Fifty five years ago, on this day, July 7th, 1969, Newsweek was pointing to the environmental problems humans had created. Including CO2 build-up.
The article, the Good Earth, by John G. Mitchell, is based in part on a UNESCO conference and statement in May of the same year.
“Transparent to sunlight but opaque to the earth’s radiation, a blanket of moisture and carbon dioxide could conceivably raise the surface temperatures of the earth enough to melt the polar icepacks and raise sea levels 300 feet. Even 200 feet would inundate New York, Boston and most of Florida.”
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 324ppm. As of 2024 it is 426ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that the environment movement, and Malthusian moment had begun. You can say January 28 1969, when the Santa Barbara oil spill happened. Then a couple of months later People’s Park had kicked off in Berkeley. And so newspapers could and magazines could fill up on hand wringing pearl clutching surveys like this one. And they could do if they so chose, illustrate it all with a picture of Earthrise. And throw in some guff about “our fragile planet” “our imperilled Earth”, whatever, this stuff writes itself.
What we learn is that by 1969, everyone who was reading this stuff was aware that CO2 was probably an issue whether they agreed with it or not.
What happened next? Newsweek and Time kept running the stuff. Senators started calling for it to be written into the record. In September of ‘69. Senator Gaylord Nelson announced Earth day. I think this was the brainchild of Dennis Hayes. Anyway, Hayes ran it. And everyone held hands and sang Kumbaya and achieved not very much. But what was to be achieved?
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
Also on this day:
July 7, 1970 – an Australian banker goes “Full Extinction Rebellion”, 50 years early…
July 7, 1988 – foolish “Jumping the greenhouse gun” editorial in Nature.
July 7, 2008 – Liberals start back-tracking on climate promises.