The Man Who Created Paradise: A Fable

by Gene Logsdon, Gregory Spaid (Photographer), Wendell Berry (Foreword by)

Gene Logsdon’s The Man Who Created Paradise is a message of hope at a time when the very concept of earth stewardship is under attack. The fable, inspired by a true story, tells how Wally Spero looked at one of the bleakest places in America—a raw and barren strip-mined landscape—and saw in it his escape from the drudgery of his factory job. He bought an old bulldozer and used the machine to carve patiently, acre by acre, a beautiful little farm out of a seemingly worthless wasteland. Wally’s story is a charming distillation of the themes that the late, beloved Gene Logsdon returned to again and again in his many books and hundreds of articles. Environmental restoration is the task of our time. The work of healing our land begins in our own backyards and farms, in our neighborhoods and our regions. Humans can turn the earth into a veritable paradise—if they really want to. Noted photographer Gregory Spaid retraced the trail that Logsdon traveled when he was inspired to write The Man Who Created Paradise. His photographs evoke the same yearning for wholeness, for ties to land and community, that infuses the fable’s poetic prose.

72 pages, Hardcover

First published December 1, 2001

Reviews

[Merry · Rating 5 out of 5]

“If you can look at the landscapes produced by strip mining without reacting toward some vision of the land restored, then you not only are looking at one of the versions of Hell; you are in it.”

“‘It ain’t a return to anything and it ain’t simple,’ he said. ‘It’s going forward and it’s very complex.’”

[Kirstin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Logsdon takes a real-life premise--a man reclaiming farmland from spent strip mines with his bulldozer--and lets his imagination run wild, creating a thriving, innovative rural community that "ain't a return to anything and it ain't simple.... It's going forward and it's very complex." Very inspiring about where imagination + community can take us.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

The story of a farmer in Appalachian Ohio who turned strip mined land into sustainable farms.

An amazing story of an individual who had an idea and a tractor.

Again, thanks to Worthington's 'Ohio' shelf I found a great book I would not have found otherwise.