A Wild Idea shares the complete story of the difficult birth of the Adirondack Park Agency (APA). The Adirondack region of New York's rural North Country forms the nation's largest State Park, with a territory as large as Vermont. Planning experts view the APA as a triumph of sustainability that balances human activity with the preservation of wild ecosystems. The truth isn't as pretty. The story of the APA, told here for the first time, is a complex, troubled tale of political dueling and communities pushed to the brink of violence.
The North Country's environmental movement started among a small group of hunters and hikers, rose on a huge wave of public concern about pollution that crested in the early 1970s, and overcame multiple obstacles to "save" the Adirondacks. Edmondson shows how the movement's leaders persuaded a powerful Governor to recruit planners, naturalists, and advisors and assign a task that had never been attempted before. The team and the politicians who supported them worked around the clock to draft two visionary land-use plans and turn them into law. But they also made mistakes, and their strict regulations were met with determined opposition from local landowners who insisted that private property is private.
A Wild Idea is based on in-depth interviews with five dozen insiders who are central to the story. Their observations contain many surprising and shocking revelations. This is a rich, exciting narrative about state power and how it was imposed on rural residents. It shows how the Adirondacks were "saved," and also why that campaign sparked a passionate rebellion.
Show moreA Wild Idea shares the complete story of the difficult birth of the Adirondack Park Agency (APA). The Adirondack region of New York's rural North Country forms the nation's largest State Park, with a territory as large as Vermont. Planning experts view the APA as a triumph of sustainability that balances human activity with the preservation of wild ecosystems. The truth isn't as pretty. The story of the APA, told here for the first time, is a complex, troubled tale of political dueling and communities pushed to the brink of violence.
The North Country's environmental movement started among a small group of hunters and hikers, rose on a huge wave of public concern about pollution that crested in the early 1970s, and overcame multiple obstacles to "save" the Adirondacks. Edmondson shows how the movement's leaders persuaded a powerful Governor to recruit planners, naturalists, and advisors and assign a task that had never been attempted before. The team and the politicians who supported them worked around the clock to draft two visionary land-use plans and turn them into law. But they also made mistakes, and their strict regulations were met with determined opposition from local landowners who insisted that private property is private.
A Wild Idea is based on in-depth interviews with five dozen insiders who are central to the story. Their observations contain many surprising and shocking revelations. This is a rich, exciting narrative about state power and how it was imposed on rural residents. It shows how the Adirondacks were "saved," and also why that campaign sparked a passionate rebellion.
Show moreIntroduction: Two Views of the Landscape
1. Whose Woods These Are
2. "A Three-Year Vacation"
3. Quickening
4. Brotherly Love
5. Going Rogue
6. Order Must Be
7. "Pass the F*cking Thing"
8. The Big Map
9. The Nature Business
10. The Big Push
11. Cashing the Chips
Conclusion: Convinced against Their Will
Brad Edmondson is the author of Environmental Affairs in New York State, Ice Cream Social, and Postwar Cornell. Visit bradedmondson.com for more information.
Edmondson has told his complicated story well. He writes clearly,
shows a grasp of broad swaths of information and opinion, and
capably explains how the various players evolved in their thinking.
A Wild Idea merits the attention of everyone deeply interested in
the Adirondack region.
*Adirondack Daily Enterprise*
Brad Edmondson's thoroughly researched book details the difficult
process behind the enactment of this law.
*Albany Times Union*
Brad Edmondson, the author of A Wild Idea, published to coincide
with the anniversary of Governor Nelson Rockefeller's signing of
the APA bill on June 25, 1971, reminds us how broadly popular
environmentalism was in the early 70s, unifying a nation still
fractured along generational, cultural and political fault
lines.
*The Lake George Mirror*
A Wild Idea is essential reading for anyone interested in how human
beings can coexist in reasonable harmony with our natural
world.
*Adirondack Explorer*
Much of the journalistic-style narrative reported in A Wild Idea is
derived from Edmondson's more than five dozen interviews with
people who, in one way or another, were first-hand participants in
the APA's founding. While the author's sympathies are clearly
aligned with the APA and its supporters, his text offers a fair,
measured treatment of the arguments, reasoning, and passions of
opponents.
*New York-Pennsylvania Collector*
A Wild Idea is an important and timely intervention in Adirondack
historiography as well as a helpful addition, particularly in its
methodology, to the study of the American wilderness movement and
the history of regional planning.
*New York History*
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