Who Learns Will Love: The Story of Peace Valley Nature Center by C. Constable

 

Summary: (Amazon)

WHO LEARNS WILL LOVE anecdotally and pictorially recounts the tale of a determined, creative woman who establishes a Bucks County, PA nature center. Her enthusiasm ignites a love of nature in all who are around her. The early history, environmental education programs, wildlife, and children’s interactions with nature are included in this engaging chronicle of Peace Valley Nature Center.

Carolyn with Corey

Peace Valley Nature Center Website: https://www.peacevalleynaturecenter.org/

Videos of PVNC:

1. Great Blue Heron: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6S7uWuDRsb0

2. In the Fall: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UPQCeZxbnFE

Discussion Questions (by Carolyn, who will lead the discussion) 

The Journey of Trees by Zach St. George

 

Summary: (Amazon) Forests are restless. Any time a tree dies or a new one sprouts, the forest that includes it has shifted. When new trees sprout in the same direction, the whole forest begins to migrate, sometimes at astonishing rates. Today, however, an array of obstacles―humans felling trees by the billions, invasive pests transported through global trade―threaten to overwhelm these vital movements. Worst of all, the climate is changing faster than ever before, and forests are struggling to keep up.

A deft blend of science reporting and travel writing, The Journeys of Trees explores the evolving movements of forests by focusing on five trees: giant sequoia, ash, black spruce, Florida torreya, and Monterey pine. Journalist Zach St. George visits these trees in forests across continents, finding sequoias losing their needles in California, fossil records showing the paths of ancient forests in Alaska, domesticated pines in New Zealand, and tender new sprouts of blight-resistant American chestnuts in New Hampshire. Everywhere he goes, St. George meets lively people on conservation’s front lines, from an ecologist studying droughts to an evolutionary evangelist with plans to save a dying species. He treks through the woods with activists, biologists, and foresters, each with their own role to play in the fight for the uncertain future of our environment.

An eye-opening investigation into forest migration past and present, The Journeys of Trees examines how we can all help our trees, and our planet, survive and thrive.

Review: 

WSJ: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-journeys-of-trees-review-giants-in-transit-11602256237

Interviews:

Powell's Bookshop in Portland: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oG9Bjm_7s7o

NPR: https://www.npr.org/2020/07/28/896030567/believe-it-or-not-forests-migrate-but-not-fast-enough-for-climate-change

(wwnorton.com)

Author's Website: https://zachstgeorge.com/

Articles/Programs:

Giant Sequoia Genetic Conservation Program: http://www.torreyaguardians.org/sequoia-lunak-2015.pdf

Redwood Genome Project: https://www.savetheredwoods.org/project/redwood-genome-project/

Discussion Questions: 

(npr.org)

The Planter of Modern Life by Stephen Heyman

Summary (from book's website): "Louis Bromfield was a World War I ambulance driver, a Paris expat, and a Pulitzer Prize–winning novelist as famous in the 1920s as Hemingway or Fitzgerald. But he cashed in his literary success to finance a wild agrarian dream in his native Ohio. The ideas he planted at his utopian experimental farm, Malabar, would inspire America’s first generation of organic farmers and popularize the tenets of environmentalism years before Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring.

A lanky Midwestern farm boy dressed up like a Left Bank bohemian, Bromfield stood out in literary Paris for his lavish hospitality and his green thumb. He built a magnificent garden outside the city where he entertained aristocrats, movie stars, flower breeders, and writers of all stripes. Gertrude Stein enjoyed his food, Edith Wharton admired his roses, Ernest Hemingway boiled with jealousy over his critical acclaim. Millions savored his novels, which were turned into Broadway plays and Hollywood blockbusters, yet Bromfield’s greatest passion was the soil.

In 1938, Bromfield returned to Ohio to transform 600 badly eroded acres into a thriving cooperative farm, which became a mecca for agricultural pioneers and a country retreat for celebrities like Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall (who were married there in 1945).

This sweeping biography unearths a lost icon of American culture, a fascinating, hilarious and unclassifiable character who―between writing and plowing―also dabbled in global politics and high society. Through it all, he fought for an agriculture that would enrich the soil and protect the planet. While Bromfield’s name has faded into obscurity, his mission seems more critical today than ever before."

Reviews:

1. Kirkus Reviews: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/stephen-heyman/the-planter-of-modern-life/

2. Wall Street Journal: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-planter-of-modern-life-review-raising-the-bar-11587133008

Website for the Book: https://www.theplanterofmodernlife.com/

Publisher Site: https://wwnorton.com/books/9781324001898

Malabar Farm Foundation: https://malabarfarm.org/

E.B White's Poem, "Malabar Farm", published in the New Yorker (1948):

. . . Strangers arriving by every train,

Bromfield terracing against the rain,

Catamounts crying, mowers mowing,

Guest rooms full to overflowing,

Boxers in every room of the house,

Cows being milked to Brahms and Strauss,

Kids arriving by van and pung,

Bromfield up to his eyes in dung,

Sailors, trumpeters, mystics, actors,

All of them wanting to drive the tractors,

All of them eager to husk the corn,

Some of them sipping their drinks till morn […]

Films:

1. The Rains Came (1939): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkdQ95XEiY8

2. "The Land" Documentary (1942): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e-fAga_Yf10

(Malabar Farm: Ohiotraveler.com)

Interviews with Author:

1. National Endowment of the Humanities: https://www.neh.gov/blog/planter-modern-life-qa-stephen-heyman

2. Hudson Library: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEAlxErPtA8

Discussion Questions:

(Louis Bromfield and the farm: richlandsource.com)

Underland by Robert Macfarlane

 

Summary: (Amazon)

In Underland, he delivers his masterpiece: an epic exploration of the Earth’s underworlds as they exist in myth, literature, memory, and the land itself.

In this highly anticipated sequel to his international bestseller The Old Ways, Macfarlane takes us on an extraordinary journey into our relationship with darkness, burial, and what lies beneath the surface of both place and mind. Traveling through “deep time”―the dizzying expanses of geologic time that stretch away from the present―he moves from the birth of the universe to a post-human future, from the prehistoric art of Norwegian sea caves to the blue depths of the Greenland ice cap, from Bronze Age funeral chambers to the catacomb labyrinth below Paris, and from the underground fungal networks through which trees communicate to a deep-sunk “hiding place” where nuclear waste will be stored for 100,000 years to come. Woven through Macfarlane’s own travels are the unforgettable stories of descents into the underland made across history by explorers, artists, cavers, divers, mourners, dreamers, and murderers, all of whom have been drawn for different reasons to seek what Cormac McCarthy calls “the awful darkness within the world.”

Reviews:

Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/may/08/underland-by-robert-macfarlane-review

NY Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/03/books/review-underland-robert-macfarlane.html

The Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/07/robert-macfarlane-underland/590632/

(NY Times)

Videos, Films and Interviews:

1. Interview with Politics and Prose: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWsRPNFfpDY

2. Interview with Book Lust: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kd853p8cxos

3. Documentary Film: Kiss the Ground is about regenerative agriculture and the importance and role of soil in solving climate change. https://kisstheground.com/

(goodreads.com)

Famous Caves:

1. Lascaux: https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/85/

2. Chauvet: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/france-chauvet-cave-makes-grand-debut-180954582/

3. Alta, Norway: https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/352/; 

https://www.rockartscandinavia.com/images/articles/a13norstedt.pdf

Hellsegga, Norway

(https://www.rando-lofoten.net/de/hellsegga-de)

Local Caves and Caverns:

1. Crystal Cave: https://crystalcavepa.com/home/

2. Broomall Caves and Lenape: https://www.visitpa.com/region/lehigh-valley/mystery-unearthed-extraordinary-story-two-lenape-rock-shelters

3. Lost River Caverns: https://www.lostcave.com/sitef/index.php

Maelstrom Whirlpool Video

(Dark Matter Labs - ZMEscience.com)

Discussion Questions: (John will lead our discussion and here are his questions.)

(irishtimes.com)

1491: New Revelations of the Americas before Columbus by Charles C. Mann

Summary (Amazon):
In this groundbreaking work of science, history, and archaeology, Charles C. Mann radically alters our understanding of the Americas before the arrival of Columbus in 1492.

Contrary to what so many Americans learn in school, the pre-Columbian Indians were not sparsely settled in a pristine wilderness; rather, there were huge numbers of Indians who actively molded and influenced the land around them. The astonishing Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan had running water and immaculately clean streets, and was larger than any contemporary European city. Mexican cultures created corn in a specialized breeding process that it has been called man’s first feat of genetic engineering. Indeed, Indians were not living lightly on the land but were landscaping and manipulating their world in ways that we are only now beginning to understand. Challenging and surprising, this a transformative new look at a rich and fascinating world we only thought we knew.

(Wikipedia)

Reviews:
New York Times: '1491' Vanished Americans https://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/09/books/review/1491-vanished-americans.html

Kirkus Review: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/charles-c-mann/1491/

The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/nov/04/1493-americas-charles-mann-review

Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/04/AR2005080401609.html

Interviews:
NPR: https://www.npr.org/2005/08/21/4805434/1491-explores-the-americas-before-columbus
HCTV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhncJH4UFQI

Author's Website: http://www.charlesmann.org/

Author's Article in The Atlantic:
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2002/03/1491/302445/

Series on Vimeo based on the book: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/1491channel;
Free overview: https://vimeo.com/246849321

Penguin Random House's Reading Guide (2nd Edition):
https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/107178/1491-second-edition-by-charles-c-mann/9781400032051/readers-guide/

Discussion Questions: (John will be leading the discussion with his following questions)

1. What are some of the most important misconceptions about the Americas before Europeans? How did these misconceptions come about?

2. Describe the author’s depiction of the new world and how it was developed by its original inhabitants?

3. What were some of the accomplishments of Native Americans that equal or surpassed those of Europeans?

4. What were some of the most memorable, and catastrophic, initial encounters between Europeans and Native Americans, and what were common factors between them? Could we become vulnerable like the Native Americans in our global society today?  Could the tragic outcomes been avoided?

5. How has our understanding of the history of Native Americans and how they settled these continents changed during our lifetimes?

6. Infectious diseases perhaps played the most important role in the devastation of Native American populations. What were some of these diseases and their effects? What would have happened if Native Americans had also harbored infectious diseases unknown to Europeans?

7. An important goal for modern environmentalists is to preserve and restore the Amazonian forests.  How does this impact the native peoples of this region?  Could this also be seen as a modern version of foreigners imposing their wills upon indigenous peoples?

8. Do you think the world is a better place for what happened?

(Patheos.com)

The World Without Us by Alan Weisman

Summary: (Selection from Amazon):
"Alan Weisman offers an utterly original approach to questions of humanity's impact on the planet: he asks us to envision our Earth, without us. In this far-reaching narrative, Weisman explains how our massive infrastructure would collapse and finally vanish without human presence; which everyday items may become immortalized as fossils; how copper pipes and wiring would be crushed into mere seams of reddish rock; why some of our earliest buildings might be the last architecture left; and how plastic, bronze sculpture, radio waves, and some man-made molecules may be our most lasting gifts to the universe."

Reviews:
NY Times: "Starting Over" by Jennifer Schuessler:
https://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/02/books/review/Schuessler-t.html
The Guardian:
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/may/03/society1

Book and Author Website:
http://www.worldwithoutus.com/about_author.html

Author Interviews:
1. NPR: https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=14194915
2. Jon Stewart: http://www.cc.com/video-clips/0xoqg1/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-alan-weisman
3. NOVA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m8CsBMCfu0s
4. YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQxBYoGNmO0

Related Articles:
1. "Should it be Saved: Proposals to focus resources on some endangered species and let others go extinct are stirring fierce debate", Warren Corwall, Science, Sept. 7, 2018.
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/361/6406/962

2. "Florence engulfs hog farms and chicken houses, thrashing NC agriculture", Dan Charles, NPR, September 18, 2018.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/09/18/649132289/florence-engulfs-hog-farms-and-chicken-houses-thrashing-north-carolina-agricultu

Eleven Fun Facts from the Book: Mother Earth News:
https://www.motherearthnews.com/nature-and-environment/nature/world-without-us-alan-weisman

Discussion Questions: 

1.     What are some of the things that you found surprising or not, that would survive a world without humans?

2.     When considering common household items you use (such as a computer, cell phone, lawnmower, etc.), reflect on its origins, how it’s manufactured, its’ uses and lifespan, etc. How might such self-reflection inform your future choices that you make to buy, use or store something?

3.     Which species do you think will adapt, thrive or decline in our changing world?

4.     Many conservation groups and governments (i.e. Endangered Species Act, etc. ) have worked and continue to work to protect and restore species most at risk of disappearing. Which species do you think we should focus on to save? How does one choose?

5.     Are humans a part of the natural world or separate?

6.     We are aware of some of the worst ecological disasters such as Chernobyl, but were some of the author’s examples surprising to you, such as plastics, embalming products, flower industry waste, nuclear waste? (Remember, this book was written in 2007)

7.     Did you find this book depressing? Hopeful? What was your emotional response to this book?

8.     If humans were gone, what would you hope would return, i.e. animals, plants, etc.

9.     What new revelations might you have to help the destiny of the earth now, beyond your own personal actions, which would have a greater, broader, meaningful impact? Perhaps: promoting renewable energies, encouraging businesses to eliminate plastic bags and straws, supporting conservation and environmental groups, other ideas?

Some of the questions were inspired from: https://www.madisonpubliclibrary.org/sites/default/files/bookclubkit/discussions/weisman_world.pdf and http://www.galesburglibrary.org/BookClub/WorldWithoutUs.pdf