Sagebrush Country: Land and the American West - Hardcover

Fradkin, Philip L.

3.88

24 ratings by Goodreads

9780394529356: Sagebrush Country: Land and the American West

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0394529359 ISBN 13: 9780394529356

Publisher: Alfred A. Knopf, 1989

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As the author tours he comments on the history and conditions of the place, the area around the Uinta Mountains, as an example of what occurred in the whole West

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From Publishers Weekly:

In A River No More: The Colorado River and the West , Fradkin examined water use in the interior West. This companion volume focuses on land use and public lands in the Uinta Mountains where Utah, Wyoming and Colorado meet. It is a region relatively free of tourists, one that embraces all the natural-resource issues of the West--water, wilderness, grazing, minerals, recreation, wildlife concerns. Local people hold strong proprietary feelings about the lands even though they are controlled by federal land-management agencies. Fradkin set out with a 60-pound backpack for a 10-day walk through the Uintas, west to east. This contemporary journey evokes past history, from Indians and trappers to emigrants and railroaders; from settlers and scientists to regulators and preservers. The author argues that the use, abuse and preservation of natural resources is the most discernible trail across the mountains and through the deserts of the West. Readers dedicated to environmental concerns will want to read this fine book. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal:

Interspersing history with personal descriptions, the author, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, uses the framework of his nine-day solo backpack trip to tell the tale of "the heartland of the American West," the Unita Mountains, which are bordered by the "sagebrush states" of Utah, Wyoming, and Colorado. He describes the "long line of transient occupants," who, boom-to-bust, leave a "familiar residue of hard times." The West, he says, was and is "constantly being rediscovered." This book is similar in style to his A River No More: The Colorado River and the West ( LJ 4/15/81), but does not have the unity or impact of that work. Fradkin seems to have become more cynical over the years, and too frequent references to his own health have a somewhat jarring effect. However, this has some wonderful history in it and is well researched.
- Diane M. Brown, Univ. of California Lib., Berkeley
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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