"A brilliant rendering of what 'the open space of democracy' must be
if we are to survive its present state of erosion." -Terry Tempest
Williams
The forgotten and "energetic" history of the extraordinary couple who
rescued national parks from McCarthyism--and inspired a future of
conservation (Wall Street Journal)
In late-1940s America, few writers commanded attention like Bernard
DeVoto. Alongside his brilliant wife and editor, Avis, DeVoto was a
firebrand of American liberty, free speech, and perhaps our greatest
national treasure: public lands. But when a corrupt band of lawmakers,
led by Senator Pat McCarran, sought to quietly cede millions of acres of
national parks and other western lands to logging, mining, and private
industry, the DeVotos entered the fight of their lives. Bernard and Avis
built a broad grassroots coalition to sound the alarm--from Julia and
Paul Child to Ansel Adams, Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Alfred Knopf, Adlai
Stevenson, and Wallace Stegner--while the very pillars of American
democracy, embodied in free and public access to Western lands, hung in
the balance. Their dramatic crusade would earn them censorship and
blacklisting by Joe McCarthy, J. Edgar Hoover, and Roy Cohn, and it even
cost Bernard his life.
In This America of Ours, award-winning journalist Nate Schweber
uncovers the forgotten story of a progressive alliance that altered the
course of twentieth-century history and saved American wilderness--and
our country's most fundamental ideals--from ruin.
