The Promise of the Grand Canyon

If John Wesley Powell sounds like a contemporary environmentalist in John Ross’ new book, he should, said Steve Donoghue in OpenLettersReview.com. Ross isn’t the first historian to retell the “grand and irresistible” story of Powell’s 1869 expedition down the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. But because this telling highlights Powell’s worries about the region’s fragility, it “reclaims Powell for a battle he would almost certainly be waging if he were alive today.”