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NOTEWORTHY EVENTS FROM THE “ERA OF ACTIVISM” 1960 - 1975
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Publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring
The book is widely credited with helping launch the environmental movement.[2] The New Yorker started serializing Silent Spring in June 1962, and it was published in book form (with illustrations by Lois and Louis Darling) by Houghton Mifflin later that year. When the book Silent Spring was published, Rachel Carson was already a well-known writer on natural history, but had not previously been a social critic. The book was widely read—especially after its selection by the Book-of-the-Month Club -
The EPA is established
When the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency formed some fifteen years ago, America had just awakened to the seriousness of its environmental pollution problem. Creation of EPA was part of the response to growing public concern and a grass roots movement to "do something" about the deteriorating conditions of water, air, and land. -
• Congress passes the Clean Air Act
In 1955, after many state and local governments had passed legislation dealing with air pollution, the federal government decided that this problem needed to be dealt with on a national level. This was the year Congress passed the Air Pollution Control Act of 1955, the nation's first piece of federal legislation on this issue. The language of the bill identified air pollution as a national problem and announced that research and additional steps to improve the situation needed to be taken. It wa -
Publication of Betty Friedan’s Feminine Mystique
published February 19, 1963,[1] by W.W. Norton and Co., is a nonfiction book written by Betty Friedan. It is widely credited with sparking the beginning of second-wave feminism in the United States. -
Publication of Ralph Nader’s Unsafe at Any Speed
Unsafe at Any Speed: The Designed-In Dangers of the American Automobile by Ralph Nader, published in 1965, is a book detailing resistance by car manufacturers to the introduction of safety features, like seat belts, and their general reluctance to spend money on improving safety. It was a pioneering work, openly polemical but containing substantial references and material from industry insiders. It made Nader a household name. -
NOW is founded
The National Organization of Women was founded by Betty Friedan, who became its first president. Thus, the modern women's movement was launched. -
UFW’s Nationwide Boycott of grapes picked on nonunion farms
The UFW's first target was the grape growers of California. Chávez, like Martin Luther King, Jr., believed in nonviolent action. In 1967, when growers refused to grant more pay, better working conditions, and union recognition, Chávez organized a successful nationwide consumer boycott of grapes picked on nonunion farms. Later boycotts of lettuce and other crops also won consumer support across the country -
Woodstock
Woodstock Music & Art Fair (informally, Woodstock or The Woodstock Festival) was a music festival, billed as "An Aquarian Exposition: 3 Days of Peace & Music". It was held at Max Yasgur's 600-acre (2.4 km²; 240 ha, 0.94 mi²) dairy farm near the hamlet of White Lake in the town of Bethel, New York, from August 15 to August 18, 1969. Bethel, in Sullivan County, is 43 miles (69 km) southwest of the town of Woodstock, New York, in adjoining Ulster County. -
Protesters from the AIM take over the reservation at Wounded Knee
is a Native American activist organization in the United States. In October 1973 the American Indian Movement gathered its forces from across the country onto the Trail of Broken Treaties, championing Indian unity. The national AIM agenda focused on spirituality, leadership, and sovereignty. Thousands of volunteers emerged from reservations and cities alike, responding to the call within themselves that the time had come to take a stand against centuries of mismanaged U.S. government trust. Stud -
First Earth Day celebration
is a day that is intended to inspire awareness and appreciation for the Earth's natural environment. Earth Day was founded by United States Senator Gaylord Nelson as an environmental teach-in first held on April 22, 1970. -
Supreme Court rules to legalize abortion in the Roe v. Wade case
was a landmark, controversial decision by the United States Supreme Court on the issue of abortion. The Court decided that a right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution extends to a woman's decision to have an abortion, but that right must be balanced against the state's two legitimate interests for regulating abortions: protecting prenatal life and protecting the mother's health. Saying that these state interests become stronger o
