Authors Carl E. Fiedler and Stephen F. Arno recount the history of humans among the ponderosa pines, the historical role of fire, how and why the forest has changed, and what people can do to restore the forest to its former glory.

“Everything you could possibly want to know about the plants, animals, geology, climate and fungi of the Pacific Northwest mountains.” —The Oregonian Natural History of the Pacific Northwest Mountains is an engagingly written, portable history of Cascadia. It includes details about and identification tips for the flora, fauna, and geology of the region. If you are looking for a simple way to discover the great outdoors, this is the perfect overview of the Pacific Northwest. Covers the Coastal and Cascade Mountain Ranges, as well as the Olympic Mountains and Coast Mountains of southern British Columbia Describes more than 950 species of plants, animals, and mushrooms with helpful keys for easy identification User-friendly, color coded layout Compelling stories of the region’s plants, animals, and people bring the mountains alive The essential trailside reference for naturalists, hikers, and campers

"A volume for a lifetime" is how The New Yorker described the first of Donald Culross Peatie's two books about American trees published in the 1950s. In this one-volume edition, modern readers are introduced to one of the best nature writers of the last century. As we read Peattie's eloquent and entertaining accounts of American trees, we catch glimpses of our country's history and past daily life that no textbook could ever illuminate so vividly. Here you'll learn about everything from how a species was discovered to the part it played in our country’s history. Pioneers often stabled an animal in the hollow heart of an old sycamore, and the whole family might live there until they could build a log cabin. The tuliptree, the tallest native hardwood, is easier to work than most softwood trees; Daniel Boone carved a sixty-foot canoe from one tree to carry his family from Kentucky into Spanish territory. In the days before the Revolution, the British and the colonists waged an undeclared war over New England's white pines, which made the best tall masts for fighting ships. It's fascinating to learn about the commercial uses of various woods -- for paper, fine furniture, fence posts, matchsticks, house framing, airplane wings, and dozens of other preplastic uses. But we cannot read this book without the occasional lump in our throats. The American elm was still alive when Peattie wrote, but as we read his account today we can see what caused its demise. Audubon's portrait of a pair of loving passenger pigeons in an American beech is considered by many to be his greatest painting. It certainly touched the poet in Donald Culross Peattie as he depicted the extinction of the passenger pigeon when the beech forest was destroyed. A Natural History of North American Trees gives us a picture of life in America from its earliest days to the middle of the last century. The information is always interesting, though often heartbreaking. While Peattie looks for the better side of man's nature, he reports sorrowfully on the greed and waste that have doomed so much of America's virgin forest.

The extraction of raw turpentine and tar from the southern longleaf pine -- along with the manufacture of derivative products such as spirits of turpentine and rosin -- constitutes what was once the largest industry in North Carolina and one of the most important in the South: naval stores production. In a pathbreaking study that seamlessly weaves together business, environmental, labor, and social history, Robert B. Outland III offers the first complete account of this sizable though little-understood sector of the southern economy. Outland traces the South's naval stores industry from its colonial origins to the mid-twentieth century, when it was supplanted by the rising chemicals industry. A horror for workers and a scourge to the Southeast's pine forests, the methods and consequences of this expansive enterprise remained virtually unchanged for more than two centuries. An important part of the timber products trade, naval stores were originally used primarily in shipbuilding and maintenance. Over the course of the nineteenth century, these products came to be used in myriad ways -- including in the manufacture of paint thinner, soap, and a widely popular lamp oil -- and demand soared. In response, North Carolina producers enlarged their operations and expanded throughout the Southeast, especially into Georgia and Florida, but the short-term economic development they initiated ultimately contributed to long-term underdevelopment. Outland vividly describes the primitive harvest and production methods that eventually destroyed the very trees the trade relied upon, forcing operators to relocate every few years. He introduces the many different people involved in the industry, from the wealthy owner to the powerless worker, and explores the reliance on forced labor -- slavery before the Civil War and afterwards debt peonage and convict leasing. He demonstrates how the isolated forest environment created harsh working and living conditions, making the life of a turpentine hand and his family exceedingly difficult. With an exacting attention to detail and exhaustive research, Outland offers not only the first definitive history of the naval stores industry but also a fresh interpretation of the socioeconomic development of the piney woods South. Tapping the Pines is an essential volume for anyone interested in the region.

A detailed handbook giving clear descriptions and full historical information about the trees that grow in North America--Résumé de l'éditeur.

A collection of colorful stories about some of New Hampshire’s most notable newsmakers and remarkable historic events. Includes photos. Hidden in the cracks and crevices of the Granite State are the stories of pioneers who pursued their passions, creating legacies along the way. Compiled by a Smithsonian researcher and former Boston Globe contributor, this treasury includes tales of: the mountain man who became an innkeeper the “Bird Man” who took his passion to the White House the gentleman who ascended the highest peak in the Northeast in a steam-powered locomobile the story of one skier’s dramatic win at the 1939 “American Inferno” Mount Washington race the Shaker Meetinghouse, built in just one day, in complete silence the gallant efforts to save the Old Man of the Mountain and much more