Today’s interactive Google Doodle is inspired by Earth Day, an annual event designed to celebrate the environment and raise awareness about conservation efforts. U.S. Senator Gaylord Nelson came up with the first Earth Day — held on Apr. 22, 1970 — and this day of action is widely considered the anniversary of the birth of the environmental movement.
(PHOTOS: A History of Google Doodles)
In addition to participating in local park clean-ups and petitioning elected officials, people worldwide can also sit back and appreciate the little things in nature through Google’s interactive Doodle. Press the play button and watch the sun rise and set as day turns into night. Click on the caves and burrows and bears and badgers will emerge. Click on the dandelions, and their florets will disappear. See ants crawl around during the day and lightning bugs flicker at night.
Internationally, 2013 Earth Day celebrations have ranged from a “Great Cloth Diaper Change” in Savannah, Georgia, to a trash pick-up along Clifton beach in Karachi, Pakistan, to PETA activists covered in green body paint demonstrating for veganism in Hyderabad, India.
To see what the first Earth Day celebrations were like, watch this NBC News segment from Apr. 22, 1970 (h/t EarthDay.org):
[hulu http://www.hulu.com/watch/67649]
And to see how The Office‘s Dunder Mifflin has marked Earth Day in the past, here’s a clip of the legendary attempts by Dwight Schrute (Rainn Wilson) to galvanize his colleagues as “Recyclops”:
[hulu http://www.hulu.com/watch/109986]