David Gessner is the author of eleven books that blend a love of nature, humor, memoir, and environmentalism, including Leave It As It Is: A Journey Through Theodore Roosevelt’s American Wilderness and the New York Times-bestselling All the Wild That Remains: Edward Abbey, Wallace Stegner and the American West. Gessner currently serves as Chair of the Creative Writing Department at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, where he is also the founder and Editor-in-Chief of the literary magazine, Ecotone.
Are National Parks Really America's Best Idea?
In an excerpt from his forthcoming book 'Leave It As It Is,' nature writer David Gessner examines the iconic conservation legacy of Theodore Roosevelt and unpacks the perception that the national parks and monuments he created were previously untouched and empty