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The Hour of Land
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My experience of National Parks is limited to those in the East such as Everglades, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and Assateague Island National Seashore, so these western parks are new territory for me.
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I am now into the second chapter. This book is a great read.
Skipping around a bit. Really liked the chapter on Effigy Mounds. There are several mounds near my hometown in Ohio, including a Serpent effigy known as Serpent Mound. Very interesting places. I also like the use of color in the chapter on Big Bend.
Jump back to the chapter on Acadia national Park . Different from the others .
The chapter on Gulf Islands National Seashore is disturbing. Six years later and oil form the Deepwater Horizon is still coming ashore. I did a web search on Deepwater Horizon 2016 and found that a movie about it will be released in September. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yASb...
I have now finished all but the end matter and chapter four - the chapter on Gettysburg. Not sure why I cave that one for last, except that the Civil War is a subject on which I have an odd perspective, being an Ohioan living in Tennessee. I live near the Point Park unit of the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Battlefield http://www.chattanoogafun.com/members..., a park with several geographically separated units. The Confedearate victory which prompted a Union retreat at Chickamauga was a bloody battle indeed, and then the various Union victories at Chattanooga sent the Confederates running to Atlanta. This was after General Grant was reassigned to Chattanooga. I work in tourism, and occasionally deal with a reenactor who has his own civil war dinner theater and wears his Confedearate uniform all the time. His voice mail says that you have reached general Lee's mobile command post, and he frequently extols the virtues of Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy.
This book is my favorite of our recent selections. Already, I have finished it and find myself revisiting chapters, particularly the chapter on Effigy Mounds National Monument, Gulf Islands National Park, Canyonlands National Park, and Alcatraz Island, Golden Gate National Recreation Area. My adopted home of Chattanooga, Tennessee is undergoing a debate of water distribution, as the State of Tennessee and the State of Georgia engage in a border dispute that could give Georgia access to the Tennessee River. Very spirited. I found he comments on Major John Wesley Powell and quotations on his statements about irrigation and water very illuminating.
Effigy Mounds - final section
Just re read it and really enjoyed the description of the natural world around the bird effigy. Is anyone else enjoying this book?
I have the book, but am so far behind in my reading that I haven't even started it yet. Based on your input, I'm really looking forward to this one.
It is really a book about relationships - broken and healing. The relationship to the land is foremost, but the Gettysburg chapter is about dvisins never healed - I know this living in theSouth, whereThe Civil War is still being fought. Her comments are incisive. Relationships within her family also come into play.
I really liked the chapter on Teddy Roosevelt park. This discussion of oil and gas exploration coming up to the edge of the park was both sad and enlightening. We have a really challenge in this country to balance our energy demands with the consequences of that exploration. I spent time trying to protect wild places from energy exploration between 2000 and 2007. Often people were shocked to hear about things like what Terry presented in this chapter. I hope her book is well received and more people learn about these challenges. I am wading through the Gettysburg Chapter right now. Good book. Thanks.
Gettysburg chapter brought out issues facing a park near me, the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park.
Thanks & happy reading!
~Becky