Excerpts:

Many think America's conservation ethic started with Teddy Roosevelt, but that dismisses another 300 years of protecting public space.

Jim Levitt, Harvard University's conservation innovation program director, said the Puritans fostered the tradition in 1634 when they decided to tax themselves for the creation of Boston Common. Those same ideals underpin contemporary efforts like Montana's Blackfoot Challenge, where landowners, industry leaders and government officials have banded together to protect the land they all depend on.