User:Holley Rauen/sandbox

{Userspace draft|source=ArticleWizard|date=November 2013}}

Ellen Peterson nee Salsbury was born in Georgia on December 5, 1923. She died at her home on October 14, 2011. When she was in her twenties she rode her own bicycle across the United States for the most part completely alone. Ellen graduated from the University of Georgia in 1945 with a degree in Chemistry and she received her Masters in counseling in 1963 from Appalachia State. She came to Southwest Florida shortly afterwards, and served as the Director of the Counseling Center at Edison College for many years. Ellen Peterson was a fierce protector of Florida's waterways and the Everglades. She was a well known environmental and a 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 against nuclear energy 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.

Ellen Peterson served on many boards and advisory committees such as: the Agency for Bay Management, the Environmental Confederation of Southwest Florida, Save Our Creeks, the Responsible Growth Management Coalition, The Everglades Committee, the Environmental Peace and Education Center and the Sierra Club’s Calusa Group. Ellen founded the Calusa Sierra group in the 1980s and remained the chairperson until her death. She also founded Save Our Creeks to save FishEating Creek in Glades County Florida and succeeded in stopping developers from damming the river.

Ellen spoke at countless county commission hearings, and her presence was powerful, always intelligently informed, and unrelenting. She was responsible for saving one of the most beautiful places in all of Southwest Florida, Fisheating Creek. Ellen fought to save the Florida panther, heritage trees, and many other listed and endangered species. She succeeded in obtaining outstanding Florida waterways designations for many of our local rivers and streams, providing them higher levels of protection. With the help of several environmental groups, Ellen fought and won the battle to stop a coal-fired power plant from going into Glades County. She protested and picketed against nuclear plants and was arrested for civil disobedience. She created a presentation to save the Imperial River and was successful in preventing the Water Management District from eliminating the oxbows, an action which could have destroyed much of the river, such as killing off fish hatcheries during flood events. Ellen attended countless community and government meetings to speak out against those who threatened the Big Cypress National Preserve, even when her opponents showed up on swamp buggies and carrying guns. She continually fought to protect several beaches and islands in SW Florida. With the backing of several local environmental groups, Ellen filed suit against the developers who wanted to overbuild and destroy our density-reduction ground water resource area. She was responsible for involving a scientist whom Lee County would later hire to do water quality testing. This scientist discovered that our red tides were directly linked to the releases from the Caloosahatchee River and Lake Okeechobee. Ellen led the efforts to investigate the minimum flows and levels for our ground water, and the research showed a sustained level of harm. She also sat on a Committee for the Route 951 Extension, because some of the proposed alignments invaded listed and endangered species habitat. In 2008 Ellen received the John Kaber award from the Everglades Coalition and the Florida Wildlife Federation. She was named "Outstanding Environmentalist of 2008".

Ellen Peterson turned her beautiful property and home into an eco-spiritual center for all in the community to enjoy. Five years before her death she founded the Happehatchee Center, on the five acres of her home on the Estero River. The property includes a swing bridge that Ellen 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 Bunker for Girl Scout Camps in the 1940s. She deeded the property to Happehatchee Eco-Spiritual Center to carry on her work in providing a sanctuary for peace and healing on her historic old Florida property on the Estero River. Happehatchee is considered a sacred place and continues to operate open to the public offering classes and seminars in a natural setting.