The Ghost Forest: Racists, Radicals, and Real Estate in the California Redwoods
The Ghost Forest: Racists, Radicals, and Real Estate in the California Redwoods
This compelling book, written with first person intensity, tells the story of one of Humboldt County's greatest battles that culminated in the Timber Wars. It covers the effort to fell and exploit our once vast redwood forests and the counteracting quest to save their magnificent remnants.
King begins his over-400-page saga by recounting the Jurassic beginnings of the Sequoia family and their spread throughout the Northern Hemisphere. Then with his family roots in Sonoma's former redwood lands, he tells how he was drawn into the decades-long effort to save the remaining trees, soon focusing on Humboldt's Headwaters Forests and the contest with Pacific Lumber and Maxxam. From personal commitment, the author recounts the rise of Earth First and other environmental movements, the daring actions of tree sitters, arrests, and the surprisingly controversial Save the Redwoods League. King also details the early history of lumber companies, capitalist investors, the personalities involved, and the surprising intermingling of racism in the early conflicts.
The detailed end matter and the inserted photographs are valuable additions to this book, but it is the knowledge and passion that makes it so engrossing. Redwoods are among the major elements of Humboldt history, and "Ghost Forest" sheds a new, comprehensive and self-admittedly slanted light on the vibrant heart of Humboldt.
