With the London Olympics in full swing, and the always amazing track and field events about to get underway, I was reminded of a summer race of a different kind.This race took place 155 years ago today, on August 1, 1857, and involved none other than Henry David Thoreau—hardly an Olympian, but still someone who enjoys a good contest.The story of Thoreau’s race in the … [Read more...]
Renegade Naturalist Radio #2: Interview with Arctic Explorer John Bockstoce
This episode of Renegade Naturalist Radio features historian, author, and archaeologist, John R. Bockstoce (audio player above.)John has been traveling and working in the North since 1962. There, he carried out a series of excavations at Bering Strait, serving for ten seasons as a member of an Eskimo whaling crew at Point Hope, Alaska. In the 1970s he descended the Tanana … [Read more...]
My Recollections of Woody Guthrie
I met Woody Guthrie when I was just 8 years old and he came to visit us when we were living in Croton-on-Hudson, New York.Woody came to meet my father, Benjamin Botkin, who was a well-known folklorist and had been head of the Folklore Archives of the Library of Congress (now known as the American Folklife Center). Woody was brought to our house by Alan Lomax, who was also a … [Read more...]
Two Botkin Classics Arrive in Ebook Format
Two of Dan Botkin's classic works about explorers' Lewis and Clark are being released in ebook format for the very first time. Passage of Discovery: The American Rivers Guide to the Missouri River of Lewis and Clark (now available) and Beyond the Stony Mountains: Nature in the American West from Lewis and Clark to Today (available June 2012) are available for purchase wherever … [Read more...]
Renegade Naturalist Radio #1: Lewis & Clark And the The Allure of the Adventurers
In the debut episode of Renegade Naturalist Radio, Dan discusses how he retraced the journey of Lewis & Clark for his book, Passage of Discovery, and explains how his childhood love of adventurers lead him to Lewis and Clark's famous journals and ultimately fueled his professional desires. … [Read more...]
Henry David Thoreau and the Depth of Walden Pond
In 2001, I was asked to give the Keynote address to the annual meeting of the Henry David Thoreau Society. The talk, based on my book, No Man’s Garden, was published in The Concord Saunterer, the publication of the Thoreau Society. Here is an except from it.Ironies of the Information AgeDuring the time that I have been an ecological scientist and involved with … [Read more...]
Scientific Opinion and the Opinion of Scientists
We hear a lot these days about what "scientists" are saying, believe, or have discovered. Especially with complicated scientific problems that have major implications for economics, politics, and society, it is important to understand the difference between scientific results and what a scientist says.Scientists play three roles in our society, as I have written about in my … [Read more...]
American Dreamer: The Life and Times of Henry A. Wallace by John C. Culver and John Hyde (W. W. Norton & Company, NY. 2000)
Comments by Daniel B. BotkinCopyright (c) Daniel B. Botkin 2007The life of Henry A. Wallace is a fascinating lesson for our times, as we try to solve large problems about food, energy, and environment. Wallace was a remarkable man: a scientific genius who as a young man invented hybridization of crops; a successful businessman who founded the Pioneer Seed Company, still … [Read more...]