Keep America Beautiful

Keep America Beautiful ad circa 1970 courtesy https://www.flickr.com/photos/29069717@N02/23111986642.

I assumed that the Keep America Beautiful moniker came from Lady Bird Johnson, who championed the cause to clean up, first Washington D.C., and later other American cities.  However, today I discovered that the group was started in 1953 by some American businessmen.  "Keep America Beautiful is the largest community improvement organization with over 560 affiliates."  The strongest supporters of the Keep America Beautiful campaign are Coke, Pepsi and National Soft Drink Association.  In 1965, when the First Lady took up the cause of conservation, Keep America Beautiful came into the limelight.  In 1971, with the debut of Earth Day, the cause was furthered again.  In the 1980's with the advent of blue boxes, the campaign broke new ground.

According to Wikipedia circa 2004, Keep America Beautiful was responsible for (https://www.learningtogive.org/resources/keep-america-beautiful):

CLEAN UPS

• litter and debris collected:  150 million pounds
• roads, streets and highways cleaned:  97,000 miles
• railroad tracks cleaned:  900 miles
• areas of parks cleaned:  32, 300 acres
• hiking/biking/nature trails cleaned:  2,000 miles
• playgrounds and community recreation areas cleaned/restored/constructed:  4,000
• rivers, lakes, shorelines cleaned:  6,500 miles
• underwater cleanups:  80
• wetlands restored:  8,200 acres
• illegal dumpsites cleaned:  2,600
• junk cars removed:  7,200

REDUCE/REUSE/RECYCLE

• clothing collected for reuse:  5,800,000 pounds
• bags of aluminum/steel recycled:  645,000
• bags of newspaper recycled:  691,000
• tires collected for recycling:  1,220,000
• batteries collected for recycling:  21,000

BEAUTIFICATION:

• trees planted:  131,000
• flowers & bulbs planted:  5 million
• homes & commercial buildings painted:  1,300
• graffiti sites abated:  6,000

Keep America Beautiful billboard courtesy 

https://www.behance.net/gallery/1514213/Keep-America-Beautiful.

Lady Bird Johnson's Highway Beautification Project

"The biggest decision of all concerns our highways, the greatest public works program of any civilization... our challenge is to see that these highways are not only superbly functional, but also in harmony with our landscape and a pleasant asset to our lives.  After all, this is a civilization where our favorite recreation is driving for pleasure." (Lady Bird Johnson)

Billboards galore courtesy https://www.yahoo.com/style/bp/oct-22-1965-highway-beautification-act-becomes-law-165215592.html.

With the construction of the Interstate Highway system overseen by President Eisenhower came the growth of the billboard industry, a force more powerful in the United States than any other save the Rifle Association.  The highways had become peppered with junkyards and billboards to the detriment of nature. Lady Bird Johnson, who accompanied her husband President Johnson on road trips from their Texas ranch to the White House, was tired of seeing the endless ads on the nation's highways.  President Johnson explained:  "We have placed a wall of civilization between us and the beauty of our countryside."

She mounted a campaign to curb the billboards amid fierce opposition.  Senator Robert Dole sarcastically called it "Lady Bird's Bill" and motioned that the word "Secretary of Commerce" be replaced in the Act with "Lady Bird", a motion that lost by only one voice vote.  But President Johnson would not be deterred, telling his staff:  "You know I love that woman and she wants that Beautification Act...and by God we're going to get it for her."  The act finally passed, after much debate, on October 22 at 1 am.

Decades later, there are mixed emotions about the Lady Bird's Bill.  Some say that while the goal of eliminating junkyards along the highways was achieved, the goal of eliminating billboards failed. Today, billboards are twice as big as they were in the 1960's.  The number of billboards has increased rather than decreased (450,000 today versus 330,000 in 1965).  Seventy thousand of the "non-conforming billboards" still stand today according to the New York Times.  Some of them which were knocked down by Hurricane Katrina. The billboard industry lobbied fiercely to get them rebuilt. (http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/20/opinion/20wright.html).  

When new billboards are built, often trees are cut down.  Twenty of the most common birds have lost half their population in the past 50 years since Lady Bird's Bill first was signed.  But the billboard industry can take nothing away from Lady Bird's initiative.  Her heart was in the right place.

Poppies and flowers in South Carolina courtesy http://humanflowerproject.com/index.php/weblog/comments/lady_birds_wild_highways/.

For a More Beautiful America

"Where flowers bloom so does hope." (Lady Bird Johnson)

Yellow & blue wildflowers along a highway courtesy
http://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2012/pr12_117.htm.

It was just over 50 years ago that the Lady Bird Bill was signed.  President Eisenhower had overseen the building of the Interstate Highway System.  Now, President Johnson, with his wife leading the effort, would oversee the beautification of those highways.

The Highway Beautification Act of 1965 called for the control of outdoor advertising, for the removal of junkyards along the highways and for "scenic enhancement and roadside development" (https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/infrastructure/beauty.cfm).

Daffodils along the Potomac River courtesy 

https://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2012/pr12_141.htm.

Lady Bird concentrated not only on beautifying the nation's highways, but also cities.  Focusing on the Washington DC, which in the 1960's was in a dilapidated state, she hoped to set an example for other cities in the United States.  She believed that the state of America's cities was reflected in the state of the nation's minds.  In January 1965, Lady Bird wrote in her diary:

"Getting on the subject of beautification is like picking up a tangled skein of wool. All the threads are interwoven -- recreation and pollution and mental health, and the crime rate and rapid transit and highway beautification, and the war on poverty and parks -- national, state and local.  It is hard to stitch the conversation into one straight line, because everything leads to something else." (http://www.pbs.org/ladybird/shattereddreams/shattereddreams_report.html)

Pink & red azaleas and white tulips in front of the Capitol courtesy http://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2012/pr12_117.htm.

The Beautification Act faced fierce opposition:  the billboard industry, which had sprung up under Eisenhower, would have no part of it.  The President and the First Lady, who made frequent road trips from their Texas ranch to Washington DC, had tired of the endless advertisements along America's highways.  

Lady Bird Johnson would not not give up the fight.  The First Lady was so involved in the beautification effort that Kansas Representative Robert Dole, who is still alive today, suggested an amendment to the bill which would replace the title "Secretary of Commerce" with Lady Bird, but lost by a voice vote.

Cherry trees in blossom by the Jefferson Memorial courtesy
https://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2012/pr12_141.htm/ 

Robert Dole may have lost the battle, but Lady Bird won the war.  Her husband, who had just gotten out of the hospital for gall bladder surgery, signed the bill on October 22, 1965.  Commenting on his drive from Bethesda Naval Hospital to the White House along George Washington Memorial Parkway, he said:  

"I saw Nature at its purest.  The dogwoods had turned red.  The maple leaves were scarlet and gold.  And not one foot of it was marred by a single unsightly man-made obstruction -- no advertising signs, no junkyards.  Well, doctors could prescribe no better medicine for me."(http://www.pbs.org/ladybird/shattereddreams/shattereddreams_report.html)

Rows of crab apple trees along a suburban road courtesy
http://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2012/pr12_117.htm.

For more information, read A White House Diary by Lady Bird Johnson at https://www.amazon.ca/White-House-Diary-Lady-Johnson/dp/0292717490.

Lady Bird Johnson circq 1963 courtesy http://tti.tamu.edu/about/hall-of-honor/inductees/yr2012/