by Obiora Embry

Created on: May 22, 2009   Last Updated: March 05, 2010

“EARTH DAY is the first holy day which transcends all national borders, yet preserves all geographical integrities, spans mountains and oceans and time belts, and yet brings people all over the world into one resonating accord, is devoted to the preservation of the harmony in nature and yet draws upon the triumphs of technology—the measurement of time and instantaneous communication through space.

EARTH DAY draws on astronomical phenomena in a new way; using the vernal equinox, the time when the Sun crosses the equator making night and day of equal length in all parts of the Earth. To this point in the annual calendar, EARTH DAY attaches no local or divisive set of symbols, no statement of the truth or superiority of one way of life over another.

But the selection of the March equinox makes planetary observance of a shared event possible...”

—from EARTH DAY by Margaret Mead

EPA Journal March 1978

Because I suspect many people do not know that there are two different days that use the name Earth Day, I would like to provide some information I uncovered in 2008.

Earth Day

Many of us are used to celebrating Earth Day in April but do not know that it is actually in March. In a 1969 United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) Conference in San Francisco, eco-activist John McConnell introduced Earth Day to honor the Spring or Vernal Equinox, a time when the Earth is in a state of balance and harmony because the hours of daylight and darkness are almost equal. McConnell wanted a specific day set aside every year for humans to respect and cherish Mother Earth, promote and sustain peace, relieve human suffering, and increase the global commitment to the stewardship of our only home—Gaia. Interestingly, McConnell is also the originator of the “Minute for Peace Program,” co-founder of the Earth Society Foundation, and creator of the Earth Flag. His ultimate desire for Earth Day was to establish a universal holiday to promote peace, justice, and environmental stewardship of the Earth. At his urging, on 21 March 1970, the first Earth Day took place in San Francisco, a city named after Saint Francis, the patron saint of ecology. The city was also where the signing of the United Nations Charter took place on 26 June 1945.

Due to the efforts of McConnell and others who recognized the need to mark a renewed awareness of our collective responsibility to the health of the Earth, then-U.N. Secretary General

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