Every other week my eight-year-old son goes to an after school chemistry club with his buddy—meaning they spend an hour with a retired science teacher who is passionate about passing on his knowledge to the next generation. His "lab" is something out of the early twentieth century, containing rows of dusty bottles with handwritten labels identifying specific chemicals or simply warning of danger, wires, and gadgets that cover shelves and spill out of boxes, as well as an antique wood stove that never quite gets the room warm. On their first day, he introduced the periodic table, and since then, he has shown them everything from explosive chemical reactions to electromagnetic fields. The boys love him and eagerly anticipate their biweekly visits.
Given the twenty years I have worked on environmental health issues. I observe this class both with exhilaration一watching these young kids get excited about learning about chemistry—and with discomfort—wondering if they are sufficiently protected from hazardous exposures in his lab, knowing all too well that they can undermine healthy child development.

Foreword ix

Elise Miller

Acknowledgments xiii

Introduction xv

Part I: Historical and Cultural Roots 1

1 The European Ancestry of Environmental Health 3

2 Early Environmental Public Health in the United States 21

3 Environmentalism and Economic Growth 37

4 The Birth of the U.S. Environmental Health Movement 63

Part II: The Contemporary Movement 93

5 Organizations and Issues 95

6 Making Environmental Issues Personal 127

7 Precaution and the Limitations of Science 151

8Environmental Justice and the Right to a Healthy Environment 175

9 Changing Economics, the Markets, and Business 195

Conclusion and Next Steps: Strategies for Social Change 215

A Chronology of Key Events 233

Selected Environmental Health Resources 241

Index 245

About the Author 259

KATE DAVIES has been active in environmental health issues for thirty-five years in the United States and Canada. She has worked with numerous nongovernmental and governmental oragnizations, including Creenpeace, the Collaborative on Including Greenpeace, the Collaborative on Health and the Environment, the Institute for CHildren's Environment Health, the International Joint Commission, and the Royal Society of Canada. She is currently core faculty at Antioch University Seattle's Center for Creative Change and clinical associate professor in the School of Public Health at the University of Washington.

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