Edith K.  Pierpont

PROTECTOR OF THE ENVIRONMENT

Honored May, 1990

Edith K. Pierpont

Although many people retire to Santa Fe in pursuit of a life of leisure, for Edith Pierpont retirement welded her life-long interests and talents into a new public career. In New Mexico, at the age of sixty-one, she became a lobbyist for the environmental movement.

Born in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1922 and raised with a deep appreciation for the nearby New England countryside, Edith was trained from an early age to observe and appreciate nature. Her physician father, a great nature lover, taught his children how to look at birds and flowers. "He taught by example about the things that grew around us," Edith recalled.

"As World War II came in, we grew a victory garden in the middle of the front lawn. During the 1940s, Father got interested in organic gardening, which we discussed at the dinner table."

Edith's education at Vassar College left her with "some strong role models for educated women" and a sense of "obligation and excitement about using whatever interests you for improving the world." Her visit to West Virginia coal mining towns and factories in the East gave her "a sense of what people were doing to the earth."

With her husband, John H. Pierpont, a public relations executive, Edith raised her own five children, in turn, with an awareness of nature. As she became more interested in politics, she shifted her focus from her children's school activities to work as a reporter on her local newspaper. She interviewed many political figures, followed political campaigns, and covered environmental issues for ten years. She also earned a master's degree from Columbia University Teachers' College, and taught school.