CUUPS OF FORT MYERS

Ancient roots, Modern branches

Here is all that ever was, none are forgotten.
Nothing fades forever, for here,
What is remembered lives.


 Ellen Peterson

Ellen Peterson (December 5, 1923 – October 14, 2011) was born in Georgia on December 5, 1923. When she was in her twenties she rode her own bicycle across the United States for the most part completely alone.

Ellen founded five different non-profit environmental organizations in her lifetime and was a fierce protector of Florida's waterways and the Everglades. Ellen Peterson was a well known environmental, and peace and justice activist who protested against nuclear power plants and coal fired plants in the Everglades and wetlands of South Florida. Ellen was arrested for civil disobedience at Cape Canaveral for protesting there. She was also arrested while protesting against the School of Americas in Fort Benning Georgia, protesting against the training of torture tactics to foreign military operatives. She founded Save Our Creeks to save FishEating Creek in Glades County Florida and succeeded in stopping developers from damming the river. Five years before her death she founded the Happehatchee Center, on the five acres of her home on the Estero River in SW Florida. Her property includes a swing bridge that she built across the Estero River. The house on the South Side of the River has been designated as a historical Preservation Site as it was a Girl Scout Bunker for Girl Scout camp in the 1940s.

Ellen Peterson received many awards during the course of her life of teaching and activism.

She died from a brain tumor at the age of 87 at her home, The Happehatchee Eco-Spiritual Center on October 14, 2011 surrounded by her women friends. Her life story is being compiled and will be posted for publishing soon.

 

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