Seen through the prism of conservation, extraordinary changes have happened during my lifetime.
In 1960, when I was born, the American conservation movement was on the rise and one of its chief concerns was wilderness protection. Fast forward to today and we are facing an existential crisis threatening life on earth due to climate change. That’s only sixty years!
My work and anguished questions tracked these developments (see The Work). In the summer of 1988, Dr. James Hansen testified before Congress, announcing that climate change was real and underway. The New York Times ran the story on its front page the next day. This marks the start of the Age of Consequences, I believe. Our innocence ended. That same summer, Yellowstone National Park exploded in flames. I was hiking and camping in Bandelier National Monument, working on my first project.
I offer a brief Timeline here to put things in context:
Myself The World
- 1960 Born in Philadelphia Wallace Stegner publishes his Wilderness Letter
- 1962 Publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring
- 1966 Moved to Phoenix with my family ‘Mission 66’ successfully boosts tourism at U.S. National parks
- Late 1960s-early 1970s Major environmental laws passed; Earth Day; fights over public lands and wilderness protection
- 1974 A summer trip to Mexico lights a fire about archaeology, land and people
- 1977 A backpacking tour of western national parks Sagebrush Rebellion starts out West
- 1978-1982 Reed College; anthropology major, senior thesis on ethnographic film
- 1980 Whole Foods is founded, organic movement grows
- 1983-1985 UCLA grad school in film
- 1986-1988 Worked in the UCLA’s main library, studying American West in my spare time
- 1988 Bought a medium-format Bronica camera Atmospheric CO2: 350ppm
- 1988 Traveled to New Mexico to document the Bandelier Survey (1) Dr. James Hansen testifies before Congress that climate change is real and ongoing
- 1989 Began Indelible West photo project (2) Bill McKibben published The End of Nature
- 1991 Moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico
- 1992 Began work at Pecos NHP (3) UN Summits: Rio, COP 1, and Convention on Biological Diversity
- 1993 Clinton Administration / Bruce Babbitt becomes Interior Secretary, stirring up rural opposition out West
- 1994 Republican Revolution in D.C. / first GMO food sold
- 1995 Sierra Club activism, met rancher Jim Winder, begin column writing (4)
- 1996 Canyonlands (5) “War on the West” declared by Time Magazine
- 1997 Founded the Quivira Coalition (6) Brundtland Commission definition of ‘sustainability’
- 2001 9/11 tragedy / IPCC’s 3rd report on climate change
- 2002 Began writing profiles about the radical center Nationwide Sierra Club referendum opposing cattle grazing fails / grazing wars over
- 2003 Iraq War begins / analog gives way to digital
- 2004 Purchased my first digital camera, began photo project (8) ‘Great Acceleration’ paper published
- 2005 Wendell Berry publishes my essay The Working Wilderness Hurricane Katrina / UN Millenium Goals published
- 2006 Read Long Emergency by James Kunstler Atmospheric CO2: 380 ppm
- 2008 Begin writing AOC Chronicle / Revolution on the Range published (7) Oil Price Spike / Wall Street Collapse
- 2009 World leaders fail at Copenhagen Climate Summit
- 2010 Carbon Ranch idea Gulf Oil Spill
- 2012 travel Atmospheric CO2: 400 ppm crossed for the first time (in the arctic)
- 2014 Grass, Soil Hope published (9)
- 2015 AOC (10) and Two Percent Solutions published (11), leave Quivira Paris Climate Summit
- 2016 Donald Trump wins the presidential election
- 2017 Completed Consilience (12), started Innovators series for Chelsea Green
- 2018 Completed The Sun (13), start The Grass Canoe (14)
- 2019 Caught in heat wave in Europe Atmospheric CO2: 415 ppm / COP 24 fails / climate tipping points reached
- 2020 Coronavirus pandemic