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I mourn the loss of the Native American culture as it once was. I'm very grateful to Kent Nerburn and the New World Library for putting this book together so that the wisdom of this great culture continues to survive. I just purchased a copy of this book to donate to my local public library so that my whole town can share in this wisdom.
This book is basicly a collection of quotes and speeches by various American Indian leaders with a few comments by Mr. Nerburn that edited them into a seamless volume of American Indian thought.
There are quotes here that deal with their Spirituality including reincarnation, Their family Life, Their care for Nature, Honesty, etc.
I am considering buying several more copies of this book to help my family and friends understand my spiritual beliefs.
I only have one minor nitpick. Mr. Nerburn insists on calling the Chief of the Suquamish people "Chief Seattle". His name was Sealth. Seattle was an error in translation.
Yes; Seattle, Washington was named for this wise leader.
Please E-mail me if you have questions or comments about my review. Two Bears.
Wah doh Ogedoda "We give thanks Great Spirit"
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Sorry about my grammar, Im from Mexico.
The book is written for those who want a lot of information, yet it is accessible for anyone from a very inquisitive boy or girl, through to university students who want to identify species in the wild. (I know, I used my copy from the age of ten to twenty-five on countless field trips and excursions.)
It's sturdy and affordable, especially considering the amount of information it contains. There are many b/w illustrations within the text showing specific identifying features, and a nice set of colour and black and white plates. More useful than Audubon, if you like these peaceful little animals this book will be with you for a long time.
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The design of this volume is great. Have any of you ever looked at a book's layout? This masterpiece should be studied in a graphics design course.
I specialize in scientific illustration (black & white technical stuff). Much of my work has been published in Dr. Balon's: Environmental Biology of Fishes and I dare say I have an eye for what's good within this field. While Tomelleri's early salmonids (see Fishes of the South central USA) are okay at best, the ones featured in this book are out of this world. Strangely, he includes some of his earliest works(p.71, p.261). These must have been added for sentimental reasons and have little value being included with the otherwise superb lateral views.
I find it strange to see the reaction of people when I show them particular pictures from this book. They seem to get equal enjoyment from all the illustrations, mainly because of the flamboyent salmonid colors. No one picks up on the astounding progression in style/technique that Tomellerri has gone through over the years. Yet it is very evident indeed. No one has pointed out that while all the renderings are lovely, stuff like the pink salmon on p.43-45 represent the technical limit of what can be achieved with color pencil realism. My favorite? The Presidio trout on p. 121. I hate to say it, but the pictures (and book overall) are too good. Anyone can pick up a leica and enjoy its smooth mechanical functions but how many of us can appreciate the beauty of German industrial design and fine craftsmanship? This book suffers a similar fate. It will sell because we all love pretty trout, end of story.
I can't stop reading and looking at this book. I fall asleep next to it and in the morning, look through it some more. Our family collects antique books and my love for books extends into other fields as well. This is the greatest of all my prize posessions.
I enjoyed Dr. Benke's text. He is able to convey scientific information in a style that appeals to naturalists, fishermen and those of us within the sciences. I first came across his writings in the magazine Trout and like many of you, I fell in love with his AFS book on trout of western North America. Maybe the fact that I am fascinated by phenotypic plasticity and morphological variation within species has placed me in a situation to better appreciate what this book has tried to accomplish, but I hope not. I only wish that some of you can feel what I experienced when I first received my copy of Trout & Salmon of North America. This book beautifully articulates the complex and fascinating world of salmonids through stunning pictures and wonderful text.
Professional biologists, such as myself, may have wished for a little more technical information than the book contains, such as was available in his 1965 PhD Thesis, A Systematic Study of the Family Salmonidae with Special Reference to the Genus Salmo or his 1992 mongraph, Native Trout of Western North America. Dr. Behnke has published a continuing series of articles on salmonid taxonomy, distribution, and life histories in Trout, the journal of the Trout Unlimited organization. He has used these articles to bring the importance of preserving the diversity of life histories present in each species to the attention of anglers and managers throughout North America. Whether a population is a species, subspecies, 'race,' or 'stock' has little meaning from a management standpoint, if it displays unique life history traits that enable it to exploit habitat extremes or niches that are inaccessible to other populations or hatchery stocks. As with agricultural crops, the loss of wild genotypes can never be fully compensated for and adaptations to local environments make many of these stocks the only fish that can successfully maintain naturally reproducing populations adapted to local disease organisms and environmental conditions.
I was hoping the book would include appendices that described all of the new technical information available about the family Salmonidae. Instead the book is a wonderful publication for the general public, containing a though and highly readable description of the wonderful diversity of form and life history represented by North American salmonids. Combined with Joseph Tomelleri's incredibly detailed and lifelike representative illustrations, this is a welcome addition to the library of any angler or biologist.
In addition to his contributions to the establishment of saner management policies for native fish, Dr. Behnke described or collaborated in describing literally dozens of distinctive populations of salmonids. Many of these fish; such as the Sheepheaven Creek Redband, Humbolt River cutthroat, fine-spotted Snake River cutthroat, and Whitehorse cutthroat; were simply described as a new subspecies without assigning a subspecies name to them. Dr. Behnke generally only assigned new scientific names, where a species or subspecies designation was incorrect, and a prior name already existed. Hence, the Yellowstone cutthroat became Oncorhynchus clarki bouvieri instead of O. c. lewisi and the interior Columbia/Fraser River rainbow became O. mykiss gairdneri, rather than O. gairdneri. This brings me to one of my few quibbles about the book.
In the 1995 book, Many Rivers to Cross by M.R. Montgomery (a Boston Globe columnist), the author included the descriptive information from Dr. Behnke's monograph, Native Trout of Western North America, under the name Oncorhynchus clarki behnkei. I'm a fisheries biologist, rather than a taxonomist, but as I understand the process of naming a new species (or subspecies), the name should accompany a species account that includes a description of the species and information on the collection where the type (type specimen) is or will be deposited (perhaps Mr. Montgomery included all of Dr. Behnke's original description in his book and this is sufficient). This information is usually published in a journal or book (but I'm not sure if it has to be published by a professional taxonomist in a professional publication). The first name assigned has priority. If a non-professional can assign a name in any form of publication, then I believe that Ernest Schwiebert beat Mr. Montgomery to the punch by a couple of decades in his 1978 book, Trout, when he assigned the name Salmo carmichaeli (after a Wyoming tackle shop owner) to the Jackson Hole cutthroat and included an excellent illustration of a fine-spotted cutthroat from Blacktail Spring Creek in Wyoming. While its true that Schwiebert gave it species status, the same can be said of the rainbow trout, which was originally named Salmo gairdneri before it was reassigned the name Oncorhynchus mykiss gairdneri (gairdneri was assigned to the interior Columbia/Fraser River subspecies). Will some taxonomist please name a trout after Dr. Behnke?!! He certainly deserves the honor. It would be a nice gesture if a committee of taxonomists would decide which of Dr. Behnke's many unnamed subspecies of Oncorhynchus most deserves subspecies status and assign it the subspecies name, behnkei. The fine-spotted Snake River cutthroat seems like a fine fish to name after Dr. Behnke, but I'm sure any of the salmonids he has described over his long career would serve as a fine honor.
The editors have included Tables of Cases (32 pp.), and of Statutes and Codes (9 pp.), as well as a bibliography (10 pp.). One important note must be added. Yearly supplements are a crucial part of the business of legal research, and the editors of the "American Indian Law Deskbook" realized this when they published the first edition in 1993. This practice has continued, and stand-alone yearly supplements are available for both 1999 and 2000 that update the current edition.
"American Indian Law Deskbook" augments Cohen's "Handbook." It should be considered as a core holding for those with a desire and/or a need to learn more about current federal Indian law.
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The United States' "forgotten war" began on June 25, 1950, when the People's Republic of Korea (North Korea) invaded the Republic of Korea (South Korea). At the time, Author Joseph Owen was a Marine Corps lieutenant stationed in North Carolina, living with his wife and their two young children. According to Owen: "Nobody at Camp Lejeune had expected a shooting war. Nor were we ready for one." A captain who had been an adviser to the South Korean Marine Corps predicted Korea would be "[o]ne lousy place to fight a war. Too hot in summer, too cold in winter, and straight up and down mountain terrains all year round. Except for those stinking rice paddies down in the valleys. Human manure they use. Worst stink in the world." Nevertheless, according to Owen: "The possibility of American Marines in a combat role excited us." Owen writes: "The North Koreans continued to overpower the meager resistance offered by the South Korean soldiers....Seoul, the South Korean capital, fell with hardly a fight, and the Red blitzkrieg rolled southward. In response, President Truman escalated American involvement in the war. He ordered General MacArthur, America's supreme commander in the Far East, to use U.S. Army troops stationed in Japan to stem the invaders." And: "General MacArthur called for a full division of Marines to help him turn back the North Koreans. According to Owen: "The Marine Corps welcomed the call, but we did not have a full division to put in the field;" and "More than seven thousand of us at Camp Lejeune received orders to proceed by rail to Camp Pendleton. There they would form into companies and embark for Korea." Owen's unit, "Baker-One-Seven became one of three rifle companies if the 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment....Our ranks were filled by 215 men and 7 officers who had never before served together....Many of [the privates] were beardless teenagers with little training beyond the basics of shouldering a rifle and marching in step." While training, there was much concern about the readiness of the Marines for combat. At one point, after a sergeant remarks that the troops need more training in boot camp, Owen succinctly invokes reality: "They are not going to boot camp. They are going aboard ship. And they are going to fight." On September 1, the company boarded a Navy transport for the three-week voyage to east Asia. According to Owen: "Ready or not, we were on the way to war." And, according to Owen, the 1st Marine Division's orders were "to go for the Yalu River," North Korea's border with China. At one point, a veteran officer provides this paraphrase of William Tecumseh Sherman's famous dictum: "War is hell, but you never know what particular kind of hell it's going to be." The Korean War hell was cold and barren. Owen writes: "We were chilled through and bone tired as we slogged our way back to battalion....The bivouac was lumpy with rocks and boulders;" "The cold weather was as formidable an enemy as the Chinese;" and "Rarely did the [daily action] reports exceed zero degrees, and there were lows of twenty below."
By the time Owen's outfit arrived in Korea, he writes, "we were making bets that the war would be over before we got into it." Owen's Marines could not have been more wrong. While Owen is inspecting his men's weapons, a private asks: "Think we'll get shot at today, Lieutenant?" Owen replies: "We're taking the point for the regiment. If the gooks are there, they'll be shooting at us." A few pages later, after the outfit's first experience in combat, Owen comments: "We were fortunate that the enemy had not chosen a "fight-to-the-death" defense of this hill, as they would when we advanced farther north." But some fighting was hand-to-hand. At one point, Owen writes: "Judging from the noise they were making, and the direction of their grenades, the North Koreans were preparing to attack, not more than thirty yards away." The Captain tells Owen and the other subordinate officers: "The Chinese have committed themselves to this war....The people we will fight are the 124th Division of the Regular Chinese Army....They're tough, well-trained soldiers, ten thousand of them. And all of their officers are combat experienced, their very best....A few hours from now we'll have the Chinese army in our gunsights. We'll be in their gunsights. You damn well better have our people ready for some serious fighting." The combat was, indeed, brutal. According to Owen: "The Chinese attacked in massive numbers, an overwhelming weight, but they also endured terrible casualties." Owen recalls that, while waiting for one Chinese attack, the "men stacked Chinese bodies in front of the holes for greater protection." And the fighting around the frozen Chosin Reservoir may have been the most brutal of the war. Owen ultimately suffered wounds requiring 17 months of treatment, and he never regained full use of one arm.
A few months ago, I reviewed James Brady's wonderful The Coldest War: A Memoir of Korea here. This book has different charms. Whereas Brady is a gifted professional writer, there is no elegant prose here. But Owen provides an equally vivid account of this ugly war. Big, sophisticated studies of military history focusing on geopolitical principles and grand strategy rarely offer narrative moments like the ones in this book. Reader are unlikely to forget the Korean War after reading Joseph Owen's Colder than Hell.
Army Korean War expert Lieutenant Colonel Roy Appleman has called the 1st Marine Division of the Chosin Reservoir campaign "one of the most magnificent fighting organizations that ever served in the United States Armed Forces." The remarkable and inspiring story of the division at the Chosin Reservoir has been the subject of numerous books and several films. During their fighting withdrawal, the Marines decimated several divisions of the Chinese People's Liberation Army while at the same time fighting an exceptionally harsh winter environment.
Joseph Owen's new book on the subject tells the story from the cutting edge perspective of a rifle company. The author served as a mortar section leader and rifle platoon commander in Baker Company, 1st Battalion, 7th Marines from its activation in August 1950 through the Inchon-Seoul and Chosin fighting where he was severely wounded.
There are many reasons given for the outstanding performance of the Marines in northeast Korea during the winter of 1950. It is clear from this book that a large measure of the credit goes to the Marines and their leaders at the small unit and rifle company level.
Owen's narrative covers the hasty activation and training of the company, its brief participation in the fighting north of Seoul after the amphibious assault at Inchon and the details of its intense fighting at Chosin. He candidly discusses the mistakes made by the leaders and Marines of Baker Company, to include his own. More importantly, Owen covers what they learned from these mistakes and how they used that knowledge to defeat the Chinese in a series of intense actions.
Although focused at the company level, the author frames his story with the overall conduct of the campaign. Refreshingly, unlike many books about the Chosin campaign, it is free of partisan sniping about the contributions made by the various services involved. Owen gives credit to the Army units that fought at Chosin as well as the contributions of naval and air forces and our British allies.
This book is rich in lessons about small unit leadership, training and combat operations. It is an excellent addition to the personal narratives on the Korea War.
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This book is a compilation of quotations from Native Americans of the most diverse background and tribal affiliations. Many are quite well known while others are the unknowns. The quotations have been taken from credible sources, such as written documentation, first-hand, eyewitness accounts, and the recorded observations of social affairs.
There are thirteen chapters that cover: the ways of the land, words and silence, learning, living, leading others, the heart, believing, dying, the white man, and civilization, the passing of the ways, a warning to heed these words, and the betrayal of the land. A quick glance at these topics indicates the depth of these pieces, yet they are eloquently simple.
The introduction is a strong opener for these Native American thoughts and philosophy. It explains the different in the Native American and European views of the natural world and spirituality and points out the way the two differ in their communication techniques.
It points out the imbalance in our relationship with the natural world and tells us that we must seek to return this relationship to a proper point of stasis.
In the first chapter, composed of only five pages, we find passages from Chief Seattle (Suqwamish and Duwamish), Chief Joseph (Nez Perce), Chief Luther Standing Bear (Teton Sioux), George "Kahgegagahbowh" Copway (Ojibwe), Wovoka (Paiute), Ten Bears (Yamparika Comanche), and Chief Satanta (Kiowa). These pieces speak of the intense love of the land by the Native Americans and how they view their relationship with Mother Earth and all her beings. They set the mood for the rest of the book.
You will not be able to put this book down until you have read every page. Likely, you will find yourself dwelling on certain passages that strike a chord deeply within your heart or resonate meaning in your life. It is a wonderful book for soul searching and meditations. It leaves you feeling a kinship for all life and appreciating your life, even the misfortunes that fall upon you. This is a book that will help you to find peace in a hectic world and right your balance with the world around you. It is a treasure in the literature world.
Alicia Karen Elkins, Columnist, Editor, & Reviewer
Reprinted from Gotta Write Network Online