My professor, Dr. Lanham, had us discuss a timeline of ecological events in the last 100 years that were important to us. I separated my list into environmental organizations, disasters, media, policy, innovation, and personal events. Some events won't make sense to some environmental people (I'm a big nuclear power advocate and think that the Crocodile Hunter is a demi-god, for example) but I felt it was important to list these events for easy access and a reminder next time I forget when Earth First was founded or how much advocacy work has occurred in the last century.

Environmental organizations
When I learned of the environmental organizations in the United States, I didn’t feel alone in my local efforts. I didn’t know anything about the conservation movement as a whole, let alone the history or national players. At the time, I was focused on cleaning wetlands and learning about plants. Understanding that there were organized groups with specific focused on land and biodiversity conservation changed my entire perspective.
1935 – The Wilderness Society is founded
1947 – Defenders of Wildlife was founded
1948 – The IUCN is founded
1951 – The Nature Conservancy is founded
1961 – World Wildlife Fund is founded                          
1967 – Environmental Defense Fund is founded
1970 – National Resource Defense Council is founded
1971 – Greenpeace is founded
1977 – Sea Shepherd is founded
1980 – Earth First is founded
1987 – Conservation International is founded
1988 – IPCC is established
 
Disasters
When I was developing my relationship with conservation I saw the threats to the environment as chronic, persistent, and ubiquitous threats from constant habitat destruction and pollution. While I don’t diminish any of those threats and still see them as the primary causes of concern, I had never experienced the trauma of a major catastrophe as I did with the 2010 Deepwater Horizon event. The impacts of that event motivated an entire shift in how I approach conservation issues.
1928 – Thomas Midgley develops chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)
1929 – Swann Chemical Company develops polychlorinated biphenyl (PCBs)
1939 – DDT was used as an insecticide
1946 – GI Bill allows for low cost loans for the suburban housing boom, and subsequent sprawl to occur
1957 – KB Homes is founded and is the first home-building company to be traded on the NYSE
1969 – Santa Barbara oil spill
1969 – Cuyahoga River Fire
1984 – Bhopal disaster
1986 – Chernobyl
1989 – Exxon Valdez oil spill
2010 – Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill
2016 – Dakota Pipeline construction started
2017 – President Obama left office
2018 – East China Sea oil spill
 
Media
The Crocodile Hunter was my favorite show as a teenager and I tried to watch every episode possible. When he died in 2006, I was devastated. I built my environmental education programs around his philosophies and from that found that many other people considered his work an inspiration.
1949 – Sand County Almanac is published
1962 – Silent Spring is published
1968 – Apollo 8 picture of Earthrise is taken
1968 – Desert Solitaire is published
1997 – First episode of the Crocodile Hunter airs
 
Policy
The Endangered Species Act, with all of its flaws, is my favorite American policy. It is truly impressive and its scope is a philosophical and paradigmatic shift. I hope that there is a current trend that will involved another shift in intrinsic, holistic, and eco-centric values: nonhuman persons’ rights. The first official declaration of nonhuman persons’ rights is with India declaring dolphins and whales as such.
1970 – First Earth Day
1972 – Marine Mammal Protection Act
1972 – Clean Water Act
1973 – Endangered Species Act
1987 – Brundtland Commission is published
1987 – Montreal Protocol is signed
1992 – The Rio Earth Summit
1997 – Kyoto Protocol
2006 – California’s Global Warming Solutions Act (Assembly Bill 32)
2010 – Citizen’s United Supreme Court ruling
2013 – India declares dolphins and whales are non-human persons
2017 – New Zealand gives legal rights as humans to a river and a mountain
 
Innovation
Until a remarkable lecture I heard in 2012, I had never considered the positive power of technological innovation on conservation other than solar panels. Until then, I had always thought that technology was related to consumerism which negatively affected biodiversity conservation. In this presentation I learned that whale conservation started not because altruism but because refined oil and electricity were cheaper and more efficient than whale oil. The technological innovation decreased the need to exploit whales. Since then, I’ve tried to look at the impact of technology, positive or negative, on conservation.
1954 – The first nuclear power plant generates electricity
1958 – Mauna Loa Observatory begins monitoring CO2 levels
1968 – First formal acknowledgment of the Green Revolution of modern agriculture
1975 – Catalytic converters are included on all vehicles
1984 – Solar Energy Generating Systems opens thermal power station in Mojave Desert
2009 – 9 Planetary Boundaries concept
2017 – Doughnut Economics concept published

Personal
I’m really proud of my personal conservation history. I’ve accomplished a lot in accordance to my values and I’ve worked hard to achieve meaningful conservation metrics. I’ve had several significant events in my personal conservation history. All of the following are memorable but when I saw a wetland restored and opened up to the Pacific for the first time in 100 years in 2006, I saw that it was possible to fix things.

2003 – I started volunteering for environmental causes
2003 - I saw my first California Least Tern
2003 - I saw my first endangered species – a butterfly
2004 - I saw my first California Sea Otter
2005 – I sailed from Boston to southern California via the Panama Canal for an environmental non-profit
2005 - I did my first research on an endangered species
2005 - I saw my first endangered plant – Salt Marsh Bird’s Beak
2005 - I saw my first Western Snowy Plover
2005 - I started my first environmental company
2006 - Bolsa Chica Wetlands are opened to the Pacific Ocean for the first time in 100 years
2006 – The Baiji was declared extinct and I baked my first Fuck the World Cake
2006 - I hired my first employee
2006 - I saw my first Peregrine Falcon
2007 - El Nino where giant Humboldt Squid came north from Mexico, bringing Orcas down
2008 - I set up my environmental internship program
2009 – California Brown Pelicans are delisted
2009 - I worked in Chilean Patagonia
2009 - Los Cerritos Wetlands Authority is formed
2009 – Western Peregrine Falcons are delisted
2010 - I advocated in California’s Senate House for the first time
2010 - I worked on swordfish conservation in Hawaii
2011 – The Western Black Rhinoceros was declared extinct and I baked a Fuck the World Cake
2011 - I met Jared Diamond
2011 - I received my first $100k check for environmental work
2012 – A wetland I worked on, Colorado Lagoon, is restored
2013 - I met Joy Zedler
2013 – The Formosan clouded leopard was declared extinct and I baked a Fuck the World Cake
2013 - I received my first contract to work on an endangered species
2014 – Traveled to Iceland as photography assistant
2014 - I saw my first California Condor
2015 - I started my conservation radio show and podcast
2015 - I worked in Montana on technical conservation work
2015 - I worked in New Zealand on duck conservation
2016 - Obama approves federal designation of San Gorgonio
2017 – Chilean Patagonia is protected
2017 - I saw the endangered Red-Cockaded Woodpecker