Citation of Oakleigh Thorne II – BCAS Lifetime Achievement Award
Written By Sandra Laursen
On November 28, 2023 Boulder County Audubon Society awarded Dr. Oakleigh Thorne II a Lifetime Achievement Award for his dedication to education and conservation. Those who gathered for the BCAS November program watched a special showing of the film Mighty Oak before a question and answer session with Oak Thorne and filmmakers Pam Hoge and Christine Anderson.
Oak’s immense impact on future, not just past and current, conservation efforts was highlighted when one of the audience members shared that her 30-year-old daughter, who was mentored by Oak throughout her childhood, was on a flight to the 2023 UN Climate Change Conference (COP28) to represent an international conservation NGO. The ripples of Oak’s individual efforts will be felt long into the future.
Wonder and respect for the Earth have been lifelong guideposts for Dr. Oakleigh Thorne II. Across a career of seven decades, he has worked to mobilize people and communities to protect natural places. He helped to initiate and support numerous environmental nonprofits and led the development of the nation’s first Environmental Impact Statement. It is no exaggeration to name Oak as one of the founders of the modern environmental movement.
Here in Boulder, Oak was instrumental in achieving several conservation milestones, including the birth of the city’s Open Space program and protection of key sites including The People’s Crossing, Enchanted Mesa, and Sombrero Marsh.
Historian and former city council member Dan Corson explains,
Oak was one of a group of educated and public-minded young citizens who arrived in Boulder in the 1950s and 1960s and whose persistence and advocacy over many years resulted in retaining a high quality of life in the city, which included environmental preservation and protection. Oak and his colleagues remain the most important group in Boulder's history to positively affect the community's future.
Oak was one of the founding members of the committee to get the Boulder greenbelts sales tax passed in order to preserve habitat and provide open spaces. Photo courtesy of Pam Hoge and Christine Anderson.
Oak’s efforts have enhanced not only our treasured green belt but also enriched many of Boulder’s other significant institutions: CU Boulder, Naropa University, Boulder Valley Schools, the Conference on World Affairs, the American Music Research Center, and Cal-Wood Outdoor Education Center, to name a few. In addition to building and bolstering institutions, Oak also does the detail work-- banding birds, one leg at a time, for over 80 years, and teaching literally hundreds of thousands of students, one mind at a time, about ecology, environment, economics and human welfare.
Keith Desrosiers, executive director of Thorne Nature Experience, writes
Oak is one of the great legends of the early environmental movement in the United States. His myriad of notable accomplishments include the creation of the Boulder Open Space program. His greatest legacy, though, is the countless lives he has touched through the namesake organization he founded in 1954, Thorne Nature Experience. Here Oak has ensured that Boulder County youth have the opportunity to build an empathetic connection to the natural world and follow in his footsteps to become the next generation of Earth stewards.
Oak delighted in sharing nature with children of all ages. Bird banding was an activity that engaged and delighted everyone. Here children are able to view and touch a Dark-eyed Junco. Photo courtesy of Pam Hoge and Christine Anderson.
Building on this theme, ecologist and writer Steve Jones shares,
During all the years I've worked with young people in the field, they inevitably ask me, ‘Do you know Oak Thorne?’ His curiosity and generosity have inspired thousands of aspiring young naturalists. The warmth of his personality has reached out to and supported every facet of the environmental community, from bird banders to habitat restoration programs to conservation activists.
Naturalist Dave Sutherland says,
I want to be Oak Thorne when I grow up. This guy has done so much to protect our environment and our special places, especially in Boulder. Every time you go for a hike on Open Space you should say a silent thank you to this man, for he was instrumental in securing its protection. It is a gift he gave our children, and our children's children.
Children and all of us benefit from these gifts from Oak: green space, mentoring, curiosity and environmental consciousness – and the children teach him too. As Oak himself puts it,
It’s fun to go to work every day and connect kids with nature. Little kids are nearer to the ground and often see things we adults miss.
Well, we didn’t miss this. In Boulder County, we are proud to call Oak Thorne a mighty oak of our own. And today, Boulder County Audubon Society is proud to honor Dr. Oakleigh Thorn II with our Lifetime Achievement Award.
Dr. Oakleigh Thorne II with the BCAS Lifetime Achievement Award. Photo by Sandra Laursen.