rachel carson's book silent spring published in the 1960s

In 1967, the Environmental Defense Fund was formed, marking the first step taken toward limiting the use of DDT.Ī few years later, in 1970, the U.S. Related: 10 Enlightening Books about Climate ChangeĪll of the media coverage surrounding Silent Spring served to shift public opinion on conservation, and today, the book is widely considered to be one of the biggest contributors to the environmental movement in the 1960s. Senate subcommittee to make policy recommendations. Kennedy’s Science Advisory Committee and a U.S. Later, Carson would testify before President John F. The controversy led to a CBS Reports television special, The Silent Spring of Rachel Carson, which helped further public support of the book.

So much negative attention from the chemical industry only served to draw more attention to Silent Spring, which was widely supported by both the academic community and public opinion. Related: 12 Nature Books That'll Help You See the Beauty in Every DayĬarson also got a lucky break when Silent Spring was selected as the “ Book-of-the-Month” in October 1962-as Carson herself said, this would “carry it to farms and hamlets all over the country that don’t know what a bookstore looks like-much less The New Yorker.”īook-of-the-Month Club edition of Silent Spring. This included having the book’s chapters reviewed by scientists, Carson attending the White House Conference on Conservation and 1962, and promoting the upcoming serialization of the book in The New Yorker. To help combat this, they sought out support for the book ahead of its release. At the hearings, Carson was frustrated by the expert testimony brought forward by the chemical industry representatives-her research directly contradicted many of their claims.Ĭarson and her publishers expected that the book would receive harsh criticism for being so critical of chemical pesticides. cranberry crops, causing all cranberry products to be pulled from shelves. In the same year, Carson attended FDA hearings about the high levels of the herbicide aminotriazole in U.S. In spring of 1959, Rachel Carson wrote a letter that was published in The Washington Post, attributing the recent decline in bird populations-”the silencing of the birds”- to the overuse of pesticides.

Rachel carson's book silent spring published in the 1960s