Thing-makers, Tool Freaks and Prototypers: How the Whole Earth Catalog’s Optimistic Message Reinvented the Environmental Movement in 1968

Authors

Andy Kirk, University of Nevada, Las VegasFollow

Document Type

Magazine

Publication Date

7-17-2018

Publication Title

The Conversation

Abstract

In the fall of 1968 a Stanford-trained biologist, organizer of the legendary Trips Festival and Merry Prankster named Stewart Brand published the first Whole Earth Catalog. Between 1968 and 1972, the Catalog reached millions of readers and won the National Book Award. The title and iconic cover image of this counterculture classic celebrated the first publicly released NASA photographs showing the whole planet Earth from space. These images profoundly changed the way humans thought about the environment. And the Catalog played an important role in that change.

Keywords

Internet; Sustainability; Consumption; Anthropocene; Humanities; Environmentalism; US history; San Francisco; Communal living; 1968 50th anniversary

Disciplines

Community Psychology | Family, Life Course, and Society | Natural Resources and Conservation | Sustainability

File Format

pdf

File Size

984 KB

Language

English

Repository Citation

Kirk, A. (2018). Thing-makers, Tool Freaks and Prototypers: How the Whole Earth Catalog’s Optimistic Message Reinvented the Environmental Movement in 1968. The Conversation
https://digitalscholarship.unlv.edu/history_fac_articles/175