Dr. Douglas Brinkley writes history, and teaches. In the last decade he’s been one of our premiere historians of conservation and wilderness preservation, especially as started by Theodore Roosevelt.
The issue at the hearing was the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
One may get a whiff of “skeptic” desperation at the hearing — Brinkley’s written a book on wilderness protection. That’s why he was called to testify.
Tip of the old scrub brush to Eli Rabett. He’s right — it’s tough to improve on the straight dope, the unexpurgated version. So most of this post is borrowed from the Bunny’s Spartan, laconic post of this same material.
And the Big Bunny is correct that MSNBC’s interview of Brinkley following the hearing is good to see and hear.
More, Resources:
- Odd as hell:
the House Committee on Natural Resources removed this hearing from their calendar; at this moment, early on December 2, it’s as if the hearing didn’t happen, the official record “disappeared” (surely that’s not so)Here is where the hearing record should be, but Dr. Brinkley’s written testimony is not present. I presume the committee will put it up sometime soon. - Brinkley’s short bio at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University
- New York Times Sunday Book Review piece by Jonathan Rosen of Brinkley’s near-epic book, The Wilderness Warrior – Theodore Roosevelt and the Crusade for America; review of the book in the NYT daily edition, by Janet Maslin
- Excerpt of Brinkley’s book, The Wilderness Warrior
- Kevin Phillips’s review of Brinkley’s 2007 The Reagan Diaries; excerpt of the book
Dr. Brinkley's 2011 history of wilderness and preservation of Alaska
- From a review of Brinkley’s important 2006 history, The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast: “In his preface to ‘The Great Deluge,’ Douglas Brinkley writes, ‘My hope is that this history, fast out of the gates, may serve as an opening effort in Katrina scholarship.’ He needn’t worry. A prolific author, known for publishing at breakneck speed, Brinkley has put his skills to good use by interviewing hundreds of Katrina survivors, disaster responders and public officials, and then weaving their disparate stories into a seamless narrative of the hurricane’s momentous first week. It’s a microhistory, logging in at more than 700 pages, but its thick detail provides a ground-level view of human behavior far richer than the breathless news reports that stunned and shamed the nation in the summer of 2005.
- Brinkley’s book that Don Young should have already read, but better read now if he loves Alaska: The Quiet World – Saving Alaska’s Wilderness Kingdom, 1879-1960; a good description of the book from the publisher, HarperCollins: “A riveting history of America’s most beautiful natural resources, The Quiet World documents the heroic fight waged by the U.S. federal government from 1879 to 1960 to save wild Alaska—Mount McKinley, the Tongass and Chugach national forests, Gates of the Arctic, Glacier Bay, Lake Clark, and the Coastal Plain of the Beaufort Sea, among other treasured landscapes—from the extraction industries. Award-winning historian Douglas Brinkley traces the wilderness movement in Alaska, from John Muir to Theodore Roosevelt to Aldo Leopold to Dwight D. Eisenhower, with narrative verve. Basing his research on extensive new archival material, Brinkley shows how a colorful band of determined environmentalists created the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge just before John F. Kennedy became president. “
- The Ticket features C-SPAN’s tape of the hearing, “C-SPAN Battle: Historian shouts down Congressman at hearing”
- Heather at Crooks & Liars, notes on the Brinkley/Young dustup
- FuelFix noted the feud continues after the hearing
- History Musings links to coverage in the Fairbanks and Anchorage, Alaska, papers
Posted by Ed Darrell 
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 