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"Ric Bailey is a chronic nature lover. He's no scientist or ecologist, in fact, he doesn't even have a college degree. He uses passion and conviction to achieve his land protection successes.He doesn't know the names of very many flowers, bugs, or birds, but relishes sharing time with them. And, he's dedicated his life to protecting all life beyond humanity. But as a human himself, he recognizes that we bipedal Earth dwellers are inextricably bound to nature.This memoir describes his many raw adventures as an activist, an out-spoken campaigner who is both loved and hated. He's been hanged in effigy and boycotted in the rural community he called home, threatened with death, and accused of being everything from a misanthrope to an anarchist.Yet Ric has a blue collar work history, including falling timber and driving semi-trucks. He obliterates a lot of stereotypes. Ric once chained himself to an active bulldozer to prevent the logging of an untouched forest. He's gone to extreme lengths to rescue the special places he and scores of others love.As a self-taught writer, Ric presents this book with the same emotional zeal with which he's defended wilderness. It is entertaining, educational, and profoundly original.-Brock Evans, Environmental Elder ""Our minds are ecosystems, and wilderness can be a refuge for the most tortured of them: a living entity where we go to find our true selves, where freedom is unconditional and expressed in physical form...wilderness is where the scalding eye of surveillance is shut, and where the turmoil of the brain is not judged. It is where seemingly random color and form blend into perception's miracle, and our own moods reflect those of the world. It is where our existence is embraced without condition.""-Ric Bailey"

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9781946970183

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While growing up in the suburbs of Portland, Oregon, Ric Bailey irrepressibly gravitated toward wanderlust, and was besieged by a craving for the wild outdoors. He was quiet and independent, yet a somewhat rebellious kid.After high school, he migrated to rural enclaves and eventually resided in many small mountain towns throughout the Pacific Northwest, beckoned by nearby backcountry.Ric's work history began as a jack of many blue collar trades. He worked as a timber faller, long haul trucker, wildland firefighter, and river guide. He became a self-taught wilderness activist after the shock of realizing the irreplaceable wild places he loved were being dismantled by runaway industrial exploitation.In 1984 he resurrected the dormant Hells Canyon Preservation Council after being struck by federal mismanagement of the public lands embracing his new homeland: The Hells Canyon-Wallowa Mountain Ecosystem of northeast Oregon and western Idaho.During his activist career, Ric faced off with a corrupt federal agency, and dealt with overt hostility from logging and ranching proponents in the rural community of Joseph, Oregon. He faced down death threats, was shut out of local businesses, and was hung in effigy by local political opponents.In his memoir, Ric describes his unconventional transition from a blue collar worker with no college education to a white collar executive director of a formidable local conservation organization. He graphically describes his liaisons with wild places, and draws a deeply personal parallel between the need for respite from clinical depression and the healing power of the natural world.Ric now resides in the rural enclave of the Methow Valley in the North Cascades of Washington, and has risen from retirement to combat the same threats to his new home he faced in the Hells Canyon-Wallowa Country. I'm proud of his dedication to his cause, and his principles. After all, I'm his mother.-Wilma Bailey

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