BoomerZoo Almanac for April 22-28, 2007: Earth Day
It was during this week in 1970 that the Boomer generation generated the first Earth Day and, according to Wikipedia, about 20 million people participated, not all of them hippies. Nowadays more than 500 million people and national governments in 175 countries set aside April 22 as Earth Day, though I suspect it won’t get the boost it really needs until some exceptional sporting or sales events are associated with it.
Arbor Day is also celebrated on this day and Earth Day may just be its more famous younger sibling. That national tree-planting day, which originated in 1872, is a state holiday in Nebraska, generally celebrated the last Friday in April—meaning, I’m guessing, that anyone with a government job gets another three-day weekend. I do believe that’s one of the two biggest reasons we observe most holidays in the U.S.–the other, of course, is the opportunity to spend more hours shopping for holiday bargains. The Romans also celebrated a kind of earth day called Floralia, in honor of the flower goddess Flora. The holiday became official in 238 BC, when a temple honoring Flora was opened near the Circus Maximus in Rome. What do you think? Was it or was it not a shopping temple? Interestingly, we almost had an In Memoriam moment for our planet shortly after Earth Day in 1986, when an explosion and fire at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, at that time part of the Soviet Union. The radiation released killed at least 31 people immediately. The Soviets tried to pretend nothing happened, but Ukraine is actually in Europe, and the Europeans noticed. It took a couple days, but eventually the Soviets said, “Oops! Sorry about that.” The long-term costs of this disaster are still being calculated. (http://todayspictures.slate.com/inmotion/essay_chernobyl/) On the good news side of the Earth Day week was the 2001 trip taken by California businessman Denis Tito, the first space tourist. When asked about the wonder of viewing the earth from outer space, he said: “I’m not really a space tourist, I’m an independent researcher.” Somehow, not quite as inspiring as “One small step for mankind…” If you want to start planning for next year’s Earth Day, here’s a good starting place: http://www.earthday.org/
