Mr. Hornaday's War

Mr. Hornaday's War PDF Author: Stefan Bechtel
Publisher: Beacon Press
ISBN: 080700636X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 273

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Book Description
He was complex, quirky, pugnacious, and difficult. He seemed to create enemies wherever he went, even among his friends. A fireplug of a man who stood only five feet eight inches in his stocking feet, he had an outsized ambition to make his mark on the world. And he did. William Temple Hornaday (1854-1937) was probably the most famous conservationist of the nineteenth century, second only to his great friend and ally Theodore Roosevelt. Hornaday's great passion was protecting wild things and wild places, and he spent most of his adult life in a state of war on their behalf, as a taxidermist and museum collector; as the founder and first director of the National Zoo in Washington, DC; as director of the Bronx Zoo for thirty years; and as the author of nearly two dozen books on conservation and wildlife. But in Mr. Hornaday's War, the long-overdue biography of Hornaday by journalist Stefan Bechtel, the grinding contradictions of Hornaday's life also become clear. Though he is credited with saving the American bison from extinction, he began his career as a rifleman and trophy hunter who led "the last buffalo hunt" into the Montana Territory. And what happened in 1906 at the Bronx Zoo, when Hornaday displayed an African man in a cage, shows a side of him that is as baffling as it is repellent. This gripping new book takes an honest look at a fascinating and enigmatic man.

Mr. Hornaday's War

Mr. Hornaday's War PDF Author: Stefan Bechtel
Publisher: Beacon Press
ISBN: 080700636X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 273

Get Book Here

Book Description
He was complex, quirky, pugnacious, and difficult. He seemed to create enemies wherever he went, even among his friends. A fireplug of a man who stood only five feet eight inches in his stocking feet, he had an outsized ambition to make his mark on the world. And he did. William Temple Hornaday (1854-1937) was probably the most famous conservationist of the nineteenth century, second only to his great friend and ally Theodore Roosevelt. Hornaday's great passion was protecting wild things and wild places, and he spent most of his adult life in a state of war on their behalf, as a taxidermist and museum collector; as the founder and first director of the National Zoo in Washington, DC; as director of the Bronx Zoo for thirty years; and as the author of nearly two dozen books on conservation and wildlife. But in Mr. Hornaday's War, the long-overdue biography of Hornaday by journalist Stefan Bechtel, the grinding contradictions of Hornaday's life also become clear. Though he is credited with saving the American bison from extinction, he began his career as a rifleman and trophy hunter who led "the last buffalo hunt" into the Montana Territory. And what happened in 1906 at the Bronx Zoo, when Hornaday displayed an African man in a cage, shows a side of him that is as baffling as it is repellent. This gripping new book takes an honest look at a fascinating and enigmatic man.

Theodore Roosevelt, Naturalist in the Arena

Theodore Roosevelt, Naturalist in the Arena PDF Author: Char Miller
Publisher: U of Nebraska Press
ISBN: 1496219856
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 261

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Book Description
Theodore Roosevelt’s scientific curiosity and love of the outdoors proved a defining force throughout his hectic life as a rancher and explorer, police commissioner and governor of New York, vice president and president of the United States. Conservation and natural history were parts of a whole for this driven, charismatic public servant, and Roosevelt approached the natural world with joy and a passionate engagement. Drawing on an array of approaches—biographical, ecological and environmental, literary and political, Theodore Roosevelt, Naturalist in the Arena analyzes this energetic man’s manifold encounters with the great outdoors. George Bird Grinnell, Gifford Pinchot, John Muir, and William Hornaday were among the many conservationists with whom Roosevelt corresponded, collaborated, hiked, and governed—and in turn, inspired. Together, Roosevelt and his contemporaries developed a progressive argument for the conservation of natural resources as a way to construct a more democratic nation-state. This legacy also comes with some troubling domestic and global implications, as Roosevelt fused his call for the conservation of resources—natural and human, domestically and internationally—with a deep-seated conviction that some were more fit than others to control the world and define its future.

The Extermination of the American Bison

The Extermination of the American Bison PDF Author: William T. Hornaday
Publisher: DigiCat
ISBN:
Category : Fiction
Languages : en
Pages : 276

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Book Description
DigiCat Publishing presents to you this special edition of "The Extermination of the American Bison" by William T. Hornaday. DigiCat Publishing considers every written word to be a legacy of humankind. Every DigiCat book has been carefully reproduced for republishing in a new modern format. The books are available in print, as well as ebooks. DigiCat hopes you will treat this work with the acknowledgment and passion it deserves as a classic of world literature.

Dust Bowls of Empire

Dust Bowls of Empire PDF Author: Hannah Holleman
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300230206
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 252

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Book Description
A profound reinterpretation of the Dust Bowl on the U.S. southern plains and its relevance for today The 1930s witnessed a harrowing social and ecological disaster, defined by the severe nexus of drought, erosion, and economic depression that ravaged the U.S. southern plains. Known as the Dust Bowl, this crisis has become a major referent of the climate change era, and has long served as a warning of the dire consequences of unchecked environmental despoliation. Through innovative research and a fresh theoretical lens, Hannah Holleman reexamines the global socioecological and economic forces of settler colonialism and imperialism precipitating this disaster, explaining critical antecedents to the acceleration of ecological degradation in our time. Holleman draws lessons from this period that point a way forward for environmental politics as we confront the growing global crises of climate change, freshwater scarcity, extreme energy, and soil degradation.

Woody’s Last Laugh

Woody’s Last Laugh PDF Author: James Christopher Haney
Publisher: John Hunt Publishing
ISBN: 1803410051
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
'When I was appointed Co-chair of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service team charged with preparing a preliminary recovery plan for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, I had naive notions about the work ahead. Dr. Haney’s book would have been an immense help in navigating the many strange behaviors, misconceptions, and bitter disagreements that ensued. Woody’s Last Laugh reveals that I, too, fell to faulty thinking about the Ivory-bill and the question of its continued existence or extinction. I highly recommend this book for anyone involved in endangered species recovery as a way to avoid the many cognitive biases that we all face.' Jon Andrew, Co-chair of Ivory-billed Woodpecker Recovery Team (retired) Woody's Last Laugh explores a simmering controversy amid scientists, conservationists, birders and the media: the supposed 'extinction' of American ivory-billed woodpecker. Among the first to identify rampant mental errors inside conservation and environmental professions, the book identifies 53 distinct kinds of cognitive blunders, psychological biases, and logical fallacies on both sides of the woodpecker controversy. Few species have ever provoked such social rancor. Why are rumors of its persistence so prevalent, unlike other near or recently extinct animals? Why are we so bad mannered with each other about a mere bird? How is it that we cannot agree even on whether a mere bird is alive or dead? Woody's Last Laugh uncovers why such mysteries so mess with our heads. By exploring uncharted borders between conservation and mental perception, new ways of evaluating truth and accuracy are opened to everyone. Author Dr. J. Christopher Haney is a biologist, conservation scientist and lifelong birder. For 12 years he was Chief Scientist at Defenders of Wildlife. In 2010, following the Deepwater Horizon oil blowout, the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service invited him to lead the largest pelagic study of marine birds ever conducted in the Gulf of Mexico. Since 2013 he has been president of Terra Mar Applied Sciences, an independent public-interest conservation research firm which he founded. If there is one lesson Dr. Haney hopes his book delivers, it is to not overvalue our thinking skills. Human reason is fallible, even among scientists and technical experts. To improve our essential relationship with nature, conservation practices will need to devote as much attention to the unbridled thoughts as the unswerving sentiments. Dead or alive, however, the ivory-bill got the last laugh on us all.

The Shotgun Conservationist

The Shotgun Conservationist PDF Author: Brant MacDuff
Publisher: Timber Press
ISBN: 1643260146
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 339

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Book Description
At the intersection of hunting and conservation, a man shares his personal journey from staunch anti-hunter to compassionate, ethical hunter, weaving together a larger history of humans, animals, the environment, and our food systems. The Shotgun Conservationist doesn’t teach us how to hunt, it explores why we should hunt. As public lands remain imperiled, factory farms pollute the earth and subject animals to inhumane conditions, and global uncertainty presses us all to be more self-sufficient, there has never been a better time to take up hunting. Writer, natural historian, and public speaker Brant MacDuff has done just that. An avid animal lover and raised as a non-hunter, MacDuff started his journey intending to investigate the claim that “hunting is conservation.” So convinced, he now holds a hunting license in four states and gives lectures on the positive impact it has on conservation efforts nationwide. Armed with years of experience in the field and a deep love for the natural world, MacDuff tells the provocative, humorous, and insightful story of how he became a hunter. Along the way, readers meet a cast of colorful characters and learn the firsthand research that helped change Brant’s mind. You may not book a hunting trip after reading The Shotgun Conservationist, but you’ll have a new perspective on and appreciation for those that do.

Nature's Mirror

Nature's Mirror PDF Author: Mary Anne Andrei
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 022673045X
Category : Science
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
It may be surprising to us now, but the taxidermists who filled the museums, zoos, and aquaria of the twentieth century were also among the first to become aware of the devastating effects of careless human interaction with the natural world. Witnessing firsthand the decimation caused by hide hunters, commercial feather collectors, whalers, big game hunters, and poachers, these museum taxidermists recognized the existential threat to critically endangered species and the urgent need to protect them. The compelling exhibits they created—as well as the scientific field work, popular writing, and lobbying they undertook—established a vital leadership role in the early conservation movement for American museums that persists to this day. Through their individual research expeditions and collective efforts to arouse demand for environmental protections, this remarkable cohort—including William T. Hornaday, Carl E. Akeley, and several lesser-known colleagues—created our popular understanding of the animal world and its fragile habitats. For generations of museum visitors, they turned the glass of an exhibition case into a window on nature—and a mirror in which to reflect on our responsibility for its conservation.

Re-Bisoning the West

Re-Bisoning the West PDF Author: Kurt Repanshek
Publisher: Torrey House Press
ISBN: 1948814005
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 173

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Book Description
"A much–needed look at the exceptionally fraught relationship between bison and people…engaging and comprehensive." —BOOKLIST "A fascinating perspective…Re–Bisoning the West demonstrates the complex relationships the species maintains with the earth and humanity itself." —FOREWORD REVIEWS Award–winning journalist Kurt Repanshek traces the history of bison from the species' near extinction to present–day efforts to bring bison back to the landscape—and the biological, political, and cultural hurdles confronting these efforts. Repanshek explores Native Americans' relationships with bison, and presents a forward–thinking approach to returning bison to the West and improving the health of ecosystems.

Guncrazy America

Guncrazy America PDF Author: Frank N. Egerton
Publisher: AuthorHouse
ISBN: 1546241590
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 433

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Book Description
The conclusion of this professor-historian (emeritus) is that our gun culture had its uses in establishing American civilization, as slavery did. But we came to recognize (after a bloody civil war) that slavery was a gigantic mistake, and now I think it’s time to realize that our gun culture was a similarly gigantic mistake, though of a different kind. And we need to do what we can to minimize its horrible impacts and move on to a more positive development of a humane civilization.

Men at War

Men at War PDF Author: Bill Fawcett
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1101151722
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 255

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Book Description
Epic battles?as seen through the eyes of the men who fought them. From Gettysburg to D-Day, history?s most momentous battles have been recounted to the world on a grand scale. This book, for the first time ever, looks at man?s most epic battles from the point of view of the soldiers on the front lines; providing new insight into the great wars of history. Stories told by the Roman Legionaire, the British Doughboy, and the American Doggie, delve into these battles and battlefronts: Roman Legion Third Crusade under Richard Lionheart Waterloo, French under Napoleon American Civil War: Gettysburg WWI: Americans at Ardennes WWII: Japanese Island Defense WWII: D-Day, Americans at Normandy Marines at Chosin.