Guardians of Yellowstone: An Intimate Look at the Challenges of Protecting America's Foremost Wilderness Park

Yellowstone National Park's chief ranger reveals the challenges of protecting the park and recounts the ordeal of battling the fires that swept the park in 1988

Writing with freelancer Newman, Sholly, chief ranger at Yellowstone, presents a dramatic picture of the 2.2-million-acre park, showing how hundreds of rangers, scientists, maintenance workers and volunteers care for the wildlife, serve the public and contend with continual emergencies. Vivid descriptions of the devastating forest fires of 1988 figure prominently here, and Sholly justifies the way in which the park rangers handled them, arguing that fires rejuvenate the wilderness and may, in fact, be far less detrimental to the health of the park than the pressures exerted by special interest groups and neighboring landowners. Sholly is obviously a man with a mission to protect Yellowstone in all its grandeur, and this account of how he carries out his work, undaunted by controversy and criticism of his administration, makes wonderful reading. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.

A genial, wide-eyed nature-lover who happens to be Yellowstone's chief ranger writes of the Park's natural wonders and troubles in this entertaining if corny report. Sholly, whose dad was chief ranger at Big Bend National Park, moved into Yellowstone with his wife and kids in 1985. Here he was in his boyhood dream: in charge of 2.2 million acres of ``the first, the oldest, the most famous, the most respected, and certainly the most treasured of the world's national parks.'' For the most part, this is a paean to Yellowstone's great beauties- -its canyons, geysers, forests, bison, elk, moose, bear. Sholly loves 'em all. He also deals in human drama, as he and his staff confront poachers, toxic spills, protesters, even a hostage-taker at Old Faithful. Usually, the ranger holds the middle ground on hot disputes, such as cattle-ranchers vs. bison-lovers, although he favors banning kayaking and hang gliding from the park as a disruption to the wildlife. The centerpiece of his tenure, however, is the terrible fire of 1988, which pits locals against rangers and environmentalists against themselves, and which Sholly calls ``the ecological event of the past 300 years.'' Event--not disaster: Sholly is among those who believe the fire was necessary for Yellowstone's ecological health. Simple, cozy, unadorned: like a night around a campfire, somewhere in those gorgeous Yellowstone mountains. -- Copyright ©1991, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Sholly, Chief Ranger at Yellowstone National Park, has a magnificent job filled with dangerous rescues, spectacular scenery, and controversial policies. Unfortunately, his book conveys none of this grandeur. Instead it consists of sophomoric prose that never really explains the philosophical underpinnings of Park Service policy. Sholly settles for defensive positions and assumes the reader will agree that his is the only reasonable course. For a much more incisive critique of Park Service policy, see Alston Chase's Playing God in Yellowstone ( LJ 4/15/86). Not recommended.
- Randy Dykhuis, OCLC, Dublin, Ohio
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc.