SUN JOURNAL • April 21, 2020
The Earth Day protests 50 years ago promoted the creation of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency by Congress the following December. The federal Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act followed, in large part thanks to the late U.S. Sen. Edmund Muskie, D-Maine. Muskie grew up in Rumford near the then-polluted Androscoggin River. After graduating from Bates College in Lewiston, becoming governor and then U.S. senator, Muskie shepherded through Congress the landmark Clean Air Act in 1970 and the Clean Water Act in 1972.