Aldo Leopold who was born on January 11, 1887, in Burlington, Iowa, United States of America and died on April 21, 1948, was an American writer, philosopher, scientist, ecologist, forester, conservationist, and environmental activist.
Aldo Leopold is a professor at the University of Wisconsin and is best known for writing a book called A Sand County Almanac in 1949, which has sold more than two million copies worldwide.
His parent’s name Carl Leopold and Clara Starker. His father, Carl was a businessman who made a walnut table. Charles Starker, Clara’s father and uncle from Carl, is a German immigrant, who is an expert in engineering and architecture.
Rand Aldo, he was named after two business partners from his father namely C. W. Rand and Aldo Sommers, although he did not end up using “Rand”.
The first language that Leopold used was German even though he had mastered English from an early age. Aldo Leopold was very good in the development of modern environmental ethics as well as the wilderness conservation movement.
According to him, natural ethics and animal conservation have a big impact on the environmental movement, with its eccentric or holistic ethics regarding the land. He also emphasizes biodiversity and ecology and he is the founder of wildlife management science.
The Childhood of Aldo Leopold
Aldo Leopold’s childhood life was accustomed to the outdoors life. Carl will take his children on a trip to the forest and teach wood crafts and hunt for his eldest son. Aldo showed skills for observation, therefore, he could spend days counting and cataloging birds near his home. Mary, who is the younger brother of Aldo, even said about her brother that he really likes to work outside the house. He even likes extreme activities such as rock climbing or wading through rivers and forests.
As a child, Aldo studied at Prospect Hill Elementary School, where he was top-ranked in his class, and then continued to Burlington High School. Every August, the family is vacationing in Michigan on Les Cheneaux Island in the forest on Lake Huron, where they can go wander and explore.
The Legacy from Aldo Leopold
The Aldo Leopold Foundation of Baraboo in Wisconsin, United States of America was founded in 1982 by all the five children of Aldo and Estella Leopold as a non-profit conservation organization. The mission of this foundation is to foster land ethics through Aldo Leopold’s legacy.
The Aldo Leopold Foundation owns and manages 300 hectares of Aldo Leopold Shack and Farm in the vicinity. The head office is at the Leopold Center where it conducts education and land management programs. The Leopold foundation encourages scholarships as well as serves as the center for the information about Leopold and the ideas.
The Foundation provides interpretive and tourism resources for thousands of visitors every year, distributing the curriculum on how to use Leopold’s writings and ideas in environmental education.
The foundation collaborated with the United States Forest Service to release the first film about Leopold in 2012. The title of the film is Green fire: Aldo Leopold and Land Ethic for Our Time. The film aired on public television stations across the country and finally won the Midwest regional Emmy award in the documentary category. The Aldo Leopold Wilderness in the New Gila National Forest of New York was named after him in 1980.
After that, the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture was established in 1987 at Iowa State University in Ames. The name is pinned to honor Aldo Leopold. Since its establishment until now, Aldo Leopold has pioneered new forms of sustainable agricultural practices.
