Ellen Peterson, nee Salisbury, was born in Georgia on December 5, 1923.
She graduated from the University of Georgia in 1945 with a degree in Chemistry and 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. She also became a fierce advocate for our wildlife and wild places.

Ellen was a warrior when it came to the environment; she cared deeply and devoted her life to saving the planet and protecting Mother Earth. She served on many boards and advisory committees.

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.

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 spoke out against those who threatened the Big Cypress National Preserve.  She worked with several local environmental groups, filing 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.

Ellen received the 2008 John Kaber award from the Everglades Coalition and the Florida Wildlife Federation named Ellen outstanding environmentalist of 2008, and she has received numerous other grateful recognitions. Ellen lived to see her biggest goal realized: the creation of the Happehatchee Center in Estero. Ellen turned her beautiful property and home into an eco-spiritual center for all in the community to enjoy. Anyone who entered through the gates immediately felt the peace and energy of this very special place.

Ellen Peterson was a fierce, protective voice for all living creatures on Earth: human, animal, and plant. She championed many social causes, such as equal rights for women and fair wages for farm workers. She advocated for those who could not speak for themselves.

Peterson passed away on October 14, 2011.

FGCU holds an archive of her work online.