Give Earth A Chance: Environmental Activism in Michigan

Abstract

In March 1970, students in Environmental Action for Survival (ENACT) organized a four-day environmental teach-in at the University of Michigan, the precursor of the national Earth Day demonstration that mobilized twenty million participants on April 22, 1970. "Give Earth a Chance" explores these pivotal events from the perspectives of the ENACT activists at the University of Michigan and their counterparts in Environmental Action, the national committee that coordinated the first Earth Day. The exhibit traces the origins of the environmental movement in the state of Michigan and in modern America and then focuses in depth on the ways that activist groups and policymakers responded to the "ecological crisis" during the late 1960s and early 1970s. "Give Earth a Chance" tells the stories behind major environmental breakthroughs in Michigan, including the establishment of the Pictured Rocks and Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshores, the enactment of the landmark Michigan Environmental Protection Act of 1970, and the formation of the Ecology Center in Ann Arbor. The exhibit also investigates the volatile political conflicts over air and water pollution, toxic chemicals, and nuclear power at the state and national levels as environmental organizations launched campaigns to save the Great Lakes, reduce automobile emissions and industrial contamination, fight for environmental justice, and limit environmental degradation by government, corporations and consumers.