John Muir

by Thurman Wilkins

Nearly a century after John Muir's death, his works remain in print, his name is familiar, and his thought is much with us. How Muir's life made him a leader and brought him insights destined to resonate for decades is the central question underlying this biography by Thurman Wilkins. Born in Scotland, Muir came from a stern background of religious fundamentalism. Life grew sterner yet when the family immigrated to the United States and undertook the backbreaking task of developing a farm in Wisconsin, but Muir's fertile mind enabled him to escape farm drudgery by means of bizarre inventions. Armed with a university introduction to geology and botany, he became a consummate walker, tramping the Canadian forests, the southeastern woodlands, the Sierra Nevada, and several Alaskan glaciers until he had learned about wilderness at nature's own knee. Profoundly attached to dramatic wild places and plants, and to the Sierra and the redwoods in particular, Muir spearheaded efforts to protect