Owning A Piece Of History

"My internal lust to own old found objects is not altogether different from the external struggles over ownership that define environmentalism," writes Steven Moss, publisher of the Neighborhood Environmental Newswire. "At one end of the continuum, Americans strongly believe in the right to own, and sell, almost everything, from cleaning products that emit health-damaging volatile organic compounds to nature itself, in the form of large tracts of private property populated by wild animals. Where we draw the line between what can be owned and what cannot defines how strongly we feel about environmental protection, and about the common good."