One day in 1973, tired of arguing with people about his beliefs and actions, John Francis stopped speaking. His silence lasted for 17 years.
Francis had already earned a reputation as a bit eccentric by the time he decided that talking didn’t serve his goals. Two years earlier, after the collision of two tankers in San Francisco Bay caused a massive oil spill, he had stopped using all forms of motorized transportation. Occasionally he biked or sailed, but mostly he traveled on foot as a form of environmental protest. He called himself the Planetwalker.
But what was the point, people would ask.