JOHN MUIR
FROM SCOTLANDTO THESIERRA
Frederick Turner
Introduced byGraham White
CANONGATE
First published in the USA by Viking Penguin Inc.
First published in Great Britain in 1997 by
Canongate Books Ltd,
14 High Street, Edinburgh EHI ITE.
Copyright © 1985 Frederick Turner
Introduction copyright © 1997 Graham White
This digital edition first published in 2014 by Canongate Books
Photographs: courtesy of the John Muir Papers, Holt-
Atherton Department of Special Collections, University of
the Pacific Libraries, © 1984 Muir-Hanna Trust and courtesy
of The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.
The right of Frederick Turner to be identified as the author
of this work has been asserted in accordance with the
Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this volume is available on request from the British Library.
ISBN 9781782114314
In Memory ofPeter Farb
Contents
The Lessons of a Long-Distance Runner
Civilization and Its Discontents
Acknowledgments
My first debt, chronologically and otherwise, is to my late friend Peter Farb, who enthusiastically encouraged me to attempt this book. Ronald H. Limbaugh, archivist of the Muir Papers at the Holt-Atherton Pacific Center for Western Studies, University of the Pacific, has been unfailingly generous, both with his time and with his great knowledge of the Muir Papers. Thanks are due also to the members of his staff, especially Berenice Lamson.
I was cordially assisted by the staffs of other institutions holding Muir materials or items of related interest. These include the Yosemite National Park Research Library, with special thanks to Jack Geyer; the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, with special thanks to James Hanson and Harold Miller; the University of Wisconsin and its archivists Bernard Schermetzler and F. Frank Cook; the Huntington Library; the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University; the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, with special thanks to Mary-Ellen Jones; the Widener and Houghton libraries, Harvard University; the Cape Cod Community College library, with thanks to Gregory Masterson; the Martinez (California) Public Library; the John Muir National Historic Site, Martinez, with special thanks to P. J. Ryan, Armando Quintero, Margaret Plummer, and Linda Moon Stumpff; the California Hospital Medical Center, Los Angeles, with thanks to Vicky A. Ryan and Joan Flynn of its Medical Records division; the Military Service Branch, National Archives, with thanks to Brenda Beasley Kepley; the Tennessee State Department of Conservation, with thanks to Terry Bonham.
Many individuals helped me along my way, and for what they freely gave, the mere mention of their names seems poor recompense. However, my sincere thanks to Millie Stanley, T. H. Watkins, Honora Moore, John Hay, Robert Card, Sr., Stephen B. Oates, Clara Gee Rymer, Grant Barnes, Nelson Lichtenstein, Eric Simmons, William Cadman, Robert E. Fletcher, Dr. John Talley, Eugene Newmann, Holway Jones, Dr. Gulden Mackmull, Harry Kearns, Roy Harvey Pearce, William A. Williams, and Charles A. Reich; to