Family of late Gov. Russell W. Peterson visits University Library

1:56 p.m., March 2, 2015--The University of Delaware Library had special visitors who came to view the exhibition “Legacy of the Delaware Coastal Zone: Conserving the First State,” which is on view through Friday, July 3, on the first floor of the Information Room in the Morris Library.

June Jenkins Peterson, the widow of former Gov. Russell W. Peterson (1916-2011), and Elin Peterson Sullivan, the daughter of the former governor, visited the exhibition on Feb. 9. During their visit they met one of the co-curators of the exhibition, Meg Grotti, associate librarian in the Reference and Instructional Service Department. (The other co-curator, Meghann Matwichuk, associate librarian, Film and Video Collection, Multimedia Collections and Services Department, was out of town.)

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The Coastal Zone Act, signed in 1971 by Gov. Peterson, is widely considered to be the most important – and one of the most contentious – piece of environmental legislation ever passed in Delaware. For over 40 years, it has protected 115 miles of Delaware’s coast from the destructive impacts of heavy industrialization and commercial development.

The exhibition, “Legacy of the Delaware Coastal Zone Act: Conserving the First State,” features selected manuscripts, books including children’s books, videos and periodicals. It also includes information on Gov. Peterson and the Coastal Zone Act, ecological treasures of the Delaware coast, the importance of protected habitats to the extraordinary symbiotic between the red knot shorebird and the prehistoric horseshoe crab, local research and future directions connected to these topics.

“The Coastal Zone exhibition is excellent. I hope many students and visitors learn what an important act it was and continues to be,” said June Peterson.

Russell Peterson served as governor of Delaware from 1968-1972 and was a leader in passage of the Coastal Zone Act of 1972. After his service as governor, then-President Richard Nixon appointed him as chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality.

An online version of the exhibition is available at this website.

Photos by Wenbo Fan