Over one hundred scholars assembled for the conference. Environmental history was broadly defined, for the purposes of the conference, as including “all studies of the relationship between human societies and the natural environment through time” (4). Four subareas were covered: (i) changing values and attitudes toward nature and their significance; (ii) the effects of human economic activity on the natural environment and vice versa; (iii) the history of conservation and environmentalist movements, and (iv) the role of professionals such as scientists and engineers in transforming nature and their relationship to environmental thought and movements.