As I remember it, the word "environment" was not even used to describe "the environment" back then. Rachel Carson came out with her book in 1962 "Silent Spring", but it hardly changed most people's minds in the sixties. We were too busy guzzingly 25 cent a gallon gasoline, building parking lots (some people refer to these as freeways), and tearing out all of the mass transit systems. People smoked everywhere, we had our food scraps hualed away by a truck, we burned our trash in the back yard and bottles of any kind were thrown on the road (predeposits). The black soot from citrus smug pots in the winter required clothes to be re-washed. We had to drive halfway across our city to look up information for a school assignment at the "local" library. And, we drove to the drive-in for our cultural experience. Yes, I worked since I was in the third grade, but all of my friends did not work until they got out of high school. Would I want to go back...NOOO! Do I think people are doing everything they could be doing to be green now...NOOO! I only thing that has really changed is we now associate the word environment to "the environment". Something that has always bothered me about the inventor of the Diesel engine Rudolf Diesel. This engine was originally intended to run on a combination of fuels including coal dust and peanut oil. For some reason he suddenly disappeared and all Diesel engines were made to run on oil based products. The more progressive governments look to future renewable energy sources the more we go backward. Would you drive a car that runs on a renewable source like peanut oil?
