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Silent Spring By Rachel Carson

Better Essays

With the 1960s came a need for change, as an immense amount of smog and toxic chemicals used in agriculture and industry caused, the blue to fade away from the sky and water in America. Rachel Carson provided the catalyst for this change with her book Silent Spring published in 1962, which revealed the harmful impacts of pesticides on almost all wildlife and human beings. People reading a book wouldn’t be enough, though, for twenty million Americans came together on April 22, 1970, to celebrate the beauty of Earth and raise awareness about increasing concerns for the environment and declining quality of life. (maybe add a sentence about structure and diversity of the movement) Without these key events leading to the Environmental Movement’s diversity and unique structure through the 1970s, American values in politics and way of life would not have been able to change. Rachel Carson played a pivotal role in shaping the Environmental Movement and American culture because of her honest, direct disclosure of the matters at hand. Although Carson was not the first person to make these scientific discoveries, she was able to radically change the way millions of Americans perceived the environment and the dangers of toxic chemicals to themselves through vivid, articulate, yet easily understandable language. For instance, in her chapter titled “Elixirs of Death,” she says “For these chemicals are now stored in the bodies of the vast majority of human beings, regardless of age. They

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