Places From The Past

This book explores the reasons that old places matter to people such as the feelings of belonging, continuity, stability, identity and memory, as well as the more traditional reasons, such as history, national identity, and architecture. This book brings these ideas together in evocative language and with illustrative images.

"This is a rich and learned volume that has a story to tell to those seeking to understand contemporary Southern California."—David Johnson, managing editor of the Pacific Historical Review "Engagingly written and well researched, California Vieja is an intriguing, persuasive examination of the politics of memory and the built environment in southern California."—Vicki Ruiz, author of From Out of the Shadows: Mexican Women in Twentieth-Century America

". . . intriguing, both a solid refresher on our savage colonial history and a smart rumination on what it means to get lost. ― Outside First time in paperback, ebook, and audio editions Part travel adventure, part history, part exploration Features four specific "blank spots" from across the country and delves into our human relationships with place In The Last Empty Places, bestselling author Peter Stark takes the reader to four of the most remote, wild, and unpopulated areas of the United States outside of Alaska and mainly not part of protected wilderness: the rivers and forests of Northern Maine; the rugged, unpopulated region of Western Pennsylvania that lies only a short distance from the East’s big cities; the haunting canyons of Central New Mexico; and the vast, arid basins of Southeast Oregon. Stark discovers that the places he visits are only "blank" in terms of a lack of recorded history. In fact, each place holds layers of history, meaning, and intrinsic value and is far from being blank. He also finds that each region has played an important role in shaping our American idea of wilderness through the influential "natural philosophers" who visited these places and wrote about their experiences--Henry David Thoreau, William Bartram, John Muir, and Aldo Leopold. It’s a fascinating look at the value of nature, the ways humans use and approach it, and what it means to seek out empty places in today’s world.