Examines the ideal of wilderness preservation in the United States from the antebellum era to the first half of the twentieth century, showing how the early conception of the wilderness as the place where Indians lived (or should live) gave way to the idealization of uninhabited wilderness.
"A landmark historical reconstruction of a forgotten story – the eviction of American Indians from a troika of our nation's major parks: Yosemite, Yellowstone, and Glacier. Spence documents the separate but symbiotic developments of the Indian reservation and recreational park systems, the former to corral Indians, the latter to sequester nature; with the twain never to interact therafter. Spence underpins his three compelling narratives with a clear exposition of the evolving 'wilderness' and 'preservationist' ideologies which spelled exclusion for Indian residents of these natural wonders. His riveting chronicle concludes with current tensions, as Indians are attempting to reclaim special rights to these sacrosanct areas and parks are struggling to correct a century of native dispossessions and misrepresentions of the cultural/historical record."
– Peter Nabokov, Department of World Arts & Cultures and American Indian Studies, University of California, Los Angeles