He touched so many lives, including three of the Climate & Capital Media team over decades…here’s how we remember him
Blair Palese
I had the incredible good fortune of having Peter Dykstra walk back into Greenpeace as my boss not long after I arrived as an envelope stuffer in 1989. Back then, I had no idea how lucky my timing was for turning up in the organization’s DC office. Peter had stepped out of Greenpeace briefly as communications director to work for the public interest law firm, the Christic Institute. When he decided to return, the Greenpeace world was grateful to have him, his legacy, and his quick-witted sense of humor back in the fold.
Left on the ice
Peter was legendary at Greenpeace. In the 1970s and ‘80s, he’d taken part in or promoted most of the organization’s legendary “actions.” This included being part of the Arctic team (and famously getting accidentally left behind on the ice!) that painted baby Harp Seals with a green dye to make their fur useless to cudgel-wielding hunters.
He supported activists running into the U.S. nuclear zone before tests and dumped marbles in the office of the Secretary of Interior — because he had clearly lost his marbles. The French government decided it was acceptable to blow up the Rainbow Warrior in an Auckland harbor after protests against their atmospheric nuclear testing in the Pacific, killing photographer Fernando Periera…the NGO lawsuit of all time followed. I was around when Peter became somewhat obsessed with tracking the solar panels Jimmy Carter put on the White House (and Regan famously removed) through a FOI request, eventually finding them in some cavernous warehouse and at a college in Maine. In truth, these were to be the heydays for Greenpeace and Peter had much to do with that.
On his return to Greenpeace’s 14th Street office in DC, Peter officially made me a press officer and started giving me more and more rope. I took it. In addition to being the funniest person I’ve ever worked with he was a trickster. He delighted in playing recordings of the office’s new phone system over the loudspeaker – early techno? – and coming up with clever ways to get under the skin of polluting corporations. He also had a phenomenal memory. When sending out press releases about a protest or report launch, I would shout out the name of the newspaper I needed to call, and Peter would, off the top of his head, return with the area code and phone number. He knew them all. He kept a giant stack of papers about whatever was going on on his desk, and every few months, he’d grab the recycling bin, lift off the top five pages, and sweep the rest into the bin, usually before an audience.
In Peter’s time, Greenpeace achieved globally impactful results—a ban on that fur seal hunt in Canada, an end to nuclear testing in Nevada and atmospheric testing in the Pacific, a ban on commercial whaling, a global ban on driftnet fishing, and the putting of Antarctica off-limits to mining and development, to name just a few. The media covered these stories around the world, in large part thanks to Peter.
Send in the hometown girl
For my first “solo action” on comms, Peter delighted in sending me to my hometown of Wilmington, Delaware, where a brave team of Greenpeace climbers hung a giant #1 polluter blue ribbon banner on a giant DuPont water tower above one of the company’s more toxic sites…and stayed for days. Something about the hometown girl returning to cause trouble seemed like a great idea to Peter. My parent’s DuPont friends, not so much.
Peter was a great baseball lover and Greenpeace’s biggest advocate for our softball team, the Sea Slugs. No one said no to Peter’s recruiting efforts, including me. And nothing made Peter happier than a summer night’s highly competitive game on Capitol Hill against, say, the Environmental Protection Agency, followed by a team beer.
I departed Greenpeace USA to head up the press desk for Greenpeace International in 1994 and kept in touch with Peter when I could. He had gone on to work for Ted Turner at some new media outlet called CNN, where he did his damnedest to keep environmental stories and, eventually, climate change at the top of the story list. At CNN, he was a groundbreaker. Peter was the executive producer of CNN’s new science, tech, and weather unit, winning multiple awards, including an Emmy and a Peabody. I saw him last in person when he was deputy director at the Pew Charitable Trust, where he complained bitterly about the marble foyer and the dress code. Later, he helped found and run Environmental Health News and the Daily Climate and edited ENN and NPR’s Living on Earth, among others. Only Peter could get away with a story in Scientific America headlined, “Is Global Warming Causing More Home Runs in Baseball?”
Hell on wheels
After the global Covid lockdowns, I traveled from Sydney to the U.S. for a work project and gave Peter a call. I knew about the infection that led to his becoming paralyzed and wheelchair-bound. It was hard to imagine such a thing happening to such a force of nature. When we spoke, he told me he required constant care, and the incredible costs, despite a lifetime of hard work, were more than his health insurance would cover. Despite these all-consuming worries, he never lost his sense of humor. He was famous in Atlanta for rolling around in a Putin-Trump 2024 t-shirt just to see who might be brave enough to have a go at a man in a wheelchair.
We talked about the work he was still doing despite his huge health challenges, what the old U.S. comms crew and I were up to, and he asked me when I was coming to see him. I had just been talking about adding an Atlanta stop to my next trip to the U.S. when Peter’s son let the Greenpeace alumni world know that he died on July 31, after complications from pneumonia. He was 67.
Peter was not only my mentor but, quite frankly, taught me everything I know. My 40-plus-year career—from Greenpeace U.S. and Greenpeace International to founding 350.org in Australia and Climate & Capital Media—would not have happened without him. I’m pretty sure this is true for many he knew and worked with.
Peter, as we activists like to say, Rest in Power. The world feels your loss.
Peter McKillop
The Boston Boys: Peter Dykstra & Steve Sawyer
I first met Peter in Boston in the summer of 1978. One day, walking down Commonwealth Avenue, I saw a Greenpeace poster on a lamppost saying you could make big money-saving whales.
With dreams of the Rainbow Warrior, I marched to Boston’s old-world Beacon Hill, where Greenpeace was. There, Peter Dykstra was busy helping David Bigley set up Greenpeace’s first office in Boston, a small office above a bar in an old Federalist-style townhouse.
We were soon joined by Steve Sawyer. He and my friend Adi Ignatiu had gone to Haverford. After graduation, Steve was selling zirconium diamonds. He hated that job. We quickly recruited Steve, who was fundamental in setting up what Greenpeace became over his 17 years there and would go on to become the global Greenpeace International Director.
But it Boton, we quickly learned there would be no Rainbow Warrior for us. Instead, we were the first legion of “canvassers” who would go door to door raising money for Greenpeace’s next extensive campaigns. It could have been worse. Boston was a target-rich city of liberals and whale lovers.
Target-rich environment
For the next eight months, we canvassed Boston and its liberal, wealthy suburbs. The day always started at around 4 pm at the Mug and Muffin on Harvard Square, where we would procrastinate for hours over coffee (and muffins) as the nights got darker and colder. It was the year of the Blizzard of 1978 when 35 inches of snow fell on the city. It was so cold that Steve would come back every night with long icicles hanging from his beard.
But when you need to pay rent, there is no obstacle, including Dobermans, cultists or the police, too big to overcome. We had endless doors slammed in our faces. Being a canvasser makes you appreciate the small things in life, like a warm house on a frigid night, smelling soup cooking on the stove as we stamped our frozen feet while the owner went off to get a checkbook with a glass of wine in her hand.
The Peter formula
But Peter made it worth our while with the “Peter formula.” You could predict a suitable donor by the ratio of the size of the house and the age and make of a car parked in the driveway. An old Volvo next to a Victorian = $$$$$. A new Caddy in front of a ranch house = don’t even bother. We would flash a full-color Greenpeace magazine full of bloody Harp Seals on white ice, and act out the slaughter, “See, see this? Save the little cute furry seals…please” It rarely failed.
However, you needed a sense of humor to do this job, and Peter had that in spades. At the end of the day, we would recount our flirtations with bored housewives, the cheapskates who once gave us a 12-cent check, the whale haters, etc.
Peter and Steve arrived at Greenpeace at a critical moment. By 1978, Greenpeace was growing and changing. Both would become the quintessential ‘new’ Greenpeacers, visionaries of their era. To them, Greenpeace was not just an adventure but serious business. Both were so different. Steve was the quiet, intense, earnest, somewhat humorless guy from New Hampshire – all business and commitment. Peter was the Energizer Bunny in a Red Sox t-shirt, always on the move and ready to jump into a discussion.
Kings of a New Era
Both were instrumental in scaling Greenpeace’s secret sauce of success: Maximizing the PR bang from outrageous, anti-establishment actions, like blocking whaling ships in Zodiacs. As the leader of Greenpeace International, Steve scaled the organization globally, while Peter, as the head of communications, built a global brand and reputation. Both helped make Greenpeace the bane of governments worldwide.
Washington, DC
One day, Peter had the zaniest idea: Why don’t we open an office in the belly of the beast, Washington, DC? A month or so later, we took a fact-finding trip to the nation’s capital and were shocked at what we saw – everyone was wearing suits and looking very adult. A classic Greenpeace debate (at that time) broke out about whether getting an office in DC would be a sell-out. Steve was against the idea, and Peter was for it. Peter won that one.
Our year as a band of Greenpeace brothers – and it was primarily brothers – are now faded memories for those of us lucky to be alive. The nightly bullshit sessions, the plotting and scheming on how to close down the Seabrook nuclear power plant or what kind of paint to splash on baby Harp Seals to disrupt the hunt.
Fading memories and endless idealism
Our youth is gone, as are Steve and Pete. But the Greenpeace spirit is alive and well – endlessly replenished by a new generation driven by the same idealism and desire to save the planet. Steve and Peter, like most Geenpeacers, were “doers” first and foremost. Saving the earth is a lifelong mission, no matter the odds. And having fun doing it, makes it even more satisfying.
Greenpeace has always stood out for its creativity, impact and mission. It has always punched above its weight. Peter Dykstra was but one small, loved cog, but as communications director at Greenpeace, he helped make sure Greenpeacers were the most visible environmentalists of the era. Peter did what so few groups do well: He made the environment accessible to all. I can‘t help but think those hours of canvassing were instrumental in grounding Peter in with the people.
Barclay Palmer
Peter was brilliant in making what at CNN was a hard sell: Explaining why environmental and climate news, which generally occurs in a vast but gradual and more remote arc, was important. Even more important than what a ratings-aware news network devoted itself to – urgent human-focused news, including war, politics, financial markets, tech, showbiz and other forms of human competition and conflict. How?
Peter pitched us with understatement and wry humor. On the daily CNN network call, attended by hundreds of journalists or managers around the world, I remember Peter pitching coverage of events such as a vast oil or chemical spill, noting that, “Ok, only a few people were killed, but hundreds or thousands of people were exposed, and became ill or would likely become ill later.” Although virtually every time it was (almost) inexplicably difficult to get clear data on how many were ill, and how badly, Peter saw how such disasters speak to the repeated dangers of how we distribute toxic substances, and the injustice of what people and/or animals and the environment are put at risk.
Yawn?
When I was the senior producer at NewsNight, Anderson Cooper 360 and Amanpour, primarily responsible for handling pitches and reports from news gathering teams, Peter would sometimes call and make his pitches directly, often with an added dash of wry ribbing. “Ok, I know that our climate and eventually our lives spinning toward some scary situation doesn’t seem as exciting as some senator accusing some candidate of some shocking, though unproven and fleeting impropriety…But maybe you can work this in for 90 seconds before the fluff piece that ends the show?”
Look up
I learned to “look up” from Peter and a few others, and I tried to honor his profound insights and ribbings by helping to get some of his many urgent reports into our ephemeral shows. But at these news networks, I also felt I had failed Peter somewhat – and the planet. I felt, and continue to feel, that “news” outlets keep missing the biggest stories of our time. This is a key reason I felt I needed to leave “news” and switch to examining what, when we step back from the daily noise, is really happening around us – and inviting others to join the wise people who are working on this, too. I hope that with more data and sadly increasing impacts, we can succeed this time. But I don’t know that. And Peter’s wry ribbing will always be in the back of my mind.
Thank you, Peter. Peace be with you. And all.
