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Title: Last Stand: George Bird Grinnell, the Battle to Save the Buffalo, and the Birth of the New West
Author: Michael Punke
Narrator: Robert Slade
Format: Unabridged
Length: 9 hrs and 43 mins
Language: English
Release date: 03-10-16
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Limited
Genres: Science & Technology, Environment
Publisher's Summary:
From the number-one international best-selling author of The Revanant - the book that inspired the award-winning movie - comes the fascinating story of America's first battle over the environment.
In the last three decades of the 19th century, an American buffalo herd once numbering 30 million animals was reduced to twelve. In an era that treated the West as nothing more than a treasure chest of resources to be dug up and shot down, the buffalo was a commodity, hounded by hide hunters seeking to make their fortunes.
Supporting them was the US Army, which considered the eradication of the buffalo essential to victory in its ongoing war on Native Americans. Into this maelstrom rode young George Bird Grinnell. A scientist and a journalist, a hunter and a conservationist, Grinnell would lead the battle to save the buffalo and preserve an American icon from extinction.
Members Reviews:
Survival of the bison is only part of the story
Very interesting biography of George Bird Grinnell and his role in saving Yellowstone National Park from complete decimation by hide and trophy head hunters, railroads, and souvenir-hunting tourists. It took a decades-long fight through his magazine, influential (rich!) friends, and lobbying in Congress to do it, but he persisted until he was successful. After winning his Yellowstone battles, Grinnell didn't ride off into the sunset, but began another fight to preserve what is today Glacier National Park. He should be known to every American school child, but had been largely forgotten until the recent celebrations of the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service.
Grinnell was an amazingly gifted and talented writer, but this book is only part of his story. Not detailed in the book is Grinnell's years of correspondence with many former Indian warriors, including George Bent, son of fur trader William Ben and his Cheyenne wife and survivor of the Sand Creek Massacre. While John Wesley Powell's Bureau of Ethnology concentrated on collecting physical artifacts, photographs, and Indian languages, Grinnell was documenting late 19th century Native Americans' views of their own oral history, culture, and wars against encroaching American civilization. Today it would be hard to say which of these efforts are more valuable to the study of the history of the American West.
The American buffalo, invasion of native lands and mindless profiteering by the early settlers
Michael Punke has done a wonderful job telling readers how the thundering herds of magnificent buffalo have disappeared and the senseless greed that drove this genocide of a species. He has given details of the way "hunting" was done of this docile creature and how this business was first considered an adventure and food source then became a way to make money then turned into an industry regardless of the obvious impact on the survival of the species. On this path, colossal waste also took place of unwanted carcasses left to rot in the open plains. How the excess meat lying around created a boom in the birth rate of wolves which in turn were also slaughtered because they came in the way of the white man. Punke also describes the brave and tireless efforts of early ecologists and wild life advocates who alone are responsible for the miniscule few buffalo we see today.
