The John Muir Newsletter, Winter 1998/99

• Main Author: The John Muir Center for Regional Studies
• Format: Text
• Language: unknown
• Published: Scholarly Commons 1998
• Subjects: John Muir; Newsletter; Holt-Atherton Special Collections; University of the Pacific; Holt-Atherton Pacific Center for Western Studies; Stockton; California; John Muir Center for Regional Studies; American Studies; Natural Resources and Conservation; United States History; Pacific; Huntington; Moses; Morrison; Forbes; Carr; Emerson; Dunbar; Atherton; Perseverance; San Jose; Hitchcock; Swett; glacier; glaciers; Alaska
• Online Access: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmn/56; https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1055&context=jmn

NEWSLETTER Winter 1998-99 The Importance of John Muir's First Public Lecture, Sacramento, 1876 by Steve Pauly, Pleasant Hill, CA INTRODUCTION his article focuses on Muir's first public lecture and its importance as one of several turning points in his evolution as a public figure. The venue was the Congregational Church in Sacramento on January 25, 1876. The lecture was the fifth in a series sponsored by the Sacramento Literary Institute. Muir approached this task with fear, began poorly and with apology, finally recalled his topic, enthralled the large audience with his discussion and illustration of the current and ancient glaciers jjf California, and built enough confidence to agree to His second lecture a few months later in San Jose. One of several turning points in his life, this lecture is seen as a trial, conceived by Muir to determine whether he could emerge from his very private lifestyle enough to succeed in the public appearances necessary to further his emerging role: educator of the public on the preservation and enjoyment of our natural resources. Although not the primary focus of this article, Muir's glacial studies were important in three other ways beyond his presentation: (1) he advanced the science of glaciol- dgy at a time when the principles of glacial erosion were not well understood, (2) his careful observations and rigorous reasoning became a model for scientific research technique, and (3) his simple, clear, and entertaining Writing style inspired others to take up careers in nature. At the time of the lecture Muir was 38. He had survived a harsh and cruel childhood, finished two and a half years at the University of Wisconsin, walked the thousand ririles to the Florida gulf, and had recently completed several years of intense study of the Sierra glaciation. Factors that conditioned Muir for his first public lecture: the previous turning points in his life, his per- UIMIYTERSITY'OF sonality and interests, his education, books then in his library, and magazine articles he had authored. TURNING POINTS IN MUIR'S LIFE PRIOR TO 1876 Muir's life seems abundant in serendipitous events that changed or conditioned him for the service he rendered humanity. Those which preceded the first lecture were: Exhibition of his whittled wooden inventions at the Agricultural Fair in Madison, Wisconsin (1860), leading to his exit from family and farm life and his admission to the University of Wisconsin. This was the first escape from his father's domination, and the success of the exhibition led other exhibitors to suggest that he enroll at the University. Enrollment in botany, geology, and glaciology classes at the University of Wisconsin (1861-1863), leading to intense interest in these subjects and lifelong friendships with some of his professors. The influence of his geology professor, Dr. Ezra S. Carr, and Carr's wife, Jeanne, was very strong. Carr, a student of Louis Agassiz, father of the study of glaciers, taught Agassiz's ideas in his course. Meeting Jeanne Carr at the University (1860), leading to her lifelong advice and admonitions. Mrs. Carr's influence on Muir was extensive over their several decades of friendship. She repeatedly encouraged him to continue his life work, become more socially involved, publish, meet prominent persons from many walks of life, and marry. (Additionally, during visits to the Strentzel ranch in the Alhambra Valley, Mrs. Carr prepared Louie Strentzel for the life she would lead as Muir's wife.) ( c o nl i n ii e d o n page 3 ) F> A C I F I C page 1 News & Notes SCOTLAND'S MUIR RENAISSANCE CONTINUES Our October issue featured Graham White's report on the admirable effort to reclaim John Muir's legacy in the land of his birth. Since that report the momentum has continued to build. Early this year the John Muir Birthplace Trust announced it has completed the purchase of the historic house on High Street in Dunbar where Muir was born in 1838. This is a significant step forward, since the home had been in some jeopardy because of the conflicting interests and financial difficulties involved. As White noted last issue, a coalition of environmental and heritage organizations had been endeavoring to secure the property for some time. Our congratulations to the Birthplace Trust and its supporters for their successful efforts to protect this crucial historic site. Also newsworthy is a new film project now underway. Trans-Atlantic e-mail has heated up recently with news from the BBC and the Hollywood Reporter that Sean Connery — that's right, old 007 himself— will co-produce and star in "Dominion," a film about Muir evidently planned several years ago but did not move forward until Paramount Studios recently stepped in. The Hollywood studio acquired the script and hired Richard Friedenberg, a screenwriter whose credits include "A River Runs Through It," to rewrite the original. The film will be produced by Gale Ann Hurd's Western Pacific Productions, and by Connery and Rhonda Tellefson's Fountainbridge Films. Not to be slighted is the exhibition mentioned in our last newsletter, "An Infinite Storm of Beauty," jointly organized by the City Art Centre of Edinburgh and the East Lothian Museums Service. As the first feature exhibit on Muir ever held in Scotland, it is certain to open Scottish eyes and contribute significantly to the Muir renaissance not only in his homeland but throughout the United Kingdom. The exhibit opens 1 August 1999 as part of the Edinburgh International Festival, and will move to East Lothian in October. Elaine Greig, exhibit curator, is working with major repositories in the United States to develop an exhibit that will be both attractive and significant in interpreting Muir's life and career. The Holt-Atherton Library at the University of the Pacific is cooperating with the project which will include important items from Muir's family collection. How to account for all of this fervent activity? Doubtless one major stimulus has been the recent reprinting of virtually all of Muir's major works by two British presses. Earlier issues of this Newsletter have reported the 1996 publication of John Muir: The Wilderness Journeys, edited by Graham White (Edinburgh: Canongate Books, 1996; ISBN 0-86241-586-1). See the accompanying review by Richard Fleck of this hefty paperback which contains five of Muir's best-known books. Concurrently with the Canongate edition was the publication in 1996 of John Muir: His Life and Letters and Other Writings (London: Baton Books; Seattle: The Mountaineers, 1996; ISBN 0-89886- 463-1). This handsome clothbound reprint of Bade's Life and Letters and eight other works was preceded by another in the same series, John Muir: The Eight Wilderness-Discovery Books (London: Diadem Books; Seattle: The Mountaineers, 1992; ISBN 0-906371-34-1). The latter two volumes were both edited and introduced by Terry Gifford, Senior Lecturer at Bretton Hall College, University of Leeds. His challenging paper on Muir and Ruskin, presented at the last Muir Conference in 1996, will soon appear as part of a new anthology edited by Sally M. Miller, John Muir in Historical Perspective (Peter Lang, 1999). Speaking of new releases, we have just received a paperback copy of John Muir: To Yosemite and Beyond: Writings from the Years 1863 to 1875, edited by Robert Engberg and Donald Wesling (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press, 1999; ISBN0-87480-580-5). Originally published in 1980, this handy reprint is a welcome addition to the new generation of Muir literature that has contributed to the re-awakening of interest in Muir here and abroad. CHI '99 REGISTRATION PACKETS IN THE MAIL Make sure you register early for the 51st California History Institute on "Jedediah Smith and the Fur Trade Era," to be held on the UOP campus April 23-24. The program begins Friday morning with a day-long field trip covering significant trapper sites in the Central Valley. That will be followed by a banquet and keynote address by David J. Weber, distinguished professor of history at Southern Methodist University, who will discuss the (continued on page 7) Volume 9, Number 1 Winter 1998-99 Published quarterly by The John1 Muik Center for Regional Studies University of the Pacific, Stockton, CA 95211 Staff Editor Production Assistants . Sally M. Miller Marilyn Norton, Pearl Piper All photographic reproductions are courtesy of the John Muir Papers, Holt-Atherton Department of Special Collections, University of the Pacific Libraries. Copyright 1984 Muir-Hanna Trust. This Newsletter is printed on recycled paper. page 2 John Muir's First Public Lecture, by Steve Pauley (continued.) Advice by Dr. James Butler (1862) to keep a diary, leading to the 84 journals that Muir kept and to the articles and books he produced. Butler was Muir's professor of Latin and Greek at the University. He too continued his interest in Muir's career long after the university days. Eye injury at Osgood & Smith, Indianapolis, Indiana (1867), leading to a promise to himself to devote his life :[to.h'the inventions of God instead of the inventions of man.' Muir took several jobs after leaving the University to raise the funds that would support his planned botanizing ventures. The accident, in which a file slipped and the -.tip tail pierced his right eye at the edge of the cornea, left him temporarily blind. When the eye recovered in a few weeks, he made good on the promise and began the walk to the gulf. Unavailability of ships going to South America from Cuba (1867), I ding to Muir's voyage to New York, Panama, and San Francisco (1868). He intended to continue on lo South America, build a raft and botanize his way down the Amazon. The trip to South America would occur several decades later, but in 1868 fate turned him away from South America and toward Yosemite and his new home in Califor- [ nia. No doubt Muir would have gotten to California and Yosemite later, but the outcome might have been different. Encouragement from Ralph Waldo Emerson (1871) in Yose- imite to devote his life to nature. Emerson visited Muir in Yosemite and spent a few days in the "hang nest," Muir's abode hung under the rafters of Hutchings' sawmill. Emerson later said that Muir was the right man in the j It place at the right time. When Muir found he could i port himself on fees earned from magazine articles, he concluded that since his siblings had respectable occupations in society, perhaps he could devote his life lo nature. The shy and self-effacing personality that he never outgrew. Eventually he became slightly more outgoing. In January 1876, Muir would have been reticent and unsure, especially in a public occasion. An inherent interest in nature and an irrepressible quest for knowledge despite his repressive formative years. A difficult childhood (1838-1860), dominated by his repressive, harsh father, during which John learned to survive and even flourish despite difficult circumstances. 1 .atcr these hardships allowed him to withstand extended periods without adequate sleep, food, clothing, or shelter. Accounts of Muir's perseverance and stamina are legend: cold nights at high altitude with insufficient supplies and Jolv clothing, long trips with only bread and tea for sustenance resulting in significant weight loss, difficult solo mountaineering feats, and adventures on crevasse-covered glaciers, to cite a few. Muir was prepared for these by the trials of his childhood, such as, the lashings from his father and school teachers, carbide gas poisoning while single-handedly digging the 90-ft. well at Hickory Hill Farm, and getting through two-and-a-half years at the University with very little money. MUIR'S EDUCATION In Scotland, grandfather David Gilrye took John on walks around Dunbar and taught him the letters and words on the signs they saw around town. John learned to read Roman numerals and tell time from the clock when they passed the town hall. At age three, John began classes at the Davel Brae School in town. Later on, when seven or eight, he entered a grammar school, and kindly grandfather Gilrye listened to John recite his lessons in the eve-ning by the fire. In Wisconsin the lessons mostly were practical, concerning farming and farm life. His father insisted he memorize all of the New Testament and most of the Old Testament of the Bible, the only book allowed in the house. Encountering good poetry and literature at the neighbors' homes, he was intrigued and wanted time and permission to read them. But from dawn to dusk, his father allowed time only for meals, Bible study, farm work and sleep. Finally John won permission to have the hours before dawn for himself, and he used the cherished early morning hours to teach himself math, to read, and to whittle his wooden inventions. The inventions included thermometers, barometers, clocks, sawmills, and other items. At the University he took courses that suited him, including mathematics, physics, chemistry, botany, geology, glaciology, Greek, and Latin. MUIR'S LIBRARY PRIOR TO 1876 Books were important sources of knowledge for Muir, and when he left on the walk to the Gulf in 1867, he carried Burns' Poems, Wood's New Class Book of Botany, and Milton's Paradise Lost in addition to a small New Testament. By 1876 he had accumulated a sizable library. It is likely that he had been exposed to the following geologists' works: Charles Lyell, Louis Agassiz, John Tyndall, Alexander von Humboldt, Arnold Henry Guyot, Edward Forbes, J. D. Whitney, and Edward Hitchcock. Lyell (1797-1875), a prominent geologist of Scottish birth, published Elements of Geology between 1838 and Muir at about the time of nis first lecture. page 3 John Muir's First Public Lecture, by Steve Pauley (cont in ued.) 1865. As this work became quite large, Lyell removed the theoretical portion to his Principles of Geology and issued a revised and updated The Student's Elements of Geology in 1871. Student's Elements discusses rock classes, aqueous rocks, fossils, denudation, chronological classification, glacial conditions, several geologic epochs, volcanic, plu- tonic, and metamorphic rocks, and mineral veins. A short section on Glacial Formations in North America describes in general terms the striation, smoothing, fluting, till, rock movement, fossil, and quadruped evidence of glaciation. Principles of Geology was issued from 1830 to 1875 by Lyell and subtitled The Modern Changes of the Earth and Its Inhabitants. Muir's 1874 11th edition, two volumes, was issued shortly before Lyell died. Volume 1 discusses the history of geology, aqueous and igneous causes, development of organic life, climate change, transportation of matter by ice, springs, rivers, and the effect of tides. A chapter "Transportation of Solid Matter By Ice," describes the theory of downward glacial movement, smoothed and grooved rocks, moraines, terraces, and limits of glaciers. Lyell refers to European (especially Swiss) glaciers, and lauds the work of DeSaussure, Charpentier, Agassiz, James D. Forbes, Hopkins, and Tyndall. Volume 2 contains chapters on volcanism, earth-quakes, subsidence, transmutation of species, natural selection and geographical distribution of species, extinction of species, fossils, imbedding of man and his works into aqueous strata, and formation of coral reefs. Louis Agassiz first published Geological Sketches in 1866. Muir had an 1869 edition of this work. This book is a collection of lecture notes and had been published serially in the Atlantic Monthly. It discusses the origin of mountains, growth of continents, and formation of glaciers, their structure, progression, and external appearance. The chapter on "Formation of Glaciers" describes the climatic changes which brought on glaciers, the shape of mountain valleys in which glaciers form, comparison of North American and European conditions, and transformation of snow into ice (progressing through the neve or frozen slush form). The chapter on "Internal Structure and Progression of Glaciers" describes the stratification, dirt bands, snow-strata, and the effects of weight, compression, and the downward (gravitational) tendency of glaciers to progress to lower elevations. The chapter on "External Appearance of Glaciers" considers boulders on elevated ice columns, rills, surface material such as dust and sand, glacial rivers, moulins (circular wells), troughs, crevasses, moraines, and use of stakes to determine movement across a glacier. In 1841, Agassiz planted stakes across a glacier and in 1842 observed that the middle had moved more than the margins. The influence of Agassiz (whose theories were discussed in Muir's geology classes at the University of "GOB'S HBST TEMPLE3" SOW BHilfc WB JPBBSjBRYK O0B FOBK8T8? The Question CeBSt«er*tf %y Uhn Muir, the I'all- * fornl* Jieeiegijt—fhe Flews of a rracticoi S*b an« » »ci«$iiflc Obaemr-A profound)* iDtereattiiK'Jtrtiela. \ , Wisconsin) and Lyell can be seen in Muir's pre-1876 articles and in the first lecture. Muir's theory of glaciation of the Sierra, while not correct in all aspects, was as nearly correct as could be expected considering the state of geological and glaciological research at the time. Muir's conclusions certainly were more nearly right than those of his detractors. Prior to the first lecture, Muir had authored 47 magazine articles including fifteen relating to geology or glaci- ology. At the end of 1875, Muir's education, personality, and interests prepared him for a private life dominated by solitary wanderings, individual research, letters to friends, and production of articles and books. He was brought out of this cocoon by the stark realization that wildness must be saved, and to accomplish that, the public must be educated, and he must lecture and write. THE LECTURE AS A TURNING POINT At the beginning of 1876 we see Muir equipped with the knowledge and experience required for a public lecture on the glaciers of California but lacking in self-confidence and social adjustment. His apprehension is understandable under the circumstances. If a success, the lecture would encourage him further. If a failure, he could have concentrated on writing as his sole public educational tool. Although never completely comfortable before groups, he became extremely capable as a speaker. He lectured again in Sacramento in 1879.1 LECTURE VENUE: THE CONGREGATIONAL CHURCH, SACRAMENTO, CALIFORNIA The First Church of Christ (Congregational) was established on September 16, 1849. Thirty-one year old Rev. Joseph A. Benton had first conducted services in Sacramento 1 . i —i in mid-1849 and served as the first pastor until 1863. The first chapel, a wooden structure erected in 1850 on Sixth Street between I and J Streets, was damaged by flood and fire in 1850, and survived flood and fire again in 1852. Both the church and parsonage were lost in an 1854 fire. A second building was started in 1854 on the opposite side of Sixth Street between I and I across from the original building. Rev. Israel Edson Dwinell, a graduate of the Union Theological Seminary (1848) in New York, became the second pastor in 1863 at a salary of $3,000 per year, and he served until 1883. Among the worshipers during this period were C. P. Huntington, Moses Hopkins, and Mrs. Charles Crocker. In 1868 the church and Sixth Street were elevated twelve feet to protect from floods, and the lecture room was finished. Based on a study of interior and exterior photographs of the 1854 church, the lecture hall likely page 4 was on the lowest level, below the sanctuary.2 The sanctuary occupied almost the entire street level floor, reportedly seating 1,000. Muir's lecture was in the lecture hall before a "large" crowd, but no estimate of the capacity of this room has yet been possible. The church was torn down in 1923, rebuilt in 1924 on L Street, directly across from Sutler's Fort, and survives today in that location as the Pioneer Congregational Church. Dr. Dwinell, pastor at the time of Muir's lecture, had helped found both the local Literary Institute and the Agassiz Institute, probably attended the lecture and likely introduced Muir that evening. The Agassiz Institute was formed in November 1872 following a visit by Louis Agassiz to Sacramento. The first President was Dr. Thomas M. Logan and Dwinell was the first First Vice President and a member of the Lecture and Literary Committee. According to the memoir of Dwinell by Jewett,3 if a noted visitor was to be introduced, it was most generally Dr. Dwinell who stood beside him on the platform, and in a few well-chosen and scholarly words acquainted the public with the person and his history. In 1865 Dwinell accompanied his friend Cyrus Mills to inspect the then for sale Young Ladies Seminary in Benicia, where Muir's future wife Louie Strentzel had been a student from 1859 to 1864. It is presumed that Dwinell became known to the Strcnlzels through this connection, although it was Muir who invited him to officiate at John and Louie's 1880 marriage ceremony.4 THE SPONSOR: THE SACRAMENTO LITERARY INSTITUTE The Institute was organized luly, 1868, with Dwinell chosen as President and C. G. W. Grench as Secretary. It was intended to present annually a course of five lectures, and it was decided not to employ residents of Sacramento as lecturers. A season ticket could be purchased for one dollar, and a single admission was fifty cents for each lecture. In 1880, according to Thompson & West in History of Sacramento County, "The enterprise has been quite popular, and hence has proved to be a complete success financially, and the refining and elevating effect on the community has also undoubtedly been great."5 THE DAY OF THE LECTURE Although Muir had participated in the Athenian debating society at the University of Wisconsin, had several years of first-hand experience observing the glacial evidence in the field, had guided many people through Yosemite Valley and the Sierra Nevada, and had authored, as above, fifteen magazine articles on the glaciation of the Sierra, he still was nervous and unsure prior to the lecture. He traveled from San Francisco, where he was staying the winter with the Iohn Swett family arrived in Sacramento, probably via ferry to Vallejo and California Pacific train to the station just upriver from the main Central Pacific station. He could have gotten to the Congregational Church by hired hack or could have been met with a buggy. Just prior to the lecture and in spite of a stormy evening and muddy footpaths, he took a turn around the block to try to calm his nerves. He had been promised a small audience, but upon returning to the church he found a large crowd awaiting, and he felt worse. KEITH'S LOAN OF HEADWATERS OF THE MERCED John Muir and William Keith met in October, 1872, when Floy Hutchings led Keith and two other painters, Benoni Irwin and Thomas Ross, to him at his cabin below the Royal Arches. Keith carried a letter of introduction from Jeanne Carr and inquired whether Muir knew any area that would make a picture. Muir replied "Yes, I saw it only yesterday." Two days later, the four, with Merrill Moores, set out for the upper Tuolumne River area. As it turned out, Willie and Johnnie, as they soon called each other, were born in the same year in Scotland. They became close friends for the next forty years, until Keith's death in 1911. Knowing of Muir's nervousness, Keith loaned him one of his paintings, "Headwaters of the Merced," to take to the Congregational Church, telling him "Just look at the painting Johnnie. You'll think you're back in the mountains. You'll relax and be fine." Muir took the painting to Sacramento and placed it in the church lecture hall before the guests arrived. During the lecture, Muir pronounced the painting "as topographically correct as it is beautiful and artistic." The Sacramento Daily Record reported the lecture the following day, January 26, 1876, and it was reprinted in the semi-weekly Record-Union. RECONSTRUCTION OF THE LECTURE This author's reconstruction of the lecture used the newspaper coverage as well as material from the journals and magazine articles published prior to the lecture. Applicable portions of Muir's previous works were reorganized and inserted into the following sequence: introduction, definitions, current glaciers of California, ancient glaciers of California, closing, and degradation of the mountains. The great majority of the material came from the "Studies in the Sierra" series plus the 1872 Overland Monthly article, "Living Glaciers of California," and the 1875 Harper's New Monthly article, "Living Glaciers of California." In every case possible, Muir's own words are used, along with the references to their origins. Missing or connecting text inserted by the author is shown in brackets. The influence of his life, personality, interests, education, library, published articles up to the time of the lecture, and writing style were the basis for selection of the excerpts and for the author's insertions. Finally the author timed the reconstruction including the time to draw or explain illustrations. Muir's lecture, without the encore, was an hour and a half, according to the newspaper report. The reconstructed lecture consists of 12,517 words of which 246 were added by the author to join sections or insert information judged necessary. The author hopes page 5 John Muir's First Public Lecture, by Steve Pauley (continued.) that the result is a fair representation of the essence, emphasis, and blackboard illustrations of the original lecture. Muir used his original material over and over and would have relied on previously crafted words, phrases, and drawings, especially when worried about his ability to succeed in his evening's task. EFFECT ON THE AUDIENCE The following excerpt from the newspaper account describes the effect Muir had on the audience: "He forgot himself and his audience, only remembering that he was to make clear some wondrous mysteries, and to unfold to those who listened the story of the six years he has spent in the mountains, reading their lives and tracing alike their growth and destruction. His positiveness was so simple, fresh and artless that it scarcely needed the proofs with which he fortified every position. His manner was so easy and so social, his style so severely plain and so homely his language and logic as often to provoke a smile, while the judgment gave hearty approval to the points he made. Indeed, Mr. Muir was at once the most unartistic and refreshing, the most unconventional and positive lecturer we have yet had in Sacramento. He was profoundly entertaining, and showed convincingly that while a devotee of science, he was no mere enthusiast; while plain and unarti- ficial, that yet he found beauty, grandeur, God, in all nature, and was at once a student, a thinker, and a practical searcher in the archives of the rocks, whose labors will bring forth benefits to his adopted State. At the close of the lecture large numbers of citizens seized the occasion to go forward and congratulate Mr. Muir, and thank him heartily for the pleasure and instruction he had given them." IMPORTANCE OF THE LECTURE The success of the lecture surely encouraged Muir to continue at least periodic contact with the public. He would have recognized that the audience was impressed, fascinated, and enthusiastic, and probably saw the newspaper report. Muir's close friends, noting his success and the appetite of the public for his opinions and the results of his research, would have encouraged him further to lecture and to write. Shortly afterward he agreed to lecture to the State Normal School in San Jose. On January 14, 1879, he returned to Sacramento to lecture on "The Great Basin" before the Literary Institute again at the Congregational Church. The next-day newspaper report stated, "He was received by a large and very superior audience. He spoke for nearly two hours and kept the close attention of his audience throughout. Mr. Muir is not a lecturer; he is a simple unskilled talker, a man who lives in the free air of the mountains, and whose highest ambition is to delve into the wondrous mysteries of nature. He talks to his audience simply, as if speaking to a small circle of friends. Graced by the arts of oratory his lectures would be wonderful productions. He said his subject was too great for one evening's talk; he could, therefore, only sketch its outlines, skim over the surface of what should form a whole course of lectures. Mr. Muir said that he made his maiden speech in Sacramento two years ago, and was so kindly received that in returning he felt like coming among old friends. He had brothers and sisters in number, in society and in business, and so he thought it didn't make much difference if he for one wandered off to commune with the mountains and the forests. About fifteen years ago he went to take a walk in the woods, and he had been in the woods ever since. Perhaps some day he might come out and mingle with men, but just now his loves and friends were all with mountains and the trees, the birds and the fishes, the rocks and streams of this beautiful Pacific coast."6 John Muir's momentous career was well underway. ENDNOTES 1. Strentzel, Louisiana, Diary (for 1879), Martinez Public Library. 2. Pioneer Congregational Church archives, Sacramento, California. 3. Jewett, Rev. Henry E., /. E. Dwinell, A Memoir with Sermons, W. B. Hardy, Oakland, 1892. 4. Dwinell, I. E., Letter to Muir, April 9, 1880. 5. Thompson & West, History of Sacramento County, 1880. 6. Sacramento Daily Record-Union, "The Great Basin," Jan. 15, 1879. BOOK REVIEW John Muir: The Wilderness Journeys Introduced by Graham White. Edinburgh: Canongate Books (Canongate Classics Imprint), 1997, L7.99. By Richard F. Fleck, Dean, Community College of Denver In his introduction to this much-needed Scottish edition of the writings of John Muir, Graham White explains that the five books of The Story of My Boyhood and Youth, My First Summer in the Sierra, A Thousand Mile Walk to the Gulf, and Travels in Alaska "chart the epic journeys on which John Muir explored the geography and ecology of the American continent, from the snowy Alaskan glaciers to the alligators and orchids of the Florida swamps." This solidly representative collection of Muir's writings also includes Stickeen which illustrates Muir's expanded vision of all living beings. White's introduction not only provides the reader with biographical information such as Muir's many first alpine ascents, but also with an assessment of his important and telling influences on the twentieth century, especially in the areas of conservation and ecology. As White explains, "John Muir was writing about the sustainable use of the world's natural resources as long ago as 1870." But Muir was more than a pioneer conservationist, as White points out, he was a mystic: "Muir sensed a divine presence behind all things, shining through them, imbuing them with infinite meaning and profound beauty." What makes White's introduction particularly interesting to the American reader is the inclusion of updated information on the contemporary Scottish conservation movement inspired by their fellow countryman, John Muir. page 6 News & Notes (continued (CHI '99, continued from page 2) fascinating cache of Smith documents he recently discovered in Mexico. A full day of sessions on Saturday include papers on the sea otter trade, the winter quarters of the "mountain men," American and Mexican commerce, Smith's contemporaries, his trapping practices, legends of his gold discoveries in California, and his legacy. The conference will conclude Saturday evening with a reception and a one-man portrayal, "Mountain Man," by Bruce Druliner. For information and registration packets contact Mrs. Pearl Piper, John Muir Center, University of the Pacific, Stockton, CA 95211, or phone her at [phone]. CANADA'S PROPOSED MUIR NATURE CENTER By Daryl Morrison Head, Holt-Atherton Department of Special Collections University of the Pacific Dr. Jim Butler of the University of Alberta recently visited the UOP campus and presented the Library with a bound copy of his class project, The John Muir Nature Center: Interpretive Proposal and Prospectus (Meaford, Ontario, 1998). Sixty-seven university students in an Environmental Interpretation Class were involved in this project to gather information documenting the importance of Trout-Hollow, the Trout-Jay Mill and the Meaford, Owen-Sound area to John Muir and the history of the environmental movement in North America. The results were compiled in this discussion-prospectus for a John Mui https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmn/1055/thumbnail.jpg