Who gains from saving nature
Ledger 1 : 33 — For each dollar financing nature-based solutions in 2023, about $33 financed activities harmful to nature. (UNEP)
Cases / Lobbying, PR and greenwashing · United States · 1953–2023

Keep America Beautiful founding and Crying Indian ad (US)

Nature's voice · report
No measurement of the harm done to me here is on record.
Did nature suffer? Not measured.
Not on record
  • The record does not name which of my species, waters, soils or forests were harmed.
What the record lacks: 5 insufficient · 1 not measured · 1 disputed See the gaps

Keep America Beautiful was founded in December 1953 by a can maker and a glass-bottle maker. In 1971 its 'Crying Indian' advertisement presented litter as a matter of individual behaviour, while its executives opposed container deposit laws.

American Can and Owens-IllinoisFounders of the litter-prevention group, December 1953
Coca-Cola and Dixie Cup joined later; the founders did not announce their involvement.

Status As of 2023 (latest dated item): KAB transferred the copyright of the 1971 advertisement to the National Congress of American Indians.

What?
A litter-prevention group founded by packaging companies ran a 1971 advertisement that presented litter as individual behaviour, and its executives opposed deposit laws. Finis Dunaway (via whatitmeanstobeamerican.org)
Where?
United States.
When?
Founded December 1953; advertisement aired on Earth Day 1971; copyright transferred 2023.
Who?
Gained
  • American Can and Owens-Illinois (founders) — Founded and supported an organisation whose executives opposed deposit laws that would have pushed producers towards reusable containers (Dunaway). Finis Dunaway (via whatitmeanstobeamerican.org)
Lost
None on record
Harmed
None on record
Why?
Per Rogers, KAB was a reaction to Vermont's ban on no-deposit beer bottles; per Dunaway, its executives opposed deposit laws. Finis Dunaway (via whatitmeanstobeamerican.org)
How?
Advertising Council campaigns, the 1971 'Crying Indian' advertisement, and opposition to deposit laws.
6 of 6 questions answered from the record

What happened

The record, in order.

Keep America Beautiful (KAB) was founded in December 1953 by American Can, a can manufacturer, and Owens-Illinois, a glass-bottle manufacturer. Coca-Cola and Dixie Cup joined later, and the founders did not announce their participation. Author Heather Rogers has written that KAB was a reaction to Vermont's ban, in the same year, on beer bottles without a deposit; the Vermont law ended four years later.

KAB joined the Advertising Council in 1961. The 'Crying Indian' advertisement, in which a man in traditional dress looks at a polluted landscape and weeps, first aired on Earth Day 1971 and won two Clio advertising awards. The slogan said that people start pollution and that people can stop it. The advertisement's actor, Iron Eyes Cody, was of Italian descent; his birth name was Espera DeCorti. KAB transferred the copyright of the advertisement to the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI) in 2023.

According to historian Finis Dunaway, KAB executives opposed deposit laws that would have pushed producers towards reusable containers and described those who supported such laws as communists. The Audubon Society and the Sierra Club left KAB's advisory board for that reason. Tennessee chose in 1981 a small container tax instead of a deposit, and directed the revenue to litter crews and Keep Tennessee Beautiful. The tobacco industry ran cigarette-butt clean-up programmes with KAB in place of smoking bans.

KAB's own 2020 study found about twice as much beverage-container litter in states without deposit laws, according to Resource Recycling. Between 2017 and 2020 a KAB and Dow programme, the Hefty EnergyBag, was marketed as 'recycling'; plastic collected in Omaha was burned in a cement kiln, and material from Boise also went to a cement kiln.

  1. 1953KAB founded in December by American Can and Owens-Illinois
  2. 1961KAB joins the Advertising Council
  3. 1971'Crying Indian' advertisement airs on Earth Day; two Clio awards
  4. 1981Tennessee chooses a container tax instead of a deposit law
  5. 2017KAB and Dow launch the Hefty EnergyBag programme (2017-2020); collected plastic burned in cement kilns
  6. 2020KAB study: about twice as much beverage-container litter in states without deposit laws
  7. 2023KAB transfers copyright of the advertisement to the NCAI

What was said

Claims, in the words of those who made them.

Where accounts differ

Each party's account, side by side, with its source. The record does not settle these points; it shows them.

Did KAB's litter framing shift responsibility from producers to individuals?
Researchers
Finis Dunaway, historian

KAB executives opposed deposit laws that would force producers towards reusable containers and called their supporters communists.

Finis Dunaway (via whatitmeanstobeamerican.org)
Company or project
KAB (1971 advertisement, as described in the record)

People start pollution and people can stop it.

Company or project
KAB (2020 study)

Beverage-container litter was about twice as high in states without deposit laws.

Resource Recycling

How it looked

What was shown, beside what was recorded.

Shown

  • Litter presented as a moral problem, with the person who litters called a 'litterbug'
    KAB campaigns
  • A man in traditional dress weeps at a polluted landscape; the slogan says people start pollution and people can stop it
    KAB's 1971 advertisement (as described in the record)
  • The Hefty EnergyBag programme marketed as 'recycling'
    Dow and KAB, 2017-2020 · Plastics Today

Recorded

  • Founded in December 1953 by American Can and Owens-Illinois; Coca-Cola and Dixie Cup joined later and the founders did not announce their participation
    Resource Recycling
  • KAB executives opposed deposit laws and called their supporters communists; the Audubon Society and the Sierra Club left the advisory board (Dunaway)
    Finis Dunaway (via whatitmeanstobeamerican.org)
  • The actor in the advertisement, Iron Eyes Cody, was of Italian descent; birth name Espera DeCorti
  • KAB's own 2020 study found about twice as much beverage-container litter in states without deposit laws
    Resource Recycling
  • Hefty EnergyBag: plastic collected in Omaha was burned in a cement kiln; material from Boise also went to a cement kiln
    Plastics Today
  • Tobacco industry ran cigarette-butt clean-up programmes with KAB in place of smoking bans
  • Copyright of the advertisement transferred to the NCAI in 2023

Who gained

Money that reached nature, beside money that stayed elsewhere.

Reached nature or the ground

Not published
No figure published.

Gained elsewhere

Not totalled
Currency: · Window: . All figures cover the same period. * Estimate built from cited figures.

Responses on record

  • kab (2023): Transferred the copyright of the 'Crying Indian' advertisement to the National Congress of American Indians.
  • kab (2020): Its own 2020 study found about twice as much beverage-container litter in states without deposit laws. · Resource Recycling

In court and with insurers

Every proceeding and every insurer decision on record.

Lawsuits and rulings

No court case on record. No court has ruled on this case.

Insurers

No insurer decision on record.

What nature saw

Outcomes measured on the ground, and nature's note.

Nature's report opens this page. Below: further outcomes measured on the ground.

Beverage-container litter in non-deposit states
about 2x
KAB's own 2020 study, compared with states with deposit laws
Hefty EnergyBag plastic
Burned
Omaha plastic burned in a cement kiln; Boise material sent to a cement kiln (2017-2020)

What we don't know

Undisclosed, unproven, untried: recorded as data.

Nature

  • Not measured Harm to nature: The record holds no measurement of harm to nature.

Accounts

  • Disputed Did KAB's litter framing shift responsibility from producers to individuals?

Record

  • Insufficient Reported but not independently verified: that the Vermont law ended four years later after beer-industry lobbying.
  • Insufficient Reported but not independently verified: that the advertisement was produced by the agency Marsteller Inc. with the Advertising Council.
  • Insufficient Reported but not independently verified: that KAB's funders have included PepsiCo, Coca-Cola, Philip Morris, Anheuser-Busch and WM (SourceWatch and The Intercept, deposit-law advocacy sources).
  • Insufficient Reported but not independently verified: that Oregon's 1971 deposit law passed despite bottler lobbying, and that the beverage industry paid about 75% of the budget of the clean-up group SOLV.
  • Insufficient Reported but not independently verified: that the word 'litterbug' predates KAB (uses from 1939 and 1947) and was popularised by KAB in the 1950s and 1960s.

Did the harm stop?

Not a harm event: the record concerns how litter was framed and who opposed deposit laws. The Hefty EnergyBag programme ran from 2017 to 2020 and its plastic was burned in cement kilns.

Who paid?

Not established in the sources reviewed.

Sources

Voices on record: — Company or project— Government and regulators— Courts✓ Press and investigations— Communities and civil society✓ Researchers

Press and investigations

Researchers

  1. The Crying Indian ad that fooled the environmental movement
    Finis Dunaway (via whatitmeanstobeamerican.org) · 2017

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Related matters, and cases linked to this one through the same organisations, with the role each played in both.
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