Scapa Society
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox organization
| name = Scapa Society
| full_name = Society for Checking the Abuses in Public Advertising
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| formation = 1893
| founder = Richardson Evans
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The Scapa Society (Society for Checking{{cite book |last1=Rollins |first1=William H. |title=A greener vision of home : cultural politics and environmental reform in the German Heimatschutz movement, 1904-1918 |date=1997 |publisher=University of Michigan Press |isbn=9780472108091 |pages=64–67 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rvZLaVPitQYC&q=%22scapa+society%22&pg=PA64 |chapter=Aesthetic perception and environmental reform in modern Europe}} (or Controlling{{cite book |last1=Fletcher |first1=Winston |title=Advertising : a very short introduction |date=2010 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780191614279 |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=FqVkfuPrWJcC&q=%22scapa+society%22&pg=PT143 |chapter=The Good, the Bad and the Ugly}}) the Abuses in Public Advertising) was an organization founded in Britain in 1893 to protest against the burgeoning advertising business. It was founded by Richardson Evans, and has been called "the first organised reaction against advertising"{{cite journal |last1=Nevett |first1=Terry |title=The Scapa society: The first organised reaction against advertising |journal=Media, Culture & Society |date=1981 |volume=3 |issue=2 |pages=179–187 |doi=10.1177/016344378100300207 |s2cid=143994207 }}{{Cite book|last=Vang, Pamela, 1953-|title=Good guys : a cultural semiotic study of the print advertising of the oil industry (1900-2000)|date=2014|publisher=Department of Culture and Communication, Linköping University|others=Linköpings universitet. Institutionen för kultur- och kommunikation.|isbn=978-91-7519-318-2|location=Linköping|pages=87, 91–92|oclc=941607357}}{{cite book |last1=Licence |first1=Tom |title=What the Victorians Threw Away |date=2016 |publisher=Oxbow Books |isbn=978-1-78297-878-7 |page=16 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=lkG8DQAAQBAJ&q=%22scapa+society%22&pg=PA16 |accessdate=25 February 2020 |language=en}}
Its early members included William Morris, Rudyard Kipling, William Holman Hunt, Arthur Quiller-Couch and John Everett Millais. Morris's last public speech before his death, in 1896, was at a meeting of the society. He spoke of the general lack of concern for environmental issues: "We have to remember that the enormous majority of the people of the country do not care one straw about natural beauty".
The society published a journal A Beautiful World from 1893 until at least 1922.{{cite web |title=Catalogue record for: A beautiful world : the journal of the Society for Checking the Abuses of Public Advertising |url=https://discover.libraryhub.jisc.ac.uk/search?q=beautiful%20world%20scapa&rn=4 |website=Library Hub Discover |publisher=Jisc |accessdate=25 February 2020}} Its work helped bring about the Advertisements Regulation Act 1907, which controlled structures over {{convert|12|feet}} tall in areas of natural beauty.
By 1933 it had changed its name to The SCAPA Society for the Prevention of Disfigurement in Town and Country, and produced a report on the disposal of domestic refuse in the countryside, in conjunction with the Women's Institutes. It later became the Advisory Council for the Control of Outdoor Advertising.{{cite web |title=Folder entitled Scapa - Society for the Prevention of Disfigurement in Town and Country (now called Advisory Council for the Control of Outdoor Advertising) |url=https://discovery.nationalarchives.gov.uk/details/r/21aea765-3d76-487a-9845-634c37ec0c8f |publisher=The National Archives |accessdate=25 February 2020 |language=English }}