So what did you do in seventy two?
Did you follow the Blueprint or stand with the PEOPLE?
Was Street Farming your bag, or Appropriate Tech?
Were you Vanguard or Fundo when the movement divided?
Did you stand on a pillar or hug the trunk of a tree?
Did you vote for your choice, or were you Saving the Whale,
Embracing the Base and cutting the wire?
Did you look through the hole in the sky or your shoe?
Know the use of the wrench and the spike in the tree?
Did you travel by bike or go with the convoy
To Reclaim the Streets and put fear in The Man?
In tunnel or tree or locked to the gate, what was your motive and what did you do?
Was it Coal not the dole, and did you Tell Sid as they sold off our silver and stole all our land?
And at the high water did you really believe
another world possible, having planted the seed?
Tell us your story; your history is true.
Don't let them gloss over the things we can do.
RCO Aug 2017
This website grew from a project to capture some of the history of the Green Party in Southwest England. The authors were David Taylor and Roger Creagh-Osborne (RogerCO), but increasingly other voices are joining in.
History is defined by those who write it - the Green Movement is a collective organism and we have no desire to impose our own twist on its history - we need your help.
There is a wealth of material out there, and assistance researching, scanning, writing, editing, proofreading, designing and organising is always welcome.
If you were around in the period '72-'89, or if you have access to archive material, or if you would like to help with this site, or you simply want to keep in touch then please do complete the form to join as a Green History Contributor.
Only Contributors can comment on published articles, they can also review draft articles before publication.
We are starting with the period from 1972 when the founding organisations were created through until 1989 when the Greens in the UK achieved a 15% share of the national vote in the Euro Election but no MEPs
As time passes many of the early prime movers of the Ecology Movement are no longer with us, and many of the same organisational issues keep coming up, and many of the same mistakes get made. Sometimes we do learn from our successes, but often we repeat the formula without a proper understanding of why it might have succeeded in a particular time and place.
This site is intended as a resource both for researchers and current activists prepared to learn from the past.
We welcome contributions from others, and are particularly keen to hear from those who were involved in defining moments for the movement. Starting as the original Movement for Survival (the first ecology movement with political ambitions in the world) and PEOPLE (the second founding organisation) in merged in 1972 and became the Ecology Party in 1976, and then the Green Party in 1985, and through to the high water mark politically of the 1989 European Election.
You can contact us by emailing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. (which will reach both David and Roger).
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