Showing results by author "John Muir" in All Categories

Discover the extraordinary legacy of John Muir (1838–1914), one of the pioneers of modern preservationism. His captivating letters, essays, and books recounting his adventures in the breathtaking Sierra Nevada Mountains have inspired millions and continue to resonate today. Muirs passionate activism played a crucial role in the preservation of Yosemite Valley and other pristine wilderness areas. As the founder of the Sierra Club, he established one of the most significant conservation organizations in the United States. His profound writings and philosophy laid the groundwork for the modern ...

Join us on a captivating walking tour through the stunning Cañon of the south fork of King’s River in California. Originally published in the Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine in 1881-82, this article features a collection of beautiful charcoal illustrations that bring the majestic landscape to life. Discover the visionary ideas of John Muir, who inspired the establishment of what would become Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park, officially designated by Congress on October 1, 1890. This piece not only highlights the natural beauty of the area but also reflects the early conservation ...

The pioneering advocate of wilderness preservation, John Muir (1838-1914) was influential in the creation of many national parks.

Part of John Muir's appeal to modern audiences is that he not only explored the American West and wrote about its beauties but also fought for their preservation. His successes dot the landscape and are evident in all the natural features that bear his name: forests, lakes, trails, and glaciers. Here collected are some of Muir's finest wilderness essays, ranging in subject matter from Alaska to Yellowstone, from Oregon to the High Sierra.

The Nature Writing Essentials Collection gathers fourteen works of wilderness reflection, natural history, travel, memoir, and literary observation.

Muir was a preservationist and naturalist. His activism helped to preserve the Yosemite Valley, Sequoia National Park and other wilderness areas. The Sierra Club, which he founded, is now one of the most important conservation organizations in the United States.In early March 1867, Muir was injured while working as a sawyer in a factory that made wagon wheels: a tool he was using slipped and struck him in the eye. This accident changed the course of his life. He was confined to a darkened room for six weeks, worried whether he’d ever regain his sight. When he did, "he saw the world—and his...

The Conservation Essentials Collection brings together six classics of American nature writing, wilderness reflection, and early conservation thought. Together these works trace a line from personal communion with nature to the broader conservation ethic that helped shape modern environmental thought.

This book contains two essays, one by each of the listed authors. They describe the two religions of Hinduism and Islam, their history, and their contrast with Christianity. This book was part of the curriculum for the C.L.S.C. (the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle) in the early 1900s. (Summary by Scientila)

A collection of adult stories and poems - sad, humorous, and adventurous - about Man's Best Friend. NOTE: Most of these selections contain violence that will be objectionable to some listeners. - Summary by TriciaG

Nothing is ordinary in the world of John Muir, naturalist and author known as the Father of the US National Parks. In this short work, written in the latter part of his life for Century Magazine, Muir beckons us to come with him, unrushed, to behold the wonder of the Grand Canyon. Some of the beauty every life needs awaits here. Its magnificence envelops, "carrying us back into the midst of the life of a past infinitely remote. And as we go on and on, studying this old, old life in the light of the life beating warmly about us, we enrich and lengthen our own." - Summary by Rebecca Eden Walker

John Muir's adventure guide for the Yosemite Valley.

This book is a collection of sketches first published in the Atlantic Monthly magazine and gathered into book form in 1901. The focus here is on 4 parks in the west. Six of the 10 articles focus on Yosemite National Park; also described are Yellowstone, Sequoia, and General Grant (renamed Kings Canyon in 1940) National Parks. - Summary by TriciaG

When John Muir was a student in the University of Wisconsin he was a frequent caller at the house of Dr. Ezra S. Carr. The kindness shown him there, and especially the sympathy which Mrs. Carr, as a botanist and a lover of nature, felt in the young man's interests and aims, led to the formation of a lasting friendship. He regarded Mrs. Carr, indeed, as his "spiritual mother," and his letters to her in later years are the outpourings of a sensitive spirit to one who he felt thoroughly understood and sympathized with him. These letters are therefore peculiarly revealing of their writer's ...

"The Cruise of the Corwin is John Muir's account of a voyage he took in 1881 on the steamer Thomas Corwin, which set sail from San Francisco for arctic waters off the coast of Alaska in search of the Jeannette, a ship tragically lost two years before. The Jeannette was never found, but Muir's notes convey the excitement of exploring far and little-known horizons -- climbing frozen mountains, sketching glaciers, examining rare flora, discovering Wrangell Island off the coast of Siberia and claiming it for the United States, observing polar bears, seal, walrus, whale, and reindeer, describing ...

This article, a walking tour of the Cañon including many charcoal illustrations, was published in the Century Illlustrated Monthly Magazine, Volume 43, Nov - April 1881-82. A national park on the lines proposed herein by Mr. Muir, eventually named Sequoia and King's Canyon National Park, was established by Act of Congress, dated October 1, 1890.(Summary by Michele Fry)

A great dog story, a well told tale--the naturalist and adventurer John Muir recounts how he and his companion, a dog named Stickeen, each, alone, confronted and conquered their fears of an icy Alaskan glacier in 1880. (Summary by Sue Anderson)

http://www.adfreebooks.com - 500+ audiobooks, all ad free"The only fire for the whole house was the kitchen stove, with a fire box about eighteen inches long and eight inches wide and deep,- scant space for three or four small sticks, around which in hard zero weather all the family of ten shivered, and beneath which in the morning we found our socks and coarse, soggy boots frozen solid." Thus, with perceptive eye for detail, the American naturalist, John Muir, describes life on a pioneer Wisconsin farm in the 1850's. Muir was only eleven years old when his father uprooted the family from a ...

Reality is not what it used to be. After consensus reality shatters, and humanity evacuates to mysterious sanctuaries known as smart houses, a group of survivors navigate the uncertain future of the Quantum-sphere. John Kenneth Muir, award-winning author of Exploring Space: 1999 and Horror Films of the 1970s, brings to life a unique vision of humanity's future. Enter The House Between, and discover a world in which quantum mechanics, the many-worlds theory, Everett branches, human mutation, dark matter, and artificial intelligence shape and inform the everyday reality of all people, everywhere...

In this essay, Muir tells his experience of climbing to the top of a tree and riding it for hours through a wild Sierra storm. As he writes, “the danger to life and limb is hardly greater than one would experience crouching deprecatingly beneath a roof.”

"My First Summer in the Sierra" (1911) takes inspiration from Muir’s journals of the months he spent between June and September 1869 as a shepherd in the Sierras. Muir went on to built a cabin along Yosemite Creek, where he lived for two years. He designed it in such a way that a portion of the stream flowed through it, as he wanted to enjoy its music. From French Bar to Mono Lake and the Yosemite Valley, he was awestruck by everything he saw.