In 1977 oil began to flow south from the Arctic through the controversial Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS). This study considers the TAPS proposal and controversy as an extension (even a culmination) of established processes, policies, and attitudes within Alaska history, American environmental history, and the history of conservation. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Awarded the 1993 W. Turrentine Jackson Prize of the Western History Association, given for a professional historian's first book on "any aspect of the history of the American West."

The building of the Trans-Alaska oil pipeline, its impact on the Alaskan economy, and its environmental and social effects on the land, the people, and the wildlife along its path.

This book describes what Fairbanks was like during trans-Alaska oil pipeline construction and how the community responded to the project, and assesses the unplanned negative effects that, in many cases, outweighed the positive ones.