Mississippi festival board of directors, i had the pleasure of working with scott on the board. Hes something of a lifer. Hes been on the board since the very of the book festival in 2015. Scotts also a member of the mississippi arts commission, the Mississippi Institute of arts and letters hes an ardent champion of arts. Hes the coowner of books and cat island coffee, house and Pass Christian and gulfport gulfport. Thank you very much and welcome to our session this morning on nature and the environment for of my life, my entry to america in history was through the biographies of our founding fathers, washington, jefferson, franklin, and then through to lincoln, frederick douglass, Theodore Martin luther king, chisholm, henrietta lacks, james baldwin, eisenhower, among many others. But then two years ago, i was fortunate enough to read jack davis as the bald eagle. And then a whole new world opened to me and missed the little earth upon which our country was founded and without which there would be United States of america. Our Natural Resources, land, water flora and fauna, and how we struggled to tame and profit from it. The stories and the lives that. Jack Davis Patrick dean, ryan fertel and dean king bring us are indispensable to an understanding of our society our culture and our future. The story of our Natural Resource is recounted by these four authors. Bring a heartbeat in a context to our American History indepth, dramatic and deeply immersed in delicate splendor of the Natural World these books will discuss over the next hour. Explore humanitys connection to nature, the history of conservation and the heroes who have paved the way. Please our panel discussion. Ill introduce our four authors first and i will hold up the books jack davis is the Pulitzer Prize winning author of the gulf, the making of an american sea and providence Marjory Stoneman douglas and the American Environmental century professor of environmental history at the university of florida. He in florida and New Hampshire and he is here today to discuss his book, his fine book, the bald eagle. Patrick dean writes on the outdoors and, the environment. He has worked as a teacher a political media director and is presently the executive director of a rail trail nonprofit as an avid trail runner, paddler and mountain biker. He lives with his wife and dogs. The Cumberland Plateau in tennessee is the author of when to head to heaven about the summit of denali. And hes also here to discuss his latest book, nature messenger. Mark ksb and his adventures in the new world. Ryan patel is a writer teacher who lives in new orleans. Hes author of three previous books, drive by truckers, southern rock opera, the one true barbecue fire, smoke the pitmasters who cook the whole hog and imagining the creole city. The rise of literary in 19th century new orleans. Ryan is here today to talk about his book on the Brown Pelican and fourth author is dean king. Hes an winning author of ten nonfiction books, including on the zahara unbound and patrick obrien. Brian a life revealed and the feud hes writing has appeared granta, garden and gun, National Geographic adventure outside new York Magazine in the new york times. He is the chief storyteller in two History Channel document and a producer of a series hatfields and mccoys. White lightning is internationally known speaker. Its appeared on nprs talk of the nation. Abcs world news tonight, pbss american experience. Bbc radio and. Also at ten x dean is here today to speak about his book, guardians of the valley. John muir and the friendship that saved yosemite. Please welcome our four authors. Id like to start start well have a discussion among the authors. And as we approach the end of this hour, we will take questions. And for those questions, there is a microphone and a podium and, the center of the room. So please, as we get closer or around the 40 minute mark, step up there and, wait patiently and we will take your question. First, though, id like to start and ask each of our guests to just give a three or four minute overview of their book, the premise of the book, and just talk in general a little bit about it. And ryan, like to start with you. Tell us a bit about ryan pelican, how you found it, how you got into it. Sure i think what will become over our short time together, its not already evident, is that compelling stories about nature and the environment require compelling characters. And by characters i mean people, were all telling stories about people and how they have operated, how they have lived within what think of as nature and, the environment. And thats not to say the Brown Pelican, the subject. My new book is not a compelling character in and of itself. If you live along the gulf coast, if you live along the the more southerly ends of the atlantic or pacific, you likely love the Brown Pelican like i do. You love watching it dive bomb from 60 plus feet from on high catch fish. Its graceful. Its also so awkward that. Goo la pouch, they call it. This kind of not only dangles. But, you know, it was gulls as it walks. Its an awesome bird. But the story i tell is a story of of peoples relationships with this bird. Its a Human History of the Brown Pelican. The the the the character. That leaves off the book is. One whos probably known to a lot of us, i imagine, in this audience today, Walter Anderson, the famous who was originally born in new orleans, where i live now, of course, lived the majority of his life along coast of mississippi. And if we know him, we know him as as as the painter, the artist who whose works are highly valued on the art market. And i like to see him and i see him in this book is also a documentary. And he lived many years, many decades on several Barrier Islands. He would camp out on along the coast of first louisiana and mississippi, painting wildlife, sketching wildlife. But also documenting in a series of journals what was seeing and his his his favorite thing, i would say his favorite was the Brown Pelican. Loved to describe Brown Pelicans in all their glory. He talks about living like the Brown Pelicans, birds and sleeping among the Brown Pelicans and building nests like the Brown Pelicans and fishing and bathing like the Brown Pelican. He loved this bird. He was also towards the end of his life, he witnessed the the end, the extinction of the Brown Pelican in the gulf of mexico, the Brown Pelican was extinct along the coasts of and the greater gulf coast, the upper gulf coast by 1960. And he was documenting he was writing about this. He didnt quite understand it. He had guesses. We very soon, knew it was due to pesticides like ddt. And so its Walter Anderson that launches this book. I talk about why we have brown in louisiana and along the gulf coast today. Its largely due to a crazy plan that was developed by it was almost hollywood it was you know, it was a plan so crazy it had to work. It came down to a pair of alligator or scientists who didnt. A thing about birds. And they were tasked with rescuing, bringing back the Brown Pelican to louisiana. This also involved a series many years bird napping across state lines, learning the pinpointing the exact day to take to bird nap eight a baby pelican to the exact day to release the teenage pelican what to that baby turning into a teenage pelican over months wild scheme worked and i was i grew up in the 1980s talking to my parents and other people from older generations. Now they see Brown Pelicans. But as soon as i started understand, you know, what they could identify that bird was you know, im lucky to have Brown Pelicans in my life. Now we have around 10,000 breeding pairs, estimated of Brown Pelicans in the upper gulf gulf of mexico, a very healthy population. And thats due to two things. One, that that strange plan that that worked. But also the interestingly enough, the bp oil and the bp oil spill left the state of louisiana and many the state and federal governments with a lot of money to restore the Barrier Islands of louisiana. These Barrier Islands were being washed away. Many had already been washed under the seas, the gulf and through many, many millions of dollars. We have over the past decade plus, we have been restoring these islands which are major bird habitats and i was able to visit many of these islands are off limits to tourists. I was able to go some pelicans, scientists and take in documenting the of of this bird species. And so thats my thats my book kind of bookended by these stories with with many i think compelling characters within. Ryan thank you. Patrick tell us about mark it speaks so as ryan said you know characters and interesting can definitely drive a narrative like the ones were going to talk about today and mark kates be 18th century artist explorer and naturalist certainly qualifies and its its definitely a fascinating time. You know, were from from ryan at the present you know, with some extinctions and some and some resuscitations some recoveries to mark spear who landed in charleston in 1722 at a time when almost no one in Great Britain had any idea what an ivory billed woodpecker looked like or a magnolia tree or an american bullfrog. And it could be largely responsible for the fact that many of them saw those images the first time this masterpiece, Natural History of the carolinas, which was published between 1731 and 1746, is a is a Landmark Book again in Natural History and in books about Natural History and the story of how we how he got to america. What he did while he was here and is going back and creating masterpieces. Thats pretty much story of my book. He he hes a landmark prideaux ecologist. I think well have the time to talk about today. He was exceptional for reasons had many firsts to his name and i think hes hes definitely worth talking about especially since he has sort of found himself in the shadow of that that audubon guy so looking forward to talking about him today. Dean you have a wonderful give us the premise to tell us about it so guardians is i think, the essential story. John muir and by that i mean when i started looking into writing muir who immigrated to the united from scotland in 1838, well, i was born in 1838, immigrate in 1849. Youre the gold rush to wisconsin and. He had a very sprawling, rich, interesting life. A lot of the details have sort of been forgotten. He was actually manufacturing. He made shovel out of wood and. We forget that he had this real practical side. But when i looked at the sprawling life, wanted to figure out what i thought the coroner of there was, why should we remember him . Why is the important and that all was born out of a trip i had Yosemite National park that view from Inspiration Point that is just so magnificent. I realized i wanted to be there. I wanted to talk about it and. It turns out that so so muir, his editor, Robert Underwood johnson when you get into the muir story, you find out these two guys came together and i would arguably the maybe the most dynamic writer editor duo in u. S. English literature. They were theyre able to johnson as the editor of century magazine was able to say to muir muir write me two articles about, Yosemite Valley and the National Park. Do you envision im going to publish them in century magazine and then im going to take them down to washington and put them on the desk of every congressman. And muir was a little skeptical politics at the time, but he he trusted his editor. He did it. And sure enough, johnson went down to d. C. , put those stories on, those desks, and the National Park was created that was the beginning of their problem, really, because what they had done was they created a National Park around the state park that Abraham Lincoln had formed with the valley during the civil war. But but it was the beginning of a very rich partnership where they would also help bring about the National Forest system. They would create the sierra club, they would influence theodore roosevelt, who came camping with muir. So so you get this this is all against the backdrop of industrialization from the civil war up until the beginning of world war one when when muir died and you get mirror this sort of clarion voice in the Sierra Nevada trying to protect the mountains and also those giant sequoias that were really literally getting mowed down the states just sort of across the country. They werent even great building wood. But these thousand year old trees were getting down with no realization that they wouldnt just pop back up. So he was sounding that voice. I think thats a valuable thing to remember today when when we have voices telling us we need to Pay Attention to environmental conditions. I also tried to not just cover the history. I try put you there with muir. He left great descriptions. He wrote some magnificent stories. And so theres a lot of detail. He had hundreds and hundreds of letters. Robert underwood. Johnson so im able really work into that relationship, try to bring that alive as well so that thats really the gist of my book is trying to take you there. Make john muir come back alive to understand in his nuanced life, not just the father of the National Parks, but a real living, breathing explorer, scientist and inspirational character, jack tell us about the bald eagle. Sure first of all, id like to say that its a great to be here at the festival again and in mississippi as well. I lived in mississippi in the early nineties. My first two books were on and i still have very good friends that live here in jackson and. Its i just feel like coming home i live in gainesville, florida now and but it feels like coming home when i come to mississippi. Its just always such a delight and in really my my literary career began here in mississippi. This place has, as you know, dont have to tell you such a powerful of place. Both you know, in the physical environment, but also, you know, the cultural environment. And so theres much that you can as a writer. Theres so much that you can take away from from mississippi and its people in its natural surroundings. So but as far as the body go, the book is a a a history of the american relationship with the bald eagle. Both species and the symbol, as you know, a very powerful symbol in america and always has been since it was put on the front of the great seal of the United States, 1782. And and as ryan and my colleagues suggested, that environment and all writers see nature as a, you know, an animating in the course human affairs. As a historian, i would say an agent in the course of Human History and in so it in our works nature or the nonhuman denizens of nature indeed become become character and but in in so fun to write tell stories about those nonhuman denizens nature and the relationship with humans. But in with any great story there is conflict and. While all americans love the symbol, the bald eagle is a symbol of their country. For a long time they hated the species and pushed it the brink of extinction twice. But this is a story that also includes is also a wonderful story of restoration and redemption and you know that 1015 years ago we didnt seem eagles that was a rare sight unless you lived in alaska or northern minnesota. Bald eagles were a rare sight. Now we see them all the time and we love this bird and we could not imagine aging harming that bird now and every time we see that bird we are seeing that success story. We deserve a pat on our backs for doing something by nature. And so the bald eagle story also this great conservation success and as a as an environmental im part of genre that tends to focus on the doom, the gloom. I wanted to write a more positive uplifting story that might help guide us to some. In the 21st century we face some unprecedented environment challenges. And i should say, in writing this book, i not just simply fell in love. The bald eagle, as many of you know, many people have. But i really came to admire the this bird and his perseverance recognize that it was indeed the right symbol for for the United States. Jack, you, ron, id like to ask the first question and. If you could talk a bit about the establishment of Pelican Island and the the two pelican related murders. Im referring to the game wardens. Could you talk us through the establishment of Pelican Island what it is what it meant and then the dangerous duty that those game wardens had on that island. Yeah. Talking about conflict is this is kind of interesting in