22, 1970, to participate in a spectacularly well-publicized environmental demonstration known as Earth Day. The rallies, teach-ins, speeches, and publicity gambits almost all went smoothly, amid a heady and triumphant atmosphere that was further enhanced by perfect spring weather. But the months leading up to Earth Day had been frantic, and the success of the event had been unpredictable up to the very last moment. Such uncertainty is endemic when volunteer effort is the driving force behind any activity, let alone one as ambitious as Earth Day 1970. Some of the grassroots activists who coordinated the work of thousands of Earth Day volunteers had come to the environmental cause rather late, after (Lewis is an Assistant Editor of EPA Journal.) cutting their teeth on other political issues of the 1960s, such as civil rights and the anti-war movement. Others, however, had been intensely involved in environmental causes for many years. Whatever their background, these activists were the driving force not only behind Earth Day, but also behind many smaller and less publicized environmental reforms during the closing months of the 1960s. The term Breathers' Lobby was coined by the Wall Street Journal in the late 1960s to denote one of the most prominent components of the grassroots movement: the congeries of anti-air pollution groups that had sprung up over the previous decade in urban areas across the country. GASP in Los Angeles and Pittsburgh, the Metropolitan Washington Coalition on Clean Air, the Delaware Clean Air Coalition, and other similar groups started with sweat equity, then qualified for grants and technical assistance from the federal government. Groups focusing on water-quality issues were also making dramatic inroads: most notably, the Lake Michigan Federation, and Get Oil Out in Santa Barbara, California. The anti-pollution stance of these groups, after changing the climate of political opinion at the state and local level, quickly permeated editorials and editorial cartoons featured in the nation's leading newspapers. Even Broadway picked up the environmental theme when the smash-hit musical Hair lampooned air pollution with a hilarious song called The Air, which ended in a choking chorus of coughs. Readers were sampling a range of provocative books on the environment: The Whole Earth Catalogue, John Sax's The Environmental Bill of Rights, Paul Ehrlich's The Population Bomb, and Charles Reich's The Greening of America. Students tuned into the counterculture were picking up environmental messages from rock lyrics. EPA JOURNAL

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