George R. Stewart and the Stacked Synchronicities of Glenwood Springs

Posted on June 22, 2025

©2025 Donald M. Scott.  All rights reserved.

  “Synchronicity,” from Carl Jung, describes “events that coincide in time and appear meaningfully related, yet lack a discoverable causal connection.”  (Wikipedia)

When he was a boy George R. Stewart found a copy of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Treasure Island in his grandfather’s attic, took it downstairs and devoured it. Stewart later taught the lesson he’d learned from the novel:  Maps and the places mapped were keys to a story.

Stewart learned the lesson well.  He gained a love for maps and became an amateur cartographer.  He was inspired to live a life like that of the novel’s young hero, Jim Hawkins, of adventure and place, of exploring the land and mapping it into his works. His graduate thesis identified California places Stevenson used in the novel. In Stewart’s great ecological novels the land would always be a protagonist.  Here’s Robert Louis Stevenson’s map of Treasure Island:

∞

My third birthday gift was a recorded version of Stevenson’s novel. It was an enthralling discovery for a child on his way to boyhood.  I played it so many times that our old family friend Bob Broughton, who was at the birthday party with his family, laughed when he recalled the record grooves worn flat as playas and my 3 year old voice constantly quoting: “If ever a boy loved adventure, Jim Hawkins was his name!”  

As it did with Stewart, Stevenson’s tale inspired my life-wander through maps, places mapped, and adventures.

In 1956, our family moved to the Valley of Heart’s Delight.  One day our local Librarian pulled a copy of George R. Stewart’s Earth Abides from the shelf and said, “Here. I think you’ll like this book.”

Stewart’s novel taught an understanding – that, as he wrote in Ordeal by Hunger, “…the reader [will hopefully ]…come to feel the land…as one of the chief characters of the tale…” Reading Stewart’s ecological novel on a foundation of Stevenson’s Treasure Island, I’d gained a ‘ecological’ understanding of human affairs:  the land is a character in the work.

That way of looking at the world eventually led to work as a Ranger in a small state park near San Francisco.  One day in the spring of 1974, I sold an annual pass to a regular visitor.  When he signed his pass “George R. Stewart” (and I recovered from the shock) we became friends: He and his wife Theodosia ‘Ted’ Stewart, and later their daughter Jill and son Jack. With George and Ted’s and Jill and Jack’s help, I would write the authorized biography of GRS – which includes the story of how Treasure Island influenced Stewart.

The unexpected meeting with George R. Stewart at Thornton State Beach would be only the first of what I’d eventually see were a long series of the stacked synchronicities of George R. Stewart. 

∞

In the 1920s my Grandfather B. H. Scott II moved his family to De Beque, Colorado, where he prospected for shale oil. Decades later on a cross country trip with Dad to visit De Beque, we passed Glenwood Springs. Dad, not usually garrulous, began sharing stories of happy holiday times his family spent at the Springs during their De Beque days.  When I planned an Amtrak trip decades later Dad’s stories came to mind and I chose Glenwood Springs as the journey’s destination.  

Heading east to Glenwood Springs on Amtrak’s Zephyr, past the Book Cliffs and through the dazzling vari-colored sandstone “gateway” canyons along the spring-rushing Colorado River, I had a strong feeling I was entering an enchanted country.

Here’s a work of art that captures that feeBy Andrew Alfred-Duggan. Used with permission. Andrew produces custom life maps and retro travel prints (like this one). His website is on WordPress at andrewmaps dot com. 

By Andrew Duggan. Used with permission. Andrew produces custom life maps and retro travel prints (like this one). His website is on WordPress at andrewmaps dot com. 

Glenwood Springs is an historic town in a beautiful Rocky Mountain setting.   The town’s population numbers just over 10,000 people – small enough to be neighborly. Hiking mountain trails or sauntering the pleasant streets brings plenty of chances to stop and chat with others.

On the first day, I wandered across the Colorado River for a look at the town; then hiked the 1.7 miles of steep streets and trail to Doc Holliday’s gravesite.  The good neighbors of the trail always said hello and several offered water on the warm day. 

Along the way I took time to explore the Hotel Colorado.  The grand hotel played its role in history – the Unsinkable Molly Brown visited the place, Teddy Roosevelt used it as a summer White House, and (according to legend) the Teddy Bear was born there.  On a day when his hunting for real bears had been a failure hotel staff gave TR a stuffed bear.  His daughter Alyce named it ‘Teddy Bear’.

Hotel Colorado then….

…and now

Heading back to more modest lodgings I saw an old curio shop like those which still border Route 66.  A fan of old highways and their culture, I went in to take a look.  After browsing, I stopped to talk with the woman at the register.  I learned she’d spent a career in the US Forest Service, where she worked in (among other things) interpretive outreach. She also shared her commendable plans to create an arboretum in the Glenwood Springs area. Considering I’d met Stewart when I was a Ranger, meeting a fellow Ranger-Naturalist in Glenwood Springs added a sense of rightness to the place.

(Stop the presses! A news story and a phone conversation with Julie Williams of the Sioux Villa brings the news that this is the 70th anniversary of the store.)

The next day, walking around the town, I kept bumping into a couple. After the third encounter she said “We might as well introduce ourselves.”

He said, “We were hoping to visit the book store – they sell my book – but they’re closed today.”

He handed me the copy of his book he’d tucked under his arm. “Here. Take this.  Not great literature, but interesting memories of my years as a fireman.” [1]

I glanced at the cover. The author’s name was Jim Hawkins!

“Jim Hawkins?!”  “Why, I met you when I was three, listening to Treasure Island.”

He laughed.   “My teachers had me read that book every year.”

Jim, Sharill, and I talked until Rocky Mountain thunder roared and rain splattered.  A willing student, I listened as they described their ranch and shared some lore of the Roaring Fork River Valley.  Then we shook hands and went our separate ways. 

As the skies opened up, I rushed to the 1904 Amtrak station to wait for the westbound Zephyr. In the quiet station, (recently revitalized so women and children no long need sit in a separate waiting room) I mulled over the meetings with Jim Hawkins and the Ranger of the Curio Shop –  an extraordinary pair of coincidences. 

You need be careful about leaping from coincidence to synchronicity; but once coincidences start stacking my “ranger radar” kicks in to say they could be synchronicities, and I might be on a portage between two stages of life.   And stack the synchronicities would.

∞

The next leg of the trip took me Salt Lake City to visit Granddaughter Megan. She picked me up at Clearfield Station and we drove to “our” place, a nearby Cracker Barrel restaurant, to catch up while we gorged on her birthday dinner.  In the middle of dinner she burst out with “I love food!”  Megan’s Cystic Fibrosis means she “ate” through a tube until her late teens when the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation funded research to create miracle medicines.   They saved her life.  Now she can drive and now she can eat, and she loves food.

While we  talked, Amtrak messaged to say there was a major train delay on the Westbound Zephyr. I rebooked for the next day, found a motel in Salt Lake City, and decided to spend the bonus day exploring.  

Far larger and busier than Glenwood Springs, Salt Lake City has an urban bustle to it. Yet I walked through streets enjoyable and parks beautiful to the Main Library (stopping along the way to talk with legendary Bookseller Ken Saunders).

The Main Library is worth a trip to Salt Lake City. As you approach, there’s a quote by George R. Stewart’s old friend Wallace Stegner to help shift the mind into Enlightenment mode:  Culture is a pyramid to which each of us brings a stone. As I sat sipping coffee under the light from the over-arching windows that enclosed Library, book and art stores, and an auditorium, music began floating through the air:  Musicians were filling the space with masterful Celtic song. It was a cathedral of enlightenment and the light and music were part of the worship.

After finishing the coffee, I walked through the music and light to look at the auditorium‘s schedule of events.  Trenton B. Olsen, Robert Louis Stevenson Scholar, Editor of The Complete Personal Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson, and Director of the Robert Louis Stevenson Cottage Museum in Saranac, New York, would be speaking that afternoon!  The museum is the first site in the world dedicated to Stevenson, who lived in the cottage for several months to heal his lungs and otherwise re-create himself while writing essays and The Master of Ballantrae.  (https://www.rlscottagemuseum.org/ )

 There was no longer a doubt.  The Ranger/Naturalist, Jim Hawkins, and now Dr. Olsen:  the coincidences were synchronicities and the synchronicities were stacking.

Dr. Olsen’s talk seemed worthwhile.  Indeed, on this stacked-synchronicity journey, essential. So I took a seat and gave a listen.  It was a potlatch.   Dr. Olsen shared his research on RLS’s time in Saranac. Informally, English teacher/ Stevenson scholar Mark described how he taught Treasure Island in his classroom, and I explained Robert Louis Stevenson’s influence on George R. Stewart.

Then I picked up my luggage, wandered the city until late evening, and then headed to the Amtrak station to await the midnight arrival of the train.

∞

I was born to teach about George R. Stewart. In the ups and downs of life, I could never be sure I’d done that completely or well. But the stacked synchronicities of the Glenwood Springs journey were a reassurance that the quest had succeeded.  The Mt-Shasta-high summit was the publication of the George R. Stewart book, a way to teach hundreds or thousands of readers about the man and his works. Now, after a life filled with the encouragement of friends, family, and colleagues, and several stackings of synchronicities, I stand satisfied that a life’s quest had been fulfilled. 

As the Zephyr rocked through the night-darkened deserts of the West I knew I’d reached a summit.  I’d climbed my Mt. Shasta; and at the summit inserted one small pebble into the pyramid-shaped Cathedral of Humankind.    Like all such wanderers I found helpers along the way who granted gifts. On this part of the journey a “magic” cord and Jim Hawkins’ book.  This writing is offered in return, a freely-given boon, in the belief that some of you will find it encouraging , hopeful, and offering a road map for your quests. 

∞

A few days later friend and Literary Agent Sally called, excitement in her voice.

“Don, do you watch The Last of Us? [I don’t].  In last night’s episode one of the characters (Gail) is reading a paperback novel when another character (Joel) interrupts to ask a question.  The book is George R. Stewart’s EARTH ABIDES!” She sent a couple of screen shots of the scene:  “Gail” reads a classic paperback of the novel with George R. Stewart’s name prominently displayed on the cover. 

Add recent articles by John Hay and Kevin Mims, the MGM+ Earth Abides mini-series. and it seems clear to me that a George R. Stewart Renaissance is under way. 

It’s also clear the Stewart Renaissance was influenced by the book I wrote and Sally agented.  It was cited in Min’s article, by Kim Stanley Robinson in his [excellent] Introduction to the recent Mariner Press reprint of Earth Abides, and by ecolit author Nathaniel Rich in his Introduction to the NYRB Press reprint of Stewart’s ecological novel Storm. The reprint of Stewart’s Fire by the NYRB has a cover based on a Chiura Obata woodblock print, suggesting the cover designer knows my book since it describes Obata and Stewart at Thornton State Beach.

∞

As Dr. Olsen would later write in an email, the Glenwood Springs journey was a clear example of what Robert Louis Stevenson called the power of destiny. One set of coincidences, one stacking of synchronicities in a lifetime, would be intriguing.  It wouldn’t be worth much comment, though.  After decades of such stacks, each encouraging  “stay the course,”  each opening a new window of enlightenment, how could there be anything but a destiny in this? 

Now  near the end of things I understand the feeling of Wendell Berry’s Jayber Crow when he writes:  I am an ignorant pilgrim, crossing a dark valley. And yet for a long time, looking back, I have been unable to shake off the feeling that I have been led – make of that what you will.

∞

Dag Hammarskjöld wrote  “Never measure the height of a mountain until you have reached the top. Then you will see how low it was.” There were higher summits – I could see them from the “GeoS” Summit – but I’d leave those to others.   So here I share a borrowing from George R. Stewart:  Opus perfeci

Yet  George R. Stewart had nearly a quarter of a century of work and accomplishment ahead when he wrote those words.  So don’t write me off just yet.

Coda.  Synchronicity is a concept that exists in the fog between art and philosophy, and experimental science. Yet Jung, who was a brilliant scientist, intuited that synchronicities and what they imply are “real.”  Later, Wolfgang Pauli would work with Jung to explore strong analogues between quantum mechanics and synchronicity – like the concept of entanglement, which Einstein called “Spooky action at a distance.” So the idea seems valid, if not yet fully scientifically proven true.

One coincidence is probably just that.  When coincidences begin to follow one upon another quickly it’s a clue there’s a pattern, and those coincidences are probably synchronicities.  When the synchronicities stack and reinforce each other, (which has happened many times along the GeoS trail) it may signal an enchantment at work. When that happens in enchanted places, Jung’s concept feels as real as a growing redwood, a 14,000 foot volcanic peak, or the narrow sedimentary canyons next to a rushing river that welcomes a wanderer to the town of Glenwood Springs.

---

[1] The book is a good read.

The Smoke Jumpers of FIRE identified – They were members of the “Triple Nickels”

In George R. Stewart’s classic novel of fire ecology, FIRE, one group of human characters has always intrigued me.  Beginning on page 110, he describes smokejumpers parachuting into a dangerous location to fight the Spitcat, the fire that’s the protagonist of the work.  Their accents are those of southern black men; and when the Forest Service Superintendent asks where they’re from the list is of cities up north and states down south with large black populations. As the novel progresses, the jumpers weave in and out of the story, always working on the fire with vigor and integrity.  There is some dated language which contemporary readers might find offensive, but the portrayal of the smokejumpers is admiring and respectful.  Stewart doesn’t focus on their race, but on their ability and character.  Stewart was decades ahead of his time in his treatment of black Americans and this was one of his ways of portraying them as valuable members of society. 

I often wondered if he was referring to a real band of smokejumping brothers; but in all the research nothing turned up.  Until today:

An obituary in today’s (April 8’s) Los Angeles Times celebrated the life of Sargent Joe Harris, who passed away at the age of 109.  Sargent Harris  was a member of the all-black “Triple Nickels,” highly-trained army paratroopers  who were detailed to fight forest fires in the American northwest.    The obituary goes into some detail about the selection, training, and deployment of the men, explaining that since one of the original reasons for setting up the unit was military – finding and disarming the balloon bombs Japan sent to the northwest.  Their battalion was the 555th – which gave them their nickname.  One of its main bases was in Chico, California, a city close to the fictional national forest where Stewart sets FIRE. 

It’s clear that he knew about the Triple Nickels, even perhaps worked with them doing research, and honored them in FIRE.

In his later years, Harris was presented with a Pulaski, an iconic firefighting tool invented by an earlier hero of the Forest Service, Ed Pulaski.  His funeral procession included uniformed Forest Service Rangers and military personnel wearing World War II uniforms, a Willys Jeep, and a flyover by a vintage aircraft.

So the mystery of the black smokejumpers is solved and we know who Stewart was honoring in FIRE.  The black Triple Nickels, heroes all.

 

 

 

 

An Invitation to Review the Earth Abides Mini-Series

It’s been a long wait, 75 years since Earth Abide’s publication, for a movie or series based on George R. Stewart’s novel.   Now that series has been produced and shown on MGM+

. Mr and Mrs Edward Stewart at the Premiere of the MGM+ Earth Abides mini-series

it would be interesting to get viewer reactions,  If you’ve seen the series, please leave a review in the comments section of the GRS/EA weblog.  Please let us know in the comments if this is your first exposure to the story.

Anyone, of course, is welcomed to send comments.  But I’m especially interested in hearing from viewers who have NOT read the novel.

Looking Forward to your thoughts.

A Wonderful Christmas Story

 

The solstice will be upon those of us who live in North American in the early morning hours of December 21.  Christmas follows on the 25th, Boxing Day on the 26th.  It’s a reminder that, once again, it’s time to post the annual Christmas story, about the connections between the life of George R. Stewart and Frank Capra’s great film, It’s a Wonderful Life.  Here it is:

For many people It’s a Wonderful Life   is the Christmas movie.    George R. Stewart fans will be interested to know that George R. Stewart – and another Stewart – spent their boyhoods in a town that was one of the inspirations for “Bedford Falls.”

George R. Stewart was raised in Indiana, Pennsylvania, where his mother’s family lived.  His maternal grandfather, Andrew Wilson,  planned to be a teacher and even helped found a school nearby (which would eventually become the prestigious Kiski School).  But he couldn’t earn enough to support his family so he went into the mercantile business.  He  had a hand in a hardware store owned by another Stewart.  That Stewart’s son was James Stewart, who was also raised in Indiana, PA.

George and Jimmy bore a remarkable resemblance to each other.  With all their similarities in family history, geography, and physiology, you’d expect they were related.  But they  shared only one possible distant relative, and lived in different worlds of the town.  The George Stewart family went to the middle-class Presbyterian church on the flats; Jimmy Stewart and his parents attended the upper-class Presbyterian church on the hill.  GRS went to a public high school out west, Jimmy to a prestigious private school in the east.

Still, the two young Stewarts’ lives paralleled in remarkable ways.  GRS and his family moved to Pasadena; he went to Princeton; and after marriage,  moved his family to Berkeley, California.  Jimmy Stewart also went to Princeton and also moved to Pasadena; then spent his life in Southern California.  GRS wrote books, two of which were filmed.  Jimmy made films, like the beloved Christmas classic.   GRS worked as an consultant to Walt Disney at the Disney studios for a time.  Jimmy worked at many studios, creating that characters and stories that touch the hearts of millions.

Their paths apparently never crossed.  GRS and his family left Indiana for California when he was 12, in 1905 – the year James Stewart was born. Out West, nothing in their interests or their work brought them together.  Since the film we now consider a classic failed in its initial run, it is unlikely GRS would have seen it. (For one thing, GRS didn’t like the mass media and rarely if ever  attended movies.)

Yet in the Christmas season we should remember there is one thing they shared – which, thanks to Capra’s film, we share with them:  The experience of life in a small Midwestern American town in the early 20th century.  For a time, we can walk the streets and meet the people of the town in an earlier time.

From my book (paraphrased and edited):

“George R. Stewart’s boyhood town was so archetypically American that it could pass for George Bailey’s “Bedford Falls” in Frank Capra’s It’s A Wonderful Life. In fact, the town was “Bedford Falls” – at least for the movie’s male star. Indiana, Pennsylvania, was also the boyhood home of James Stewart, who played “George Bailey” in Capra’s film. … Although the movie’s “Bedford Falls” was built on a studio backlot in the San Fernando Valley, Jimmy Stewart said that when he walked onto the set for the first time he almost expected to hear the bells of his home church in Indiana.”

In fact, Producer/Director Frank Capra probably modeled his set on the upstate New York town of Seneca Falls. But for James Stewart, Indiana, Pennsylvania, was the place he held in his heart as he brought George Bailey to life on the set of “It’s a Wonderful Life.”

Each year, Indiana, Pennsylvania, holds an It’s a Wonderful Life Festival, with a parade, hot chocolate,  tree lighting, and continuous showings of the film at the Jimmy Stewart Museum.  The people in warm winter clothing lining the streets  bring life to the snow-bound town, just as the movie brings life to  “Bedford Falls.”

So when you watch Capra’s film this Christmas please give a thought to the boyhood town of George R. Stewart, Indiana, Pennsylvania, where he celebrated Christmas.  A real town that for Jimmy Stewart was the model for Bedford Falls, a fictional town which  brings an American Christmas into many hearts.

Merry Christmas!

Earth Abides Premieres; Where to Next?

EARTH ABIDES MINI-SERIES IS ON THE AIR BEGINNING DECEMBER FIRST

Tracy and Ed Stewart stand in front of the poster for the EARTH ABIDES mini-series

Ed Stewart sent an email about the premiere of the MGM+ mini-series adaptation of George R. Stewart’s EARTH ABIDES.  (He and his wife were invited to Hollywood for the Red Carpet event.)   The series premieres on Sunday, December 1. 

Those of you familiar with the book will notice differences. The producers are honest about making those changes, noting that the series is“based on” the novel.

I don’t think George R. Stewart would mind.  The MGM+ production will encourage new generations to buy and read the classic novel, perhaps also leading them to read STORM, NAMES ON THE LAND, FIRE, ORDEAL BY HUNGER, and his other books, thus rekindling broader interest in his work and passing that onward to generations yet to come.

Thanks to Producer Michael Phillips (who bulldogged the project for years), Showrunner/Writer Todd Komarnicki, Amazon/MGM+ , and the cast and crew for bringing this to fruition. It wasn’t an easy job, since much of Stewart’s novel is based on Ish’s thinking about post-Anthropocene Earth.  Internal reflection isn’t easy to film but the MGM+ team accepted the challenge to produce the first major film based on EARTH ABIDES. 

In his email, Ed Stewart kindly thanks me for my book about his Grandfather and other efforts to spread the word about George R. Stewart and Stewart’s works.  I certainly appreciate Ed’s thanks; yet it’s important to note that a book is never written by one person – it’s an effort by a Fellowship.  So I send special thanks to the Stewart family, the Bancroft Library, the George R. Stewart Collection at the University of Nevada’s Special Collections, agent Sally Van Haitsma for finding a good publisher (McFarland Books), and all the friends and family who helped along the way of the writing of The Life and Truth of George R. Stewart, Author of Earth Abides. Thanks, also, to those who over the decades carried the torch of GRS onward through their books and their lives: Vic Moitoret, Bob Lyon, Tom and Geraldine Vale, Ivan Doig, Stephen King, William Least Heat Moon, Frank Brusca, Baiba Strads, Irene Moran, Kim Stanley Robinson, Wallace Stegner, Jack Stewart, and all the others who built this fellowship.

Nearly 8 years ago, I ‘retired’ to Northern Nevada – Stewart Country – hoping to teach residents about the importance of George R. Stewart and his works.  It was a bit of a slog, often frustrating since there seemed to be no interest.  Finally, however, some of the best people I’ve ever worked with – Quest Lakes, Hope Williams, Connie Corley and the Talking Books Program, Nevada Humanities’ Kathleen Kuo and her colleagues, McAvoy Layne and the Never Sweats, Carson City Librarian Haley Wilson, Genie Montblanc – and Geoff and Kimberly Landry – encouraged the effort and thus made it so. Thanks to them, the “George R. Stewart Nevada Mission” seems to have been accomplished.  When Doug Nichol’s film about Stewart’s ground-breaking “U.S. 40: Cross Section of the United States of America” and Frank Brusca’s relentless scholarship about Stewart’s book is finished, I’ll be able to borrow the words George R. Stewart wrote to conclude his series of ecological novels: 

OPUS PERFECI

Since the work here seems nearly done I’m chewing over the question on a hand-crafted card from old friend Denise Lapachet Barney:  “Where to next?” 

Someplace economical, enlightened, and neighborly, where there are lessons to be taught and minds willing to learn.

Where?   I’ll know when I get there.

Stay Tuned.

“‘…the greatest weapon, the one undefeated weapon in the history of the world, is love’”

EARTH ABIDES has received a fine review in Australian literary website Quillette, .  Kevin Mims includes Stewart’s ecological novel in an article about the “Calipocalypse” – his term for the mid-20^th century apocalyptical novels set in California.  Stewart’s novel, reviewed at the end of the article, seems to get more ink – which, of course, is as it should be, since it’s the most enduring of the works he discusses.  Mims goes into unusual detail about Stewart’s life and work, especially EARTH ABIDES.  Most important, he discusses the new MGM+ mini-series in depth;  That makes Mims’ article the most up-to-date of the recent considerations of Stewart’s great novel.  (There is only one minor error, one which I’ve made in the past, so it’s understandable:  “Em” means “Mother” in Hebrew, not “woman.”)  Mims’ article is highly recommended. Thanks to Michael Ward for forwarding it to me. 

https://kevin6ca.substack.com/p/all-things-must-pass-richard-matheson?publication_id=225264&post_id=150636805&isFreemail=true&r=l3yoc&triedRedirect=true

Finally, the big news:  We have a date for the premiere of EARTH ABIDES on MGM+.  The first two episodes will air on Sunday, December 1^st – a prime slot, which indicates that Amazon/MGM+ considers the series to be one of its most important series of 2024.  And its theme, which is found in the title of this post, is remarkably appropriate to this time. Writer Todd Komarniki nails it, in this article:

“I’d like to describe the show as being counter-culture, because the post-apocalyptic genre is always about using guns or the ‘dark arts’ to survive, while this show says:  ‘Actually the greatest weapon, the one undefeated weapon in the history of the world, is love’,” explains Todd Komarnicki, writer and showrunner of Earth Abides.

https://www.todotvnews.com/en/todd-komarnicki-mgms-earth-abides-a-second-chance-at-the-garden-of-eden/

George R. Stewart Goes to War

There are several ways to go to war. Enlist, go to the front, join the ambulance corps, or write a book. George R. Stewart did a few of these, in two World Wars. He joined the Ambulance Corps in WW I, but caught the Spanish Flu; barely recovered, he hitchhiked from Yale to Garden City, Kansas, then rode the train to his family home in Pasadena. (If he wasn’t going to have the adventure of the trenches, he’d have the adventure of the open road.) In World War II, he was on special assignment for the US Navy, re-writing sailing instructions for submariners in easy to read English.The Navy project seemed convoluted, and he felt it was of limited success. But on the way home by commercial jet he met a Navy man who let Stewart know how critically important Stewart’s other service, writing a book, was to servicemen.

Vic Moitoret had quite a war, surviving the sinking of two aircraft carriers. One of the things he carried with him on both sinkings was a small black book which held a list of the ten best books he’d read. One of them was Stewart’s first ecological novel, STORM. It not only helped him get through the war, it inspired him. Moitoret would eventually become the Chief Aerologist (Meteorologist) of the Navy. Later, he’d found the George R. Stewart Fan Club.

In her excellent book about the distribution of great American literature, WHEN BOOKS WENT TO WAR: The Stories that Helped Us Win World War II, Molly Guptill Manning shares the tale of how an America angered by the Nazis burning of books realized that books are weapons, and our soldiers and sailors needed (and treasured) as books much as they needed guns. The effort began by distributing books donated by civilians. Those books were treasures to the troops, but they were large, heavy, and sometimes in poor shape. So publishers, printers, and authors worked together to design books that were compact, tough, and easy to read – the Armed Services Editions.In mid-1943, the publication target was set at 30 MILLION books PER MONTH. The authors whose books were accepted watched the numbers of their books read in ASE Editions soar, to numbers far beyond copies sold in bookstores.

ASE books were read by tens of thousands of troops, many of whom hadn’t been recreational readers before the war. The ASE project had created a Nation of Readers – who, after the war, kept reading.

The symbolism was important, too. Want to burn or ban books? We’ll outprint you even more than we’ll outgun you. Those books will win the war of ideas, and endure, no matter who wins the landscapes.

The first books were released in September of 1943. STORM was one of 31 titles published in November, 1943. The novel was the first Stewart book released by ASE. As later events showed it was a good choice – A best seller and Book-of-The Month Club selection, It would be filmed by Walt Disney and reprinted due to massive sales. It still has power and was recently re-released by the New York Review Books as one of its Classics.

Stewart would eventually see three of his books on the list as EAST OF THE GIANTS and ORDEAL BY HUNGER followed STORM.

In this time of book-banning, no matter how well-intentioned, we should never forget that banning is a step on the road to burning. It’s important to remember how the books that George R. Stewart and many other authors published through the Armed Services Editions helped America and the other democratic nations defeat the Axis. Along the way, the ASE program helped create nations of readers.

If you buy Molly Guptill Manning’s excellent book, you’ll find a complete list of every one of the ASE books.  It makes a good reading list, even today, for anyone who wants to indulge in the power of our books, or to reflect on how banning books (she also lists the Nazi-banned books) never succeeds.

****

By the way, there’s another reason STORM was popular with the troops. Remember: those young, virile men suffering through the hardships and horrors of war were without the soft and encouraging touch of women. The cover designed for STORM played on that need, teasing readers with the hope that there might be a juicy section in the novel. If you’ve read the novel, you’ll know the only juiciness was on the cover. Still, I can imagine the young men racing through the novel looking for that section, only to be disappointed at the end of the book that it only existed on the dust jacket. It may have been discouraging to them at the time. It may also have changed their lives through Stewart’s beautiful page-turning education in the ecological world view.

That cover was excellent marketing.

Here, for your edification and entertainment, is a clipped version of that teasing cover:

 

A personal note:  I was born in the month the first ASE books were sent to the troops – September, 1943 – so I feel a deep connection to all of those books. 

FIRE: George R. Stewart’s Second Ecological Novel will be republished in August

In the 1940s and 1950s, George R. Stewart wrote four extraordinary, popular ecological novels: STORM, FIRE, EARTH ABIDES, AND SHEEP ROCK. Three of the books were best sellers, two Book of the Month Club selections. Two were filmed. Since the books were so carefully based on the concepts of ecological science and thought, so well-written, and so widely-read, it’s been suggested that they were a major foundation of the Environmental Movement of the 1960s and 1970s – that is to say, they inspired the kind of thinking that led to the widespread understanding of the Whole Earth view of our home planet and the establishment of Earth Day.

With the recent interest in Stewart’s work and ideas, several of his works have been republished, or filmed, or been the inspiration for other works. EARTH ABIDES is now published by Mariner Press/HarperCollins, STORM by the New York Review of Books Press. Each of these new printings of Stewart’s ecological novels includes an introduction by a distinguished writer.  New Yorker-profiled Kim Stanley Robinson wrote the Introduction to EARTH ABIDES, and ecological writer Nathaniel Rich wrote the Introduction to STORM.  (NYRB Press has also re-published Stewart’s classic place-naming history, NAMES ON THE LAND.  Matt Weiland, Vice-President and Senior Editor at W.W. Norton, wrote the Introduction to that book.)

Now it’s been announced that the NYRB Press will release a new printing of FIRE this August.  The Introduction to FIRE will be written by distinguished Harvard and Cambridge Historian Emma Rothschild.  

FIRE and STORM are similar ecological novels, with the ecosystem as the major protagonist in each book; a storm, in STORM, a fire in FIRE.   Since Stewart never wanted to repeat himself, he chose to create a fictionalized National Forest for his fire ecology novel.  (STORM was set in real places.)  His son Jack, an excellent mapmaker and a student of geology, helped with the landscape of the fire.  As in STORM, Stewart named his fire – the “Spitcat” – to help communicate the idea of ecosystem as character. 

FIRE is important for another reason.  It’s the first work published after Stewart realized he was clearly writing from an ecological point of view.  His previous novels and histories were  primarily written  from a geographic viewpoint. (“I consider the land to be a character in the work,” as he wrote in ORDEAL BY HUNGER.)  But when a publicist sent him a letter requesting information about FIRE, he replied, more or less, that he had come to believe  himself someone who might be called “an ecologist.”  It’s a major turning point in his work, in his thought, and in literature.

FIRE, like STORM, was so carefully researched that it has been used in the training of fire lookouts in national forests.  And like STORM, it’s  still a page-turner of a book.  

The novel was filmed twice.  The Disney TV version is disneyfied, but holds closely to the ecological theme.  The Paramount version, RED SKIES OF MONTANA, has little resemblance to Stewart’s focus on fire ecology.

In an interesting sidenote – like STORM, this new printing of FIRE has a Thornton State Beach connection.  It was in my Ranger days at Thornton that Stewart and his family and I met.  The friendships were a foundation of my book about Stewart, so it can be said that the book grew from Thornton Beach.  FIRE has a cover showing what appears to be a fire; it’s by the great artist, Chiura Obata.  Obata, and his friend Wilder Bentley the Elder, were regular visitors to the park where we spent hours talking over coffee after they’d finished a day’s fishing.  It’s thanks to my friend and colleague, Johanna Silverthorne, that I can share this second Thornton Beach connection since she is the one who pointed out that that was Obata’s work.  

Anyone interested in fire ecology, or the ongoing daily human drama within Earth’s ecosystem, is well-advised to read FIRE.  The novel is now available for pre-order from Amazon, and I’d imagine other booksellers as well.  

The Fellowship of George R. Stewart: The Librarians, I

The First Librarian:

A good Librarian is also a teacher. the Librarian gets to know her patrons – especially the young ones – identifies potential scholars and writers, then points them down the trail to enlightenment.  Decades ago, one Librarian in a small town in the Valley of Heart’s Delight pointed to a trail that would lead to the writing of a book about Stewart.

 Our family had recently moved back to California, leaving behind the friends of small heartland towns in Jeffersonian farm country and the pleasant  industrial country of Ford.  Without friends, spinning through the confusing years between childhood and adolescence  I spent many days in the small Valley town’s Library. 

The Librarian, In her early 50’s, graying hair in a modern bob style, slender, moderate height, dressed professionally, and always pleasant in demeanor,  was the mental image of the librarians of the time.  It was clear she loved her work and those of us it brought her way.

One day, hearing that the movie Forbidden Planet  had been novelized by an author named ‘Stuart” I asked the Librarian if the Library had a copy.   

“No,” she said. “But we have a excellent  book by an author named “Stewart.

“Follow me,” and she walked us into the stacks. To fiction, to the “S” section.

She pulled out a book, handed it to ma, and said, “Here.  I think you’ll like this book.”

Earth Abides, by George R. Stewart.

I didn’t know it then, of course; but she handed me my life when she handed me the book .

By summer’s end I’d read the other Stewart novels in the Library – Fire and Storm – and thus finished three of Stewart’s ecological novels.  The ecological view, which he developed as early as the 1930’s, was subconsciously but effectively embedded in me.  It would eventually encourage me to become a Ranger.

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Sadly, the Librarian in the Valley of Heart’s Delight has vanished into the mists of history.  I did my best to learn her name so it could be included in my book, but to no avail.  The library in the Valley town seemed incensed at the queries, finally stating emphatically they would not give out private information about former employees.  The County Library system promised to research the question but didn’t responded.

In a way, that’s a gift – because as far as this tale is concerned, she has become an archetype – the  Archetype of all librarians in all the libraries that would follow along the trail to enlightenment and the writing of the book.  . 

The Librarian.

 

The George R. Stewart post is now live on the Nevada Humanities Double Down weblog

The post commissioned by Nevada Humanities is now live.  The Editor/Publisher, Christi Shortridge, did a fine job, making some excellent suggestions and setting up a nice layout.

See the post here