Roland Clement, artist, naturalist, and former Audubon Society Vice President, gave a presentation in Gloucester today to celebrate Rachel Carson’s 100th, and specifically her book that launched today’s environmental movement, Silent Spring. He noted that the local, U.S.-only ban on DDT that resulted from this book’s publication has had little impact on the chemical’s deadly global effects, and that in fact, today there is more DDT manufactured and sold than in the 1960s. “We are witnessing its effects in terms of diminishing fish and fowl all around us.” He noted that the chemical companies have a far broader reach than they did back when Kennedy was president, when Clement himself testified to a Senate committee on the poisonous effects of DDT. He noted that now these companies participate in and donate to many of the organizations (such as, we assume, his own Audubon Society) which are tasked with preserving nature rather than controlling it through chemicals. He counseled his audience not to get emotional about the loss of birdlife all around us, but to wait for the proper time before acting in concert.

He recently donated his papers to a New England university and is considering publication of further work on environmental activism.

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