Making the Most of Science in the American West: An Experiment

by Patricia Nelson Limerick

On August 1, 2003, the Center of the American West released its report, “Making the Most of Science in the American West.” In the report, we look at the key role that scientists have played in the West and in the shaping of natural resource policies that govern so much of the Western landscape. We asked Westerners to retain their faith in science, but to remodel the dream to make the most of our spectacular talent pool of scientists in universities, federal agencies, and non–governmental organizations throughout the West

Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 2003

About the author

Patricia Nelson Limerick is an American historian, considered to be one of the leading historians of the American West. She was born and raised in Banning, California.

Limerick received a B.A. in American Studies in 1972 from the University of California, Santa Cruz, and a Ph.D. in American Studies in 1980 from Yale University. She worked at Harvard University as an Assistant Professor from 1980 to 1984. Previously she taught at Yale as a graduate teaching assistant, where she helped teach the highly-regarded 'daily themes' class. Since then Limerick has been at the University of Colorado at Boulder, where she is Professor of History and chair of the Board of the Center of the American West.

Limerick is a former president of the American Studies Association (1996-1997) and the Western History Association (2000). She is known for her 1987 book The Legacy of Conquest, which is part of a body of historical writing sometimes known as the New Western History. In 1995, she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship.

Her essay on the Modoc War, titled "Haunted America" appears in the collection "Ways of Reading," a textbook widely used by undergraduate English students. She also co-edited a collection of essays, titled "Trails: Toward a New Western History," which relate to her famous 1989 Trails Through Time exhibit.