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Jared Farmer is professor of history at Stony Brook University. A specialist in the environmental history of the American West, he has written two previous books: Glen Canyon Dammed: Inventing Lake Powell and the Canyon Country (University of Arizona Press, 1999) and On Zion's Mount: Mormons, vis mere Indians, and the American Landscape (Harvard University Press, 2008). In 2014 he won the Hiett Prize in the Humanities. Visit his website at jaredfarmennet. vis mindre

Værker af Jared Farmer

Associated Works

Reconstruction and Mormon America (2019) — Bidragyder — 6 eksemplarer
Journal of Mormon History, Vol. 41, No. 1 (Winter 2015) (2015) — Bidragyder — 3 eksemplarer
Utah Historical Quarterly, Vol. 75, No. 3 (Summer 2007) (2007) — Bidragyder — 2 eksemplarer
Utah Historical Quarterly, Vol. 78, No. 1, Winter 2010 (2010) — Bidragyder — 2 eksemplarer
Utah Historical Quarterly - Vol. 63, No. 2, Spring 1995 (1995) — Bidragyder — 1 eksemplar

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I found Trees in Paradise too detailed for popular history, and likely too scattershot in subject to interest academic scholars. Farmer's approach (thematically grouping around groups of trees that characterize the California landscape and history) is sound. But do we really need to cover every freeze that threatened citrus trees in the last 150 years? Similarly, the section on eucalypts seemed interminable. A more heavy-handed editor might have improved this mightily.
 
Markeret
Treebeard_404 | 1 anden anmeldelse | Jan 23, 2024 |
”I am the Lorax, I speak for the trees.”

I expected this book by Jared Farmer to be about giant sequoias and bristlecone pines and their competitors. What I got was a jeremiad about climate change and the other bad things people have done. Although there are appearances by: Cedrus libani, Sequoiadendron giganteum, Pinus longaeva, Taxus baccata, Agathis australis and their kin, the real star (and, of course, villain) is Homo sapiens.

Raised a Mormon, Farmer says that “patriarchal temporalities and biblical dispensations now repel” him. To me, this book is evidence that while you can take the man out of the religion, maybe you can’t take the eschatology out of the man. Farmer seems very, very concerned about the end times.

My rating for Elderflora comes from averaging 5 stars for talented writing with 2 stars for tendentiousness. The latter comes particularly fast and furious in the epilogue:

P. 349 “The oldest living thing ever known to science succumbed to male knowledge seekers.”
P. 351: “For centuries, male scientists had searched for fame and glory by age-dating trees.”
P. 359: A bristlecone pine tree cutter was a “masculine violator who succeeded”.
P. 359: “Many fully credentialed men of Currey’s generation did wrongs in the name of science.”
P. 359: “Currey was just another male researcher in pursuit of measurable data and the career validation that data provided”.
(Emphases added.)

On a mundane note, I was surprised that there were no photographs or illustrations in the book. Thank goodness for Google and Wikipedia.
… (mere)
½
 
Markeret
cpg | Dec 4, 2022 |
Equally mocking of liberal pretensions and conservative indifference to the environment, Farmer traces the history of California via trees—eucalyptus, palm, oranges, redwoods. They’re interesting stories, and some of the sharpest moments come when people import the language of “immigration” to defend or attack certain trees. As he points out, though, the great exclusionist racists of the 19th and 20th centuries were often the most excited to import trees they thought would be good for the economy, so the analogy was never coherent.… (mere)
½
 
Markeret
rivkat | 1 anden anmeldelse | Sep 21, 2021 |
For the past several years, I have lived in a place with Mount Timpanogos practically in my backyard and a great view of Utah Lake close by. I have been aware of some of the recent history of American Fork and Provo canyons and Utah Lake as well as the folklore told about Timpanogos Cave. However, like most people in Utah Valley, I have been unaware of where these places really fit in history. This book was written to inform us of the forgotten history – that Utah Lake was once the dominant feature that this valley was known for, and that Mount Timpanogos (often referred to locally as “Timp”) is actually a very recent landmark. The book is made up of a long introduction, which gives a good summary of the entire book, followed by three parts that tell different aspects of the same story.

In the first part, the book tells about the Indians that inhabited the valley (not the mountains) and depended on the lake and rivers for trout and other food fish. When the Mormon pioneers came, they coexisted with the Indians in both the Salt Lake and Utah valleys for a time, sharing the hot and warm springs near the Great Salt Lake as well as the fishing places at and near Utah Lake. At that time, the mountains to the east were simply that – “the mountains.” The Indians were eventually forced out to reservations, and the settlers continued using Utah Lake until the 20th century when it was polluted and forgotten, except as a shallow lake mostly populated with trash fish, and the site of Geneva Steel.

Part two explains that as the lake vanished from prominence, Mount Timpanogos was turned into a landmark in the 1910s and 20s in a campaign spearheaded by a BYU faculty member, Eugene Roberts, who led hikes to the top and made up the legend of the Indian princess that is still retold to visitors of Timpanogos Cave. The book goes into great detail about how the hike became an institutionalized yearly event which was repeated into the 1960s before being discontinued, although individuals and smaller groups still continue to make it today. It also traces the history of hiking from Europe to the United States to fit the Timp hike into context, as well as giving a brief history of places such as Sundance, Mutual Dell, Aspen Grove, and Timpanogos Cave.

The third part discusses the history of naming places throughout the United States in memory of the original inhabitants, often creating legends to go along with them. It shows that what has happened in Utah is similar to what has happened in the rest of the country – as the Native Americans were forced out of the land, Indian-sounding names and legends were created to commemorate them, so that what we tend to know about them was largely fabricated. Ironically, some of these legends have now been picked up and retold by Indians living today as authentic - including the one that is retold about Timpanogos Cave, even though the particular formation mentioned is in a part of the cave that was not accessible until a passage was made between the original two caves.

I found most of the book to be very interesting, although parts of it were very tedious to get through. In putting everything in perspective in history, it seemed as if the author was continually going off on tangents, although I’m sure others may find these parts more interesting than I did (there were over 45 pages devoted entirely to “Lover’s Leaps,” for instance). I also found that a dictionary was often a handy accessory.

The author tends to write very long paragraphs with a single footnote at the end, so it is difficult to pin down many of the sources, and for some of the material which should have had sources cited, there were none. Near the beginning of the notes the author states that many secondary sources regarding LDS history aren’t cited because there is a great bibliography available for them, but it would have been much more helpful to not leave the reader wondering where some of the information came from.

The history of the LDS Church is recited in varying degrees of detail from its founding to the settlement of Utah, dealings with the Indians (although they were considered to be descendants of the Lamanites, there was limited success in coexisting peacefully), and then up through the present day in relationship with the subject of the book. However, there are some dubious claims made, some exaggerations, and some things that are arguably untrue. In some cases this is a result of using questionable theories from secondary sources and stating them as facts.

For instance, it is stated that "A reluctant pragmatist, Woodruff meant his 1890 edict (popularly known as the Manifesto) to be a delaying tactic. On the basis of a revelation given to Joseph Smith, many Mormons expected the Millennium to begin in 1891." While there is evidence that some members expected the Second Coming to happen at about that time, due largely to a revelation given to Joseph Smith that is contained in Doctrine and Covenants section 130 (at the end of which Joseph notes that he’s unsure of the actual meaning), it seems unlikely that the Manifesto would have even been issued if Wilford Woodruff expected it to be that imminent.

Another example is the statement that “In 1981 the Church quietly revised the Book of Mormon passage relating to the promise of the Lamanites: they would become ‘pure and delightsome’ instead of ‘white and delightsome.’” The implication is that the text was changed to try to make the Book of Mormon less racist. This change was actually made in the 1840 edition of the Book of Mormon, but was then forgotten (because later editions were based on the 1837 edition) until it was restored in the 1981 edition, where it is noted that "Some minor errors in the text have been perpetuated in past editions of the Book of Mormon. This edition contains corrections that seem appropriate to bring the material into conformity with prepublication manuscripts and early editions edited by the Prophet Joseph Smith." It’s doubtful that Joseph Smith had racism in mind when the change was made or other similar verses would have been changed as well.

To Farmer’s credit, when he discusses the recent studies that show no relationship between the DNA of “contemporary native peoples of Israel and the Palestinian territories and of contemporary native peoples of the Americas,” he states that it’s possible that the Lamanites were absorbed by other population groups, and that “The science of historical genetics is young; the evidence is sure to change.” However, in the footnotes he only cites the works of those that claim the DNA issue to be problematic.

For anyone interested in the history of Utah, the West, Native Americans, place names, hiking, environmentalism, or any of the other topics covered, there should be something of interest in this book. Even the casual reader can read the parts of the book they find to be of most interest and learn some of the history that has largely been forgotten. It seems that the author has met his goal in writing it – I have a new appreciation for and a renewed interest in the landmarks that make up my surroundings, both the lake and the mountain.
… (mere)
1 stem
Markeret
atari_guy | 1 anden anmeldelse | May 11, 2021 |

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