Rachel Carson

Rachel Carson (1907 to 1964) was an American marine biologist and conservationist. Born on 27 May 1907 at the family homestead in Springdale, Pennsylvania, she trained as a scientist and worked for many years for the U.S. government's fisheries service, while also writing. Her gift was to explain the natural world accurately and with real beauty, so that general readers could feel its wonder.

Her books about the sea made her widely admired, and her later work on pesticides made her famous. In Silent Spring she warned that the careless use of chemicals was harming birds, wildlife and people. The book was fiercely attacked by some, but it helped start the modern environmental movement and led to greater public scrutiny of chemical use. She died on 14 April 1964, and she is remembered both as a scientist and as a fine prose writer.