Taking Action

Heeding environmentalists, Washington comes through for wilderness, clean air and water, and endangered species.

By Frank Graham Jr.

Previous: New Risks	Next: Return to the Wild

1960-1969
1960 Alexander "Sandy" Sprunt, the Audubon Society's research director, begins the Continental Bald Eagle Project, which charts the numbers, reproductive results, and sharp decline of that species as DDT spreads through ecosystems. 1961 John Vosburgh becomes editor of Audubon Magazine and changes its name to just plain Audubon. The pollution of shellfish beds around Raritan Bay is blamed for a hepatitis outbreak among 1,000 New Jersey residents. Observers say oil refineries impart to shellfish a distinct taste of kerosene, while human waste makes them "fat as butter." Among new conservation organizations founded this year are the World Wildlife Fund-U.S. and the Society of Tympanuchus Cupido Pinnatus, dedicated to the preservation of the prairie chicken. 1962 Rachel Carson's Silent Spring is published, to great public acclaim and chemical-industry brickbats. Congress amends the Bald Eagle Protection Act of 1940 to give similar protection to the golden eagle. The impetus for the revision is that golden eagles look like immature bald eagles, the national bird. 1963 A massive fish and wildlife kill occurs in the lower Mississippi River. "The bodies of turtles floated on the waters," The New Republic reports. "Tough 150-pound garfish and catfish weighing 70 pounds surfaced too weak to move. Crabs lay along the banks. Thousands of cranes and robins lay dead." Laboratory tests of some of the estimated 5 million dead fish implicate endrin, an insecticide related to DDT. 1964 After eight years of heated debate and 66 versions, the Wilderness Act finally passes. It amounts to a directive from Congress that federal agencies resist political pressure and save magnificent wild areas from cutting, mining, and other intrusions. The long campaign's "spiritual leader," Howard Zahniser of the Wilderness Society, dies three months before the bill's passage.	1965 Congress approves the Garrison Diversion Project, a colossal billion-dollar-plus irrigation scheme mandating 3,000 miles of canals, pipelines, drains, and reservoirs for the benefit of a few hundred North Dakota farmers. Taxpayers protest that it will cost at least $700,000 for every beneficiary. The National Audubon Society will spend the rest of the century fighting the project in its various guises. 1966 Les Line becomes editor of Audubon and directs a makeover that will soon prompt The New York Times to call it "the most beautiful magazine in the world." Thanks to the revamped magazine and to a new group of benefactors, membership jumps from 36,000 in 1965 to 60,000 in 1968. 1967 The Environmental Defense Fund is founded on New York's Long Island to stop the use of DDT. Audubon and EDF officials call for a nationwide ban on the chemical. Carl Buchheister retires as president of Audubon, and Charles H. Callison is appointed interim chief executive officer. 1968 Elvis J. Stahr, secretary of the army during the Kennedy administration and a former president of the University of Indiana, is named president of Audubon. He uses contacts in Congress and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to kill plans for a dam and reservoir in Kentucky's splendid Red River Gorge. Congress passes the National Wild and Scenic Rivers Act and the National Trails Act. 1969 A mammoth oil-well blowout in the Santa Barbara Channel, off California, focuses attention on the threats from oil installations and tankers. Residential development in dry regions of the West taps scarce water supplies, which prompts the founding of the Desert Fishes Council.
1970-1979
1970 Earth Day, the brainchild of Wisconsin's senator Gaylord Nelson, is celebrated on April 22 by 20 million Americans. The radical right detects a conspiracy, pointing out that the date coincides with Lenin's birthday. But fervor for a clean environment builds. President Richard M. Nixon establishes the Council on Environmental Quality, and Congress passes the Clean Air Act and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). 1971 The Murie Audubon Society in Casper, Wyoming, makes headlines across the country when members discover a graveyard of illegally poisoned eagles. In response, Congress tightens eagle-protection legislation. New York governor Nelson Rockefeller signs into law the Adirondack Park Agency Act, which -- for the first time -- gives a measure of protection to private lands within the park's boundaries. 1972 A campaign by the Environmental Defense Fund and the National Audubon Society ends in victory when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency bans the discredited insecticide DDT. 1973 Congress passes the Endangered Species Act. Arab countries proclaim an embargo on oil, causing widespread fuel shortages. Audubon biologist Stephen W. Kress starts an experimental project to return the Atlantic puffin, long extirpated from the area, to an island in Maine. 1974 The slaughter of the great whales continues, and the National Audubon Society announces its first boycott, singling out products from the two largest whaling nations, Japan and the Soviet Union. The magazine is especially hard hit by the three-year boycott, losing lucrative ads for Japanese binoculars and cameras. The Worldwatch Institute is founded in Washington, D.C., to identify and analyze emerging global problems for national leaders and the public.	1975 The winter roosts of blackbirds take a hit. The U.S. Army claims they spread diseases to humans and announces plans to destroy the big nightly congregations near military bases in Kentucky and Tennessee. Bird lovers protest the attacks, carried out with streams of detergent that rob feathers of their insulating properties and cause the birds to freeze on chilly nights. But the courts, and later Congress, uphold the army's right to strike. 1976 Audubon president Elvis Stahr leads a successful drive to relax IRS restrictions on lobbying activities by nonprofit organizations. Now environmentalists can lobby legislators on comparatively even terms with Big Business. Audubon earns the National Magazine Award for Excellence in Reporting, for a March 1975 article about an irrigation project in North Dakota. 1977 Investigators determine that the Love Canal neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York, is perched atop a large toxic-waste dump, setting the stage for the evacuation of its residents. Oil from the North Slope of Alaska begins flowing through a pipeline to the port of Valdez. Audubon wins another National Magazine Award for reporting, this time for a January 1976 piece on a toxic chemical in the food system. 1978 As Elvis Stahr prepares to step down as the Audubon Society's president, he reports that in 10 years the society has grown from 88,000 to 388,000 members. Its net worth has doubled to more than $18.5 million, despite a surge in annual operating expenses, from $2.5 million to $10.1 million. 1979 An accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania sours Americans on nuclear energy. Russell W. Peterson -- a birdwatcher and former Delaware governor -- succeeds Elvis Stahr as Audubon president. Audubon wins the National Magazine Award for Visual Excellence.

1960-1969

1960

Alexander "Sandy" Sprunt, the Audubon Society's research director, begins the Continental Bald Eagle Project, which charts the numbers, reproductive results, and sharp decline of that species as DDT spreads through ecosystems.

1961

John Vosburgh becomes editor of Audubon Magazine and changes its name to just plain Audubon. The pollution of shellfish beds around Raritan Bay is blamed for a hepatitis outbreak among 1,000 New Jersey residents. Observers say oil refineries impart to shellfish a distinct taste of kerosene, while human waste makes them "fat as butter." Among new conservation organizations founded this year are the World Wildlife Fund-U.S. and the Society of Tympanuchus Cupido Pinnatus, dedicated to the preservation of the prairie chicken.

1962

Rachel Carson's Silent Spring is published, to great public acclaim and chemical-industry brickbats. Congress amends the Bald Eagle Protection Act of 1940 to give similar protection to the golden eagle. The impetus for the revision is that golden eagles look like immature bald eagles, the national bird.

1963

A massive fish and wildlife kill occurs in the lower Mississippi River. "The bodies of turtles floated on the waters," The New Republic reports. "Tough 150-pound garfish and catfish weighing 70 pounds surfaced too weak to move. Crabs lay along the banks. Thousands of cranes and robins lay dead." Laboratory tests of some of the estimated 5 million dead fish implicate endrin, an insecticide related to DDT.

1964

After eight years of heated debate and 66 versions, the Wilderness Act finally passes. It amounts to a directive from Congress that federal agencies resist political pressure and save magnificent wild areas from cutting, mining, and other intrusions. The long campaign's "spiritual leader," Howard Zahniser of the Wilderness Society, dies three months before the bill's passage.

1965

Congress approves the Garrison Diversion Project, a colossal billion-dollar-plus irrigation scheme mandating 3,000 miles of canals, pipelines, drains, and reservoirs for the benefit of a few hundred North Dakota farmers. Taxpayers protest that it will cost at least $700,000 for every beneficiary. The National Audubon Society will spend the rest of the century fighting the project in its various guises.

1966

Les Line becomes editor of Audubon and directs a makeover that will soon prompt The New York Times to call it "the most beautiful magazine in the world." Thanks to the revamped magazine and to a new group of benefactors, membership jumps from 36,000 in 1965 to 60,000 in 1968.

1967

The Environmental Defense Fund is founded on New York's Long Island to stop the use of DDT. Audubon and EDF officials call for a nationwide ban on the chemical. Carl Buchheister retires as president of Audubon, and Charles H. Callison is appointed interim chief executive officer.

1968

Elvis J. Stahr, secretary of the army during the Kennedy administration and a former president of the University of Indiana, is named president of Audubon. He uses contacts in Congress and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to kill plans for a dam and reservoir in Kentucky's splendid Red River Gorge. Congress passes the National Wild and Scenic Rivers Act and the National Trails Act.

1969

A mammoth oil-well blowout in the Santa Barbara Channel, off California, focuses attention on the threats from oil installations and tankers. Residential development in dry regions of the West taps scarce water supplies, which prompts the founding of the Desert Fishes Council.

1970-1979

1970

Earth Day, the brainchild of Wisconsin's senator Gaylord Nelson, is celebrated on April 22 by 20 million Americans. The radical right detects a conspiracy, pointing out that the date coincides with Lenin's birthday. But fervor for a clean environment builds. President Richard M. Nixon establishes the Council on Environmental Quality, and Congress passes the Clean Air Act and the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA).

1971

The Murie Audubon Society in Casper, Wyoming, makes headlines across the country when members discover a graveyard of illegally poisoned eagles. In response, Congress tightens eagle-protection legislation. New York governor Nelson Rockefeller signs into law the Adirondack Park Agency Act, which -- for the first time -- gives a measure of protection to private lands within the park's boundaries.

1972

A campaign by the Environmental Defense Fund and the National Audubon Society ends in victory when the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency bans the discredited insecticide DDT.

1973

Congress passes the Endangered Species Act. Arab countries proclaim an embargo on oil, causing widespread fuel shortages. Audubon biologist Stephen W. Kress starts an experimental project to return the Atlantic puffin, long extirpated from the area, to an island in Maine.

1974

The slaughter of the great whales continues, and the National Audubon Society announces its first boycott, singling out products from the two largest whaling nations, Japan and the Soviet Union. The magazine is especially hard hit by the three-year boycott, losing lucrative ads for Japanese binoculars and cameras. The Worldwatch Institute is founded in Washington, D.C., to identify and analyze emerging global problems for national leaders and the public.

1975

The winter roosts of blackbirds take a hit. The U.S. Army claims they spread diseases to humans and announces plans to destroy the big nightly congregations near military bases in Kentucky and Tennessee. Bird lovers protest the attacks, carried out with streams of detergent that rob feathers of their insulating properties and cause the birds to freeze on chilly nights. But the courts, and later Congress, uphold the army's right to strike.

1976

Audubon president Elvis Stahr leads a successful drive to relax IRS restrictions on lobbying activities by nonprofit organizations. Now environmentalists can lobby legislators on comparatively even terms with Big Business. Audubon earns the National Magazine Award for Excellence in Reporting, for a March 1975 article about an irrigation project in North Dakota.

1977

Investigators determine that the Love Canal neighborhood in Niagara Falls, New York, is perched atop a large toxic-waste dump, setting the stage for the evacuation of its residents. Oil from the North Slope of Alaska begins flowing through a pipeline to the port of Valdez. Audubon wins another National Magazine Award for reporting, this time for a January 1976 piece on a toxic chemical in the food system.

1978

As Elvis Stahr prepares to step down as the Audubon Society's president, he reports that in 10 years the society has grown from 88,000 to 388,000 members. Its net worth has doubled to more than $18.5 million, despite a surge in annual operating expenses, from $2.5 million to $10.1 million.

1979

An accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania sours Americans on nuclear energy. Russell W. Peterson -- a birdwatcher and former Delaware governor -- succeeds Elvis Stahr as Audubon president. Audubon wins the National Magazine Award for Visual Excellence.

Previous: New Risks	Next: Return to the Wild