(photograph from the NASA photo library)
On Friday, June 7th, William Anders, the Apollo 8 astronaut who took perhaps the most famous environmental photograph ever created, perished when the small airplane he was piloting plummeted into the sea off of the coast of Washington state.
I didn’t know Bill Anders. I have no idea if he ever visited the Apostle Islands, or if he had ever even heard of them. But on Christmas Eve 1968, when he looked out of the window of the lunar module and clicked the shutter on the camera he had only recently learned how to operate, he changed the fate of the islands forever.
We all know the image — the pearl-blue earth floating in the void above the lifeless surface of the moon. It is stunning in its simplicity and its effect. The image was a clarion call stirring the beginnings of the global environmental movement. It became the symbol for Earth Day, the largest nonsecular annual celebration on the planet (a celebration founded in 1970 by Gaylord Nelson who would also go on to play a major role in the creation of the Apostle Islands National Lakeshore the same year).
Most importantly perhaps, the photograph, one of the first views of the earth from space, confirmed something we all knew deep inside of ourselves but could never truly articulate - the beauty and the fragility of the planet we live on. Once and for all it was clear that this tiny teardrop we call earth is our home, the only one we have. Somewhere on that tiny sphere is the Grand Canyon, Mount Everest, the Apostle Islands, you, me, and each and every one of the now 8 billion people on earth. The photo Bill Anders took that day, now known as “Earthrise,” stands as the clearest, most pure and unequivocal message to all who see it: take care of each other and the earth.
William Anders was 90 years old.
— Jeff Rennicke
These Apostle Islands postcards every Sunday are an offshoot of the “Little Dipper” blog. Paid subscribers to the blog also receive an original, full-length illustrated essay delivered right to their inbox every Wednesday. Subscribe. Come along for the ride aboard the “Little Dipper.”
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