Every year on April 22, a multitude of people make resolutions to help their blessed environment. Little children make paper trees in class, older students write articles for their class newspapers, and every year, somewhere, someone plants a new tree to enrich the soil with new life.

Earth Day. The very words bring to mind lush forests, green life, and solemn respect to the thousands of acres of deforestation occurring each year. But how did the holiday start? Who was the one to decide, “Hey, we should make a holiday for the earth. After all, it’s the least we can do after destroying so much of it”?

The idea for the holiday actually began in 1962, developing over a period of seven years. Senator Gaylord Nelson of Wisconsin, who was deeply concerned about the decreasing health of the earth, attempted to persuade President Kennedy to go on a national conservation tour. The President liked the idea, and thus went on the tour. That was only the seed of the concept that would grow to be Earth Day.

Six years of trying and failing to convince politicians to take the issue into consideration passed before the idea of Earth Day occurred to Nelson. It was the summer of 1969. “Teach-ins” spread among college campuses everywhere to convince the general public against the Vietnam War. If people could hold demonstrations about a war, why couldn’t they hold protests against what was happening to the environment?

A conference was held in on September 1969 in Seattle, where Senator Nelson announced that in the spring of the next year there would be a nationwide grassroots demonstration to highlight the issues of environmental abuse. This at last gave Americans the opportunity to express opinions with fervent concern. A rising care for the earth swept among the nation, and it seemed that they were heading for great success on Earth Day.

And they were. The first Earth Day was held on April 22, 1970, and now, more than thirty years later, the legacy continues, touching the hearts and minds of an entire nation.