Hans Huth was for many years Curator of Decorative Arts at the Art Institute of Chicago and a consultant for the U.S. National Park Service.

For this new Bison Book edition, Douglas H. Strong has written an introduction discussing recent developments in the environmental movement and the contribution of Nature and the American to the burgeoning crusade for nature.

Douglas H. Strong is a professor of history at San Diego State University and the author of Dreamers and Defenders: American Conservationists (1988), also published by the University of Nebraska Press.

"A fascinating and charming presentation of our earliest American expressions of appreciation for the natural scene, wild and unmodified by man. . . . an account of the development of this appreciation and its practical application in programs to protect such areas from exploitation and development."—Nature

"A valuable reference work for the [reader] seeking to balance a history of wars, politics, and heroic explorations with a history of ideas and a growing environmental awareness and conscience. It is an important book."—Journal of Environmental Education

"Not often can a work of such scholarly documentation be read for pleasure. But then this is a scholarship undertaken not for its own sake but for the ends of making life more livable."—New York Times