I was in college working on my Master’s Degree in Geography during the first Earth Day. My courses encompassed much of the idea for the awareness of what was happening to destroy life on Earth. My studies were really in infancy

            I do remember one scientist saying we need not worry about running out of fish to eat because the oceans were full of fish. Of course the world population was only three billion and it is now over eight billion. Many of those species are now endangered. One huge change is our appliances, toys, and other items have become disposable so we have mountains of trash. In order to manufacture those disposable products we have dug holes that can be seen from the space station and burned fossil fuels.

            A river in Detroit was so polluted it often caught fire. It and many other rivers in America are now recreational because we no longer dump raw sewage and industrial waste into them. Now we dump invisible plastic particles and drugs into them. One reason crop yields have increased is the greater amounts of fertilizers which wash off into ditches, creeks, rivers, and finally into the oceans causing millions of acres of dead zones. Let us not forget the millions of acres of plastic islands in the world’s oceans.

            We have made many advances. The air was so bad south of Lake Michigan we rolled up the windows in our 1972 Cutlass and held our breath when driving across the area. Today the air is finally clear and clean. Lake Erie has little algae sludge anymore Acid rain is almost gone allowing Northeastern forests to revive.

            With all the advances, millions of Americans can’t see the future of life as we know it is at risk. Unless we make major changes in reducing carbon dioxide and methane gas, our days are numbered!