{"id":7039929,"date":"2026-08-16T22:49:37","date_gmt":"2026-08-16T22:49:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peraltafinancing.com\/activist\/how-america-became-the-progenitor-of-environmentalism\/"},"modified":"2026-08-16T22:49:37","modified_gmt":"2026-08-16T22:49:37","slug":"how-america-became-the-progenitor-of-environmentalism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929","title":{"rendered":"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<div id=\"article-title-block_2bf5ca506a447576046f0a714e9b7103\" class=\"article-title \">\n<div class=\"article-title__container\">\n<div class=\"article-title__eyebrow\">\n                            <span class=\"article-title__labels\"><br \/>\n                                        <span class=\"article-title__label\"><br \/>\n                        <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/subject\/environment\/\">Environment<\/a><br \/>\n                    <\/span><br \/>\n                                                            <span class=\"article-title__label-divider\"> \/ <\/span><br \/>\n                                                            <span class=\"article-title__label\"><br \/>\n                                            <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/content\/feature\/\">Feature<\/a><br \/>\n                                        <\/span><br \/>\n                                    <\/span><br \/>\n                                    <span class=\"article-title__label-divider\"> \/ <\/span><br \/>\n                                                                            <span class=\"article-title__date\">June 29, 2026<\/span>\n                                    <\/div>\n<div class=\"acf-innerblocks-container\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-the-nation-dek article-title__dek\">\n<p>From Indigenous practices to the Green New Deal, our country has always focused on prioritizing our planet.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignwide size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1440\" height=\"907\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg\" alt=\"The Knife Edge trail, not far from the Maine\u2019s North Woods, which shaped Henry David Thoreau\u2019s ideas about nature.\" class=\"wp-image-598877\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg 1440w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-275x173.jpg 275w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-768x484.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-810x510.jpg 810w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-340x215.jpg 340w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-168x106.jpg 168w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-382x240.jpg 382w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap-793x500.jpg 793w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1440px) 100vw, 1440px\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">\n<p><strong>Natural high:<\/strong> The Knife Edge trail, not far from the Maine\u2019s North Woods, which shaped Henry David Thoreau\u2019s ideas about nature.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"credits\">(Robert F. Bukaty  \/ AP Photo)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<aside id=\"issue-aside-block-block_079d97cd358c593deec581a877cf6ccb\" class=\"issue-aside-block  float-l-w-2\">\n        This article appears in the<br \/>\n    <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/issue\/july-august-2026-issue\/\">July\/August 2026 issue<\/a>, with the headline \u201cThe Environmental Idea.\u201d<br \/>\n<\/aside>\n<p class=\"is-style-dropcap\">America is a young country. I have plenty of friends who\u2014like Jane Fonda, my fellow contributor to this special issue\u2014make note of the fact that they\u2019ve been alive for a third of its 250-year history as a nation. One thing this has meant is that America came to full consciousness\u2014literary and political\u2014in the period when we were turning its forests and topsoil into money. Unlike in Northern Europe or the countries of the Mediterranean, where these transformations were ancient history by the time people were writing books, the transformations happened here in relative modernity, which explains why one of America\u2019s great gifts to the Western world has been the environmental idea.<\/p>\n<p>That Indigenous people had long since hit upon this complex of ideas almost goes without saying. But its slow rediscovery, beginning, I think, with Henry David Thoreau, has been a crucial part of the American story. Thoreau was <a href=\"https:\/\/www.walden.org\/what-we-do\/library\/thoreau\">little read in his time<\/a>; not so George Perkins Marsh, whose <em>Man and Nature<\/em>, published two years after Thoreau\u2019s death, stands as one of the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nps.gov\/people\/george-perkins-marsh.htm\">first decisive works<\/a> of environmental exhortation. <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.biodiversitylibrary.org\/2020\/08\/george-perkins-marsh\">Marsh\u2019s understanding<\/a> that, by cutting down vast swaths of timber, humans were altering the temperature and aridity of our landscape led pretty directly to early experiments in land conservation\u2014things like the protection of the Adirondacks. And they helped charge the air that Teddy Roosevelt, the first giant of conservation, breathed so deeply.<\/p>\n<div id=\"articles-list-block_47046bb62f8a87c39b55de4d6c721587\" class=\"articles-list break-l-2 float-l-w-3\">\n<h4 class=\"articles-list__title\">250 Years of Searching for a More Perfect Union<\/h4>\n<\/div>\n<p>Roosevelt\u2019s name, of course, reminds us that this legacy can be troublesome\u2014at points, American environmentalism has been <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/news\/news-desk\/environmentalisms-racist-history\">linked with eugenics<\/a>, with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.splcenter.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/files\/d6_legacy_files\/downloads\/publication\/Greenwash.pdf\">anti-immigrant nonsense<\/a>, and with a kind of privilege-based affection for scenery. But at its heart, I think, it\u2019s mostly been helpful to the human cause, a challenge to the accumulations of industrial wealth and power. Rachel Carson was among the first people to knock some of the shine off modernity, and her testament in <em>Silent Spring<\/em>\u2014combined with such <a href=\"https:\/\/environmentalhistory.org\/20th-century\/sixties-1960-1969\">horrors of the 1960s<\/a> as the Santa Barbara oil spill, and with the glories of our natural world as revealed by everyone from Ansel Adams to Jacques Cousteau\u2014produced by 1970 the single greatest outpouring of environmental protests in American history. <a href=\"https:\/\/news.harvard.edu\/gazette\/story\/2020\/04\/how-earth-day-moved-environmentalism-front-and-center\/\">Twenty million people<\/a> joined demonstrations, celebrations, and teach-ins for the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.archives.gov\/news\/topics\/earth-day\">first Earth Day<\/a>\u201410 percent of the population, for a celebration-cum-protest that drew at least some of its power from another American first: <a href=\"https:\/\/science.nasa.gov\/resource\/the-story-behind-apollo-8s-famous-earthrise-photo\">the photo<\/a> that the Apollo astronauts had recently taken of our blue-white planet floating, beautiful and fragile, in the black void.<\/p>\n<p>That dramatic demonstration of sentiment (combined with the defeat that autumn of a number of congressmen on the <a href=\"https:\/\/michiganintheworld.history.lsa.umich.edu\/environmentalism\/exhibits\/show\/main_exhibit\/earthday\/environmental-action-moving-fo\/the-dirty-dozen\">\u201cdirty dozen\u201d<\/a> list of despoilers compiled by the group Environmental Action) produced <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/outlook\/2020\/04\/22\/what-older-generations-owe-young-50-years-after-first-earth-day\">a flood of legislation<\/a>. Within a couple of years, the United States had created the Environmental Protection Agency and vastly strengthened its clean-air and clean-water laws. These were signed by Richard Nixon, himself the farthest thing from an environmentalist, but a man with a strong sense of electoral reality. And they quickly inspired similar laws around the world, effective regulations that accomplished their goals to a surprising degree. Choking air turned much cleaner; you could swim in lakes and streams that had previously been chemistry experiments.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image alignwide size-full\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-AOC-getty.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1132\" height=\"755\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-AOC-getty.jpg\" alt=\"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez carries on the legacy of American environmentalism.\" class=\"wp-image-598882\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-AOC-getty.jpg 1132w, https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/McKibben-AOC-getty-768x512.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1132px) 100vw, 1132px\"\/><\/a><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><strong>Standard-bearer:<\/strong> Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez carries on the legacy of American environmentalism.<span class=\"credits\">(Alex Wong \/ Getty Images)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>But these regulations had another effect, which was to deeply anger the industrialists who were their targets. At first their rage was impotent, but by the time of Ronald Reagan\u2019s ascension it had gathered real power. It was no surprise that the new president took his predecessor Jimmy Carter\u2019s solar panels <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2025\/01\/02\/climate\/jimmy-carter-solar-panels.html\">off the roof<\/a> of the White House and became committed to the ever-more-rapid development of America\u2019s fossil-fuel resources. For a while, it looked as if the emergence of climate change as a reality at the end of the 1980s might complicate that task: After all, there was no more perfect example of the power of American science than the discovery and elucidation of this deep problem in atmospheric physics. Even Reagan\u2019s successor, George H.W. Bush, allowed that we\u2019d have to solve the greenhouse effect with \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/1990\/04\/21\/opinion\/some-white-house-effect.html\">the White House effect<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That didn\u2019t happen. Instead, the power of Big Oil, unleashed in a massive campaign of disinformation, managed to mostly neuter America\u2019s response. (It\u2019s worth remembering that the Koch brothers were America\u2019s biggest hydrocarbon barons, with sprawling refinery and pipeline investments.) We\u2019ve turned <a href=\"https:\/\/www.eia.gov\/tools\/faqs\/faq.php?id=427&amp;t=8\">from coal to natural gas<\/a> as the biggest source of our electricity, but even that has proved a Pyrrhic victory, since the leaked methane is doing nearly as much damage as the CO2 from the coal had been doing. Joe Biden, in the process of earning Bernie Sanders\u2019s support in 2020, committed to something resembling a Green New Deal, and he was as good as his word, or at least as good as Joe Manchin would allow. The Inflation Reduction Act, with its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.energypolicy.columbia.edu\/publications\/the-ira-and-the-us-battery-supply-chain-one-year-on\">billions for battery factories<\/a>, was the most important environmental legislation since Nixon.<\/p>\n<div id=\"current-issue-block_a2c362da8d3857bb0903e2a20c265932\" class=\"current-issue  float-l-w-2\">\n<h4 class=\"current-issue__title\">\n                    Current Issue<br \/>\n            <\/h4>\n<p>    <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/issue\/september-2026-issue\/\" class=\"current-issue__cover\"><br \/>\n        <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/09-26-Cover-1.jpg\" alt=\"Cover of September 2026 Issue\"\/><br \/>\n    <\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The billionaires soon took their revenge, all but wiping the Inflation Reduction Act off the books with the help of a Republican Congress. So now we face a remarkable moment. America\u2014the country that pioneered environmentalism, the country whose scientists measured and understood the climate threat, and the country whose engineers developed the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.aps.org\/apsnews\/2009\/04\/bell-labs-silicon-solar-cell\">solar cell<\/a>, the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uti.edu\/blog\/wind-turbine\/comprehensive-history-of-wind-energy\">industrial wind turbine<\/a>, and the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thermofisher.com\/blog\/materials\/the-history-of-the-lithium-ion-battery\/\">lithium-ion battery<\/a>, not to mention the country that poured <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ucs.org\/resources\/each-countrys-share-co2-emissions\">the most carbon<\/a> into the air\u2014is now the only country on earth that has <a href=\"https:\/\/www.wri.org\/insights\/endangerment-finding-repeal-explained\">officially renounced<\/a> the idea that greenhouse gases pose a danger, and the only country to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2026\/01\/27\/so-long-paris-u-s-officially-leaves-landmark-climate-pact-00746628\">abandon<\/a> the global climate talks. We currently aim for \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.whitehouse.gov\/presidential-actions\/2025\/02\/establishing-the-national-energy-dominance-council\">energy dominance<\/a>\u201d by controlling fossil-fuel supplies (Trump didn\u2019t even bother to pretend that there was another reason for attacking Venezuela), and yet we have risked fatally undermining the premise of that dominance by waging an illogical war on Iran that has led to the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.<\/p>\n<p class=\"is-style-dropcap\">America, over the past 15 months, has ceded much of its technological, economic, and hence political leadership to our theoretical adversaries in Beijing, who are clearly basing their future prospects <a href=\"https:\/\/www.brookings.edu\/articles\/how-do-china-and-america-think-about-the-energy-transition\">on clean energy<\/a>. If we are to recover our mojo sometime in the next 250 years, it will require that we embrace once more the legacy we did so much to pioneer. We\u2019ll have to choose biology over billionaires and chemistry instead of crackpots. And perhaps beauty, too.<\/p>\n<div id=\"article-end-\" class=\"article-end \">\n<div class=\"article-end__authors\">\n<div class=\"article-end__author\">\n<h5 class=\"article-end__author-name\">\n                        <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thenation.com\/authors\/bill-mckibben\/\">Bill McKibben<\/a><br \/>\n                    <\/h5>\n<p>                                            <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/billmckibben\" class=\"article-end__author-twitter\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><br \/>\n                            <svg xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"17\" height=\"14\" viewbox=\"0 0 17 14\" fill=\"none\">\n\t<path fill-rule=\"evenodd\" clip-rule=\"evenodd\" d=\"M15.2054 3.54558C15.2122 3.6951 15.215 3.84463 15.215 3.99527C15.215 8.58792 11.7194 13.8834 5.32683 13.8834C3.36455 13.8834 1.53779 13.3083 0 12.3221C0.271606 12.354 0.548252 12.3702 0.828257 12.3702C2.45677 12.3702 3.95536 11.8147 5.14483 10.8829C3.62384 10.8543 2.34085 9.84963 1.89844 8.4692C2.11068 8.51008 2.32797 8.53136 2.55253 8.53136C2.87006 8.53136 3.17695 8.48936 3.46815 8.40984C1.87772 8.09008 0.680414 6.68501 0.680414 5.00273C0.680414 4.98705 0.680414 4.97305 0.680414 4.95793C1.14858 5.21833 1.68452 5.37514 2.25461 5.39362C1.32219 4.76921 0.708415 3.7063 0.708415 2.5006C0.708415 1.8633 0.879778 1.26633 1.17882 0.753361C2.89302 2.85621 5.45395 4.23887 8.34249 4.38392C8.28313 4.12967 8.25233 3.86423 8.25233 3.59206C8.25233 1.6729 9.80861 0.117188 11.7278 0.117188C12.7274 0.117188 13.6301 0.539436 14.2641 1.21425C15.0559 1.05913 15.8002 0.769041 16.4716 0.370873C16.2118 1.18289 15.6602 1.86386 14.9428 2.29395C15.6462 2.20939 16.3159 2.02235 16.9392 1.74626C16.4739 2.44292 15.8842 3.05557 15.2054 3.54558Z\" fill=\"#666666\"\/>\n<\/svg><br \/>\n                        <\/a><\/p>\n<div class=\"article-end__author-bio\">\n<p>Bill McKibben is the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and a cofounder of Third Act, which mobilizes people over 60 for action on climate and justice. His book <em>Here Comes the Sun<\/em> is due out in August.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><script type=\"684b099877d45ff59dc7a50a-text\/javascript\">\n\t\t!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)\n\t\t{if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?\n\t\tn.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};\n\t\tif(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version='2.0';\n\t\tn.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;\n\t\tt.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];\n\t\ts.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,document,'script', 'https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/fbevents.js');\n\t\tfbq('init', '233793277040432');\n\t\tfbq('track', 'PageView');\n\t\t\t\t<\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Environment \/ Feature \/ June 29, 2026 From Indigenous practices to the Green New Deal, our country has always focused on prioritizing our planet. Natural high: The Knife Edge trail, not far from the Maine\u2019s North Woods, which shaped Henry David Thoreau\u2019s ideas about nature. (Robert F. Bukaty \/ AP Photo) This article appears in [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7039931,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12022],"tags":[2708,71511,202437],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-7039929","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-activist","tag-america","tag-environmentalism","tag-progenitor"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism - Som2ny Network<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism - Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Environment \/ Feature \/ June 29, 2026 From Indigenous practices to the Green New Deal, our country has always focused on prioritizing our planet. Natural high: The Knife Edge trail, not far from the Maine\u2019s North Woods, which shaped Henry David Thoreau\u2019s ideas about nature. (Robert F. Bukaty \/ AP Photo) This article appears in [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Som2ny Network\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2026-08-16T22:49:37+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1440\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"907\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"admin\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"admin\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b85e3c3dc0e1daea076524dc8810c371\"},\"headline\":\"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-16T22:49:37+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\"},\"wordCount\":1195,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"America\",\"Environmentalism\",\"Progenitor\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Activist\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\",\"name\":\"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism - Som2ny Network\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-08-16T22:49:37+00:00\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg\",\"width\":1440,\"height\":907},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?bp_activities=1\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/\",\"name\":\"Som2ny Network\",\"description\":\"Daily Deals\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Som2ny Network\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/4a0953c4-logo-300x86-1.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/4a0953c4-logo-300x86-1.png\",\"width\":300,\"height\":86,\"caption\":\"Som2ny Network\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"}},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b85e3c3dc0e1daea076524dc8810c371\",\"name\":\"admin\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/729ae85bf62b9917e93538db2f2688ca?s=96&r=g&default=https%3A%2F%2Ffivemor.com%2Fwp-content%2Fplugins%2Fbuddypress-first-letter-avatar%2Fimages%2Fdefault%2F96%2Flatin_a.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/729ae85bf62b9917e93538db2f2688ca?s=96&r=g&default=https%3A%2F%2Ffivemor.com%2Fwp-content%2Fplugins%2Fbuddypress-first-letter-avatar%2Fimages%2Fdefault%2F96%2Flatin_a.png\",\"caption\":\"admin\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?author=1\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism - Som2ny Network","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism - Som2ny Network","og_description":"Environment \/ Feature \/ June 29, 2026 From Indigenous practices to the Green New Deal, our country has always focused on prioritizing our planet. Natural high: The Knife Edge trail, not far from the Maine\u2019s North Woods, which shaped Henry David Thoreau\u2019s ideas about nature. (Robert F. Bukaty \/ AP Photo) This article appears in [&hellip;]","og_url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929","og_site_name":"Som2ny Network","article_published_time":"2026-08-16T22:49:37+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1440,"height":907,"url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"admin","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"admin","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929"},"author":{"name":"admin","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b85e3c3dc0e1daea076524dc8810c371"},"headline":"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism","datePublished":"2026-08-16T22:49:37+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929"},"wordCount":1195,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg","keywords":["America","Environmentalism","Progenitor"],"articleSection":["Activist"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929","url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929","name":"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism - Som2ny Network","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg","datePublished":"2026-08-16T22:49:37+00:00","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/McKibben-Knife_Edge-ap.jpg","width":1440,"height":907},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?p=7039929#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?bp_activities=1"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"How America Became the Progenitor of Environmentalism"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/","name":"Som2ny Network","description":"Daily Deals","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#organization","name":"Som2ny Network","url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/4a0953c4-logo-300x86-1.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/4a0953c4-logo-300x86-1.png","width":300,"height":86,"caption":"Som2ny Network"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"}},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/b85e3c3dc0e1daea076524dc8810c371","name":"admin","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/729ae85bf62b9917e93538db2f2688ca?s=96&r=g&default=https%3A%2F%2Ffivemor.com%2Fwp-content%2Fplugins%2Fbuddypress-first-letter-avatar%2Fimages%2Fdefault%2F96%2Flatin_a.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/729ae85bf62b9917e93538db2f2688ca?s=96&r=g&default=https%3A%2F%2Ffivemor.com%2Fwp-content%2Fplugins%2Fbuddypress-first-letter-avatar%2Fimages%2Fdefault%2F96%2Flatin_a.png","caption":"admin"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/fivemor.com"],"url":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/?author=1"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7039929","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7039929"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7039929\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7039931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7039929"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7039929"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7039929"},{"taxonomy":"dealstore","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fdealstore&post=7039929"},{"taxonomy":"offerexpiration","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fivemor.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fofferexpiration&post=7039929"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}