Our history
Since 1971, Greenpeace has been using peaceful protest and creative confrontation to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green, just, and joyful future for people and our planet.
Half a century of Greenpeace
For more than 50 years, Greenpeace and people like you have been making a difference. It’s thanks to our supporters, allies and friends that Greenpeace has grown from just a handful of dedicated individuals to the largest environmental campaigning organization in the world.
Founding Greenpeace
In 1970, the Don’t Make A Wave Committee was established with the sole objective to stop a second nuclear weapons test at Amchitka Island in the Aleutians. The committee’s founders were Dorothy and Irving Stowe, Marie and Jim Bohlen, Ben and Dorothy Metcalfe, and Bob Hunter. Its first directors were Stowe, Bohlen, and a student named Paul Cote. Canadian ecologist Bill Darnell came up with a catch phrase to demonstrate the group’s concern for the planet and opposition to nuclear arms. In the words of Bob Hunter, “Somebody flashed two fingers as we were leaving the church basement and said ‘Peace!’ Bill said ‘Let’s make it a Green Peace’.” In order to fit the phrase on a button, the words were combined to make it what it is today: Greenpeace.
Marie Bohlen was the first to suggest taking a ship up to Amchitka to oppose the U.S. plans. The group organized a boat, the Phyllis Cormack – renamed the Greenpeace, and set sail to Amchitka to “bear witness” (a Quaker tradition of silent protest) to the nuclear test. Despite being intercepted by the US Coast Guard, their bravery brought worldwide attention to the dangers of nuclear testing. Amchitka, it has turned out, was only the beginning of what would come to be a much bigger story.
“The only delivery system we had which could possibly fend off the military’s nuclear weapons delivery system was the mass media. Our idea was that we would fire off press releases instead of ballistic missiles. So in a way this little old fishing boat became a kind of media battleship.” – Bob Hunter