Product Description
Updated and revised for the 60th Anniversary.New afterword by Michael Grunwald, author of The Swamp. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

Florida's environmental Jiminy Cricket
When activist Joe Browder was trying to round up people to fight a proposed jetport in the Everglades, one of the people he approached was Marjory Stoneman Douglas, whose 1947 bestseller Everglades: River
of Grass had first brought the state's most famous marsh to a national audience. But she demurred. Nobody would listen to some half-blind old lady, the 78-year-old writer said. People only pay attention to organizations.

"Well," Browder retorted, "why don't you start an organization?"

So she did, founding Friends of the Everglades with dues of $1 a year so anyone could join. Douglas not only denounced the jetport, she transformed herself into Florida's environmental conscience. She spent the next 30 years--until her death at 108--fearlessly confronting local, state, and federal officials, wagging her finger at them like Jiminy Cricket in a floppy garden club hat.

Her work stands as an environmental classic par excellence. For a look at Florida's current environmental woes, check out Paving Paradise: Florida's Vanishing Wetlands and the Failure of No Net Loss (Florida History and Culture)

Wonderful book to learn about the Everglades
Although there are no photos, this is an excellent table book to read and share with guests visiting Florida.It has wonderful history notes on the Everglades.

Excellent
This is an excellent book on the Everglades, the history of Florida, and the ecology of Florida. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Grand Life of a Grand Woman!
When I moved to Florida in 1973 I almost immediately fell in love with the pine forests, the bayheads, the shallow lakes, the hardwood hammocks and the swamps.By then much damage had been done to the state and more was contemplated.The drainage canals around Miami, the cross Florida Barge Canal and other, often quite unfeasible schemes, had either been done, started and then scrapped, or were in the works.It seems like the temptation to "improve" Florida from the late 1800s on was so strong it was almost impossible to stop.A number of people had warned about the fragility of the Everglades and other Florida ecosystems, but few listened.However one talented writer with a remarkable background was able to help along the effort to protect the Everglades.Almost simultaneously with the establishment of Everglades National Park, Marjory Stoneman Douglas published her "Everglades: River of Grass'" now the standard work on the subject. In it she demonstrated that the Everglades was not a worthless swamp, but a vibrant ecological community with a long history. Her book's first printing was sold out within 2 months!Other fights were raging by the time I reached Florida- the Florida Barge Canal, of course, but also efforts to protect the Big Cypress and Fakahatchee Strand.Among the people involved were Archie Carr and his wife Marjorie Carr (the latter is included in a photo in the current book).

Marjory Stoneman Douglas, in her autobiography based on tape recordings by John Rothchild, subtitled "Voice of the River," was an institution in the Sunshine State and her book informs her many admirers of the struggles and triumphs she had in a life that spanned a whole century.It is a fascinating tale and full of associations with the most prominent names in Florida and in literature, newspaper publishing and politics.I recommend it highly to anyone, but especially those who are interested in the Florida that used to be.

This brings up another point, and a very sad one.I got to see some of what was left of Florida's natural environment, including Everglades National Park and the Ocala Scrub while I was in Florida (some in the company of Archie Carr).It was a ghost of what once was! Even though the citizens of Florida voted in monies to buy up thousands of acres of sensitive areas, there were many tragic losses.The state's wilderness has deteriorated further since I left it in 1978.I have no wish now to return and see the result, but what is left in Big Cypress, the Everglades, the Ocala Scrub, and many others, is there because of people like Marjory Stoneman Douglas!

REMARKABLE STORY
It was a great surprise to find that there were no customer reviews for a book that was first published in 1987.This remarkable book is an insight into an American legend, Marjory Stoneman Douglas.She began as a young girl to write for the Miami Herald in 1915.The book shows how she was able to achieve a long history of publications and books to her credit.Additionally, this eminent conservationist who died in 1998 at age 108 has been honored with the saving of the Florida Everglades.This book is a must read for all American women because it provides insight into just what can be accomplished when one woman is motivated to take action. ... Read more

Product Description
The subjects that would fire Marjory Stoneman Douglas’s enthusiasm for the rest of her life first appeared in her short fiction published in the 1920s. Florida’s most celebrated environmentalist, the author of The Everglades: River of Grass, wrote even then about protecting South Florida’s fragile ecosystem and the state’s endangered species, about the dangers of short-sighted land development, and about Florida history.

The nine stories in this first collection take place in a scattering of South Florida settings--Miami, Ft. Lauderdale, the Tamiami Trail, the Keys, the Everglades—and reveal the drama of hurricanes and plane crashes, of kidnappers, escaped convicts, and smugglers.

Editor Kevin McCarthy relates each story to Douglas’s life and points out the autobiographical touches which surface frequently in her stories. He is the author of several books, including: Florida Stories, Florida Lighthouses, and More Florida Stories. ... Read more

Product Description
A portrait of a significant naturalist for the environmental conservation movement relates her three-quarter-century fight for the preservation of the Florida Everglades and reception of the 1993 Medal of Freedom. By the author of The Dust Bowl. ... Read more

Product Description
A biography of the Florida environmental activist whose efforts on behalf of the Everglades have resulted in the protection and revitalization of that area. ... Read more

Product Description
Traces the life of the woman who became known as the "Grandmother of the Glades" for her fight to preserve the Florida Everglades against misuse and development. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

The making of an icon
Before she wrote THE EVERGLADES: RIVER OF GRASS, Marjorie Stoneman Douglas worked the daily grind at the Miami Herald and also "slaved in the vineyards" of the Saturday Evening Post.This gorgeous volume is the first time some of her incidental writings have seen print.It is worth the price for that alone, although one wishes for a greater understanding of what had taken place in her life before she got to Florida in the first place.Until we see the autobiography of Douglas that Jack Davis, the editor of this volume, has been working on for some years, these often light and deceivingly carefree tidbits are out of focus.But it's awfully good to get a glimpse of Florida's most famous curmudgeon before she became an icon. ... Read more

Product Description
Meet the Mother of the Everglades a tireless campaigner for this unique ecological region of south Florida. She was also a journalist and writer whose life will inspire children. (9-12) ... Read more

Amazon.com Review
Originally published in 1947, The Everglades was one ofthose rare books, like Uncle Tom's Cabin andSilent Spring,to have an immediate political effect: it helped draw public attentionto a vast and little-known area that South Florida developers haddeemed a worthless swamp and were busily draining, damming, andremaking, and it mustered needed public support for President HarryTruman's controversial order, later that year, to protect more than 2million acres as Everglades National Park.

Remote and seldomvisited, the Everglades nonetheless had a rich human history: severalNative American peoples, Spanish explorers, French and Englishpirates, runaway slaves, and Anglo trappers and fishermen all came tothis limestone basin and made their lives among its slowly movingwater and fast-growing sawgrass. It is this human history, more thanthe life histories of the Everglades' deer, panthers, scorpions,serpents, and alligators, that occupies most of Marjorie StonemanDouglas's pages; even so, her lyrical if sometimes sentimental accountof the area's flora and fauna makes for fine reading.

Douglas diedin 1998 at the age of 107, having done more than any other one personto protect this magnificent portion of wild America. Anyone wishing tocontinue her good work--and to understand the Everglades' importancein the shape of things--will find great riches in herbook. --Gregory McNamee ... Read more

Customer Reviews (7)

Wonderful update!
I had read an earlier printing of this classic book, and I knew that it was an invaluable resource of information and a well-written narrative.The 50th anniversary edition has excellent updates about developments in the Everglades and the maps are much more readable than my earlier version.I was very pleased.

Two Books in One
Last winter, I purchased River of Grass at the National Park Service's store at Shark Valley in the Everglades.It was recommended by the tour guide.I visit Miami about once a year and always hope to have the opportunity to visit the Everglades.I have known that they are a very special, spiritual place on the edge of a huge city.

However, River of Grass has helped me better understand the unique place that this wilderness holds.It is an ancient area that was the sight of much fighting, greed, and sorrow.It is one of the very few places left where the Native American people fought and, to some degree, won.This, in and of itself, is fascinating.There is a deep and ancient culture that Ms. Douglas discusses and explains with great beauty and respect.

And then there is the River itself.The Everglades have been the sight of some of the most contentious environmental battles in North America.Ms. Douglas identifies the warring parties and comes down firmly in the camp of the environmentalists.This adds a great deal of power and conviction to the book.

I strongly recommend this book if you have an interest in South Florida beyond the beaches and the tourist sights.

Marvelous
What a readable and fascinating history of the wonderful State of Florida!I enjoyed every minute of the story of the struggle to conquer the environment and mold it to the white man's idea of a civilized place.Sadly, I am not convinced the developers will allow the Everglades to exist much longer.I am grateful to have lived in a time when its wonders are still available to me.

"Mother of the Everglades"
That's how most of us in Florida referred to Marjory Stoneman Douglas. Long honored by the state and then by the nation a few years before she died in 1998, she was a living legend in the South Florida environmental movement. Within a few miles of where I live there's a school, a park, a long section of highway and the Biscayne Nature Center, all of which are named after this grand old lady.

And grand and old she was. One of the most amazing facts about her life is the way it seems to have paralleled the recent history of the Everglades itself. Consider this. The first real encroachment of the Everglades began in 1890 when settlers started draining the area around the Kissimmee river. This was just 10 years before Douglas was born. When she wrote THE EVERGLADES: RIVER OF GRASS in 1947 she was 57 years old. The book played a huge part in creating public awareness about the vital importance of the area and was the prime impetus for the creation of the Everglades National Park. Douglas was in fact there when Harry Truman officially opened the park in late 1947. She was still around to receive an honor from president Clinton in 1993.Most incredibly she lived to see the publishing of this - the Fiftieth Anniversary edition of her best known book - dying shortly after at the age of 108! One of the salient points to note about this edition is that it offers an added chapter by another writer titled "Coming Together" which highlights some of the recent progress being made in reversing the damage done to the Everglades watershed area. Progress which can trace it's origins back decades ago to the constant cajoling and inspiration of one Marjory Stoneman Douglas. Never has the saying "Life imitates Nature" been any truer.

Douglas's original book is in keeping with the times it was written in. A natural history of the Everglades with a heavy emphasis on wildlife and the local culture, written in a simple straightforward style. This "just-the-facts" approach is used when recounting the early history of the area, giving names and dates of conquerors and explorers. The writing style occasionally feels a bit dry but these moments quickly pass as we get so caught up in reading about history by someone who was themselves a bit of living history.

A must-read for fans of the Everglades
Everglades National Park is one of the country's mostfascinating wilderness areas, and is quite possibly the best place forviewing wildlife on the entire North American continent.It's amazing that such a park can exist right next to one of our biggest and fastest-growing urban areas, and in a region that draws millions of visitors every year.The fact that it exists at all in the face of so much human pressure is a testament to the efforts of Marjory Stoneman Douglas and others, and to the influence of this book.

Still, for the most part, this book is a conventional dates-and-events human history of South Florida rather than an argument for environmental protection.The environmental theme doesn't really get going until after the Civil War, well past the middle of the book, when draining the Everglades was first proposed, and it isn't until "The Eleventh Hour," the final chapter of the original edition, that the book becomes an impassioned plea for saving the wilderness.A final chapter added in 1987 brings the story into our era, continues the catalog of degradation, and makes the key point that most of the forces that threaten the Everglades flourish outside the boundaries of the National Park.

I confess that I found the historical narrative a bit dull in places, though it's hard to imagine a more colorful cast of characters than the conquistadors, pirates, hardy Native Americans, escaped slaves, adventurers, poachers, speculators and old-time politicians who all play a part in the story.Nevertheless, "River of Grass" is still the best history of South Florida, and should be on the reading list of anyone who wants something a little more substantial than the tourist guides and coffee-table fluff that dominate the shelf of books about the region. ... Read more

Product Description
Henry Bunks lives in crowded Miami in the 1950s. A nearby canal -- an entrance to what will become the Florida Everglades -- provides respite from his chaotic life in an uncaring family. Henry meets and befriends an alligator hunter and stows away on his boat. The hunter, an enigmatic character, is at once an outlaw and a father figure to Henry. In the watery wilderness, the man and boy meet a wildlife photographer, a botanist, and a park ranger, and Henry is thrust into a race to save a human life. First published in 1959, this story combines great adventure with a boy's first experience of adults who are neither totally bad nor totally noble. Alligator Crossing is a rediscovered classic by Marjory Stoneman Douglas, known as the "Savior of the Everglades." ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

A world of beauty and danger
Originally published in 1959, Alligator Crossing by Marjory Stoneman Douglas (1890-1998) is an engaging novel about Henry Bunks, a thirteen-year-old boy who stows away in the boat of an outlaw alligator hunter in Florida. Henry's journey through the Everglades will take him into a world of beauty and danger, where he must rely on his own courage and resourcefulness to protect himself and the land alike. Also available in a paperback edition ... is highly recommended reading and a welcome addition to school and community library collections. ... Read more

Product Description
This digital document is an article from Water: Science and Issues, brought to you by Gale®, a part of Cengage Learning, a world leader in e-research and educational publishing for libraries, schools and businesses.The length of the article is 898 words.The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase.You can view it with any web browser.Integrates key concepts, current issues, traditional and emerging research, and major legislation in three subject areas: fresh water, marine waters, and policy and management. These topics are complemented by historical overviews, biographical sketches, and career information. ... Read more

Product Description
This digital document, covering the life and work of Marjory Stoneman Douglas, is an entry from Contemporary Authors, a reference volume published by Thompson Gale. The length of the entry is 1220 words. The page length listed above is based on a typical 300-word page. Although the exact content of each entry from this volume can vary, typical entries include the following information:

• Place and date of birth and death (if deceased)
• Family members
• Education
• Professional associations and honors
• Employment
• Writings, including books and periodicals
• A description of the author's work
• References to further readings about the author

Product Description
No one did more than Marjory Stoneman Douglas to transform the Everglades from the country's most maligned swamp into its most beloved wetland. By the late twentieth century, her name and her classic The Everglades: River of Grass had become synonymous with Everglades protection. The crusading resolve and boundless energy of this implacable elder won the hearts of an admiring public while confounding her opponents--growth merchants intent on having their way with the Everglades. Douglas's efforts ultimately earned her a place among a mere handful of individuals honored as a namesake of a national wilderness area.

In the first comprehensive biography of Douglas, Jack E. Davis explores the 108-year life of this compelling woman. Douglas was more than an environmental activist. She was a suffragist, a lifetime feminist and supporter of the ERA, a champion of social justice, and an author of diverse literary talent. She came of age literally and professionally during the American environmental century, the century in which Americans mobilized an unprecedented popular movement to counter the equally unprecedented liberties they had taken in exploiting, polluting, and destroying the natural world.

The Everglades were a living barometer of America's often tentative shift toward greater environmental responsibility. Reconstructing this larger picture, Davis recounts the shifts in Douglas's own life and her instrumental role in four important developments that contributed to Everglades protection: the making of a positive wetland image, the creation of a national park, the expanding influence of ecological science, and the rise of the modern environmental movement. In the grand but beleaguered Everglades, which Douglas came to understand is a vast natural system that supports human life, she saw nature's providence. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

The entire early movement of environmental consciousness and history is traced here
AN EVERGLADES PROVIDENCE: MARJORY STONEMAN DOUGLAS AND THE AMERICAN ENVIRONMENTAL CENTURY is a 'must' for any library strong in social or environmental history. It offers a detailed, lengthy analysis of a woman who was dedicated to environmental awareness, offering much more than a biography of her life and achievements. The entire early movement of environmental consciousness and history is traced here, making for a powerful and important survey.

struggle to preserve the Everglades by a leading 20th-century environmentalist
The year 1947 turned out to be a midpoint in the environmental activism of Marjory Stoneman Douglas, not the culmination some expected. In this year, President Truman dedicated the Everglades National Park. Stoneman's environmental classic The Everglades: River of Grass was also published. But as anyone living today knows, the Everglades was not preserved for all time. In 1947, Douglas still had 50 years of life ahead of her. She died in 1998 at the age of 108. During the second half of her life, she continued to work tirelessly to build on her earlier, partial successes in preserving the Everglades and playing a lead in environmentalism.

Though not as well-known or celebrated as John Muir or Rachel Carson even by environmentalists, Douglas was a central figure in reformulating the public's perspective on the environment as she focused particularly on the preservation of the Everglades. "More than any other single writer or activist, [she] embodied the American environmental century--that period from the closing of the frontier to the end of the twentieth century during which environmental concerns rose to the fore in American politics and society." (from the Foreword by Paul S. Sutter)

Davis's voluminous biography takes in the full scope of Douglas's life from shaky marriage, noted author of stories and novels, prominent forebears and influence of her father who was cofounder of the Miami Herald, and feminist leader, to the environmental activism and projects she was involved in, especially the recognition of the place of the Everglades in Florida's and the U.S.'s environmental heritage and its preservation for which she is most remembered. At appropriate spots in the straightforward chronological biography, Davis goes into the legal problems of the man Douglas was briefly married to, her work on the homefront in World War II, the path of her literary career, and specifics of environmental legislation. The author also relates scientific information as appropriate for readers to understand these topics and concomitantly appreciate Douglas's knowledge of environmentalism and her activist approach focusing on issues and pressing for their resolution.

In this first biography on this pioneering environmentalist--which for most readers will be an introductory biography--Davis, as was his aim, gets in all the biographical material as gleaned from references in notes running more than 125 pages. As all this in a lifespan of over 100 years is presented on the same par, as more or less indiscriminate, unevaluated information, there is little perspective or drama. The tactics of the Florida developer Broward, Douglas's work on legislation in Washington, critical points in saving the Everglades, Douglas's feminist activism, and the many other subjects are treated mostly as varied aspects of her life and work. Despite Davis's diffident, though highly informed stance as author, Douglas's unique achievements shine through.
... Read more