The Wilderness Warrior: Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America

I found Douglas Brinkley's Wilderness Warrior an invigorating read. Although this is the first Brinkley book I have attempted and my first biographical encounter with TR, I was captivated and refreshed to learn about the President's passion for science, nature, and the outdoors, especially as an American city-dweller living abroad. Brinkley has offered a vast and timely contribution to the debate about the role of policy and leadership in preservation.

To help us know where we are going, we must know from where we have come. Not only has Brinkley written a book on Roosevelt's deep interest in the environment, he has captured the tenor of our times -- the environmental movement that is happening today. We can tackle issues like renewable energy, oil exploration, climate change, with a firm understanding about the birth of the American conservation movement. In a word, this book is masterful. It is an epic, yes, epic collection of detailed stories, vignettes, anecdotes that are veritable mosaic on Roosevelt's life. He deconstructs Teddy the myth and refashions him as a compassionate, daring, and bewildering person. Brinkley captured my attention in the opening passage. The closest thing to a page turner that I've come across in quite a while.

WOW. Its rare I get a book and sit and leaf thru it in complete awe. This is a book I have wanted for so so long.In fact I plan on buying extra copies for my county library system, since we here in the Sierras in Mark Twain country, so appreciate top books with such wonderful research and information that is so well written that you literally do NOT want to put the book down. And its a book that you will read and re read and re read and get something new from each time you read it. Having grown up in a wild west, environmentalist mined family where when we backpacked we got daily lectures on leaving an area so that it looked like we have never been there, Theodore Roosevelt was akin to my families favorite relative, university professor, religious advisor and common sense favorite friend. And this book shows we were right on. Douglas Brinkley is an A+ author and one can only imagine the hours, days, months and years he put into researching Theodore Roosevelt, because the book covers ALL areas of the United States and even international areas that the President lived and fought for. And reading the book you get the sense you are there, listening to the President demand we care for the earth and the open spaces this great country offers. Especially interesting to me is how during the past election we heard candidates from different political parties evoke the name of Teddy Roosevelt, yet in reading the book one wonders just how much did or do these folks even know of the man. And I so hope the book will light a fire under people to demand that we always fun the open spaces we have as parks and natural preserves. And I didn't even know West Virginia had a state of the art naturalist center for the Fish and Wildlife folks under the Department of the Interior. And the books is honest in pointing up the few mistakes Teddy Roosevelt made, while also noting he was probably the last or even one of the few totally honest Presidents we have had. He was known to have never lied. And while he did hunt and fish, as my family does, he also understood well the role of herd management in a responsible and humane manner. As a walk the talk conservative I remind people that conserve and conservation go hand in hand with me being a conservative.