Earth Day is an annual worldwide celebration honouring the achievement of the environmental movement and raising awareness of the importance of long-term maintenance of the health of our planet.
A brief history of Earth Day
1970 - Earth Day was born in the US to provide a voice to the emerging environmental concerns of that time. The first Earth Day mobilized twenty million Americans to call for increased protection for the Earth.
1990 - Earth Day went global, rallying 200 million people in 141 countries, calling for action on the issues of pollution, deforestation, threats to plant and animal species, land use, and the effects of climate change.
2020 - Earth Day’s 50th Anniversary was marked by more than one billion, that’s 1,000,000,000 people worldwide. It was a day of action to call for change in human behaviour; and create global, national, and local policy changes for the sustainability of the only planet we have.
Earth Day in Rimbey
For a number of years, up until COVID-19 struck in the spring of 2020, the Beatty Heritage House hosted an Earth Day event on-site. Last year we hosted a program via Zoom. This year again, due to the uncertainty surrounding the virus and its attendant regulations, we have not been able to plan for a public celebration at the Beatty House.
We are instead, presenting to the public an art gallery featuring posters created by students of the Rimbey Elementary School and the Rimbey Christian School. Focused around the themes “care for the Earth” and “I (we) care for the Earth”, the posters will be displayed in the windows of downtown businesses in Rimbey on April 11-25.
It is our hope that in participating in this project the young artists will become more aware and more appreciative of the beauty and richness of Earth, the visual impact of their art will remind us all of the necessity, and our responsibility to care for the planet we are so fortunate to inhabit.
Florence Stemo - The Beatty Heritage House Society