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Brunosafari
Boulder climber
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Apr 22, 2010 - 01:39pm PT
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Well yes, Randisi, and Robs, of course, like anyone, John Muir was a product of his family upbringing and cultural hypocrisies, but to be fair, surely we should recognize how radically unique he was even in that context. Isn't it the challenge of History to see the persons and their times not through the filters of our own? It's just too easy to take pot shots at human fallibility even to the point where we no longer recognize the unique commitment and genius of amazing characters.
Say Robs, I always wondered if he was your great great grandpa???
I thought this wikipedia excerpt demonstrates that his consciousness went far beyond Sunday School.
Yosemite scene
During his first summer in the Sierras as a shepherd, Muir wrote field notes that emphasized the role that the senses play in human perceptions of the environment. According to Williams, he speculated that the world was an unchanging entity that was interpreted by the brain through the senses, and, writes Muir, "If the creator were to bestow a new set of senses upon us . . . we would never doubt that we were in another world. . . "[33]:43 While doing his studies of nature, he would try to remember everything he observed as if his senses were recording the impressions, until he could write them in his journal. As a result of his intense desire to remember facts, he filled his field journals with notes on precipitation, temperature, and even cloud formations.[33]:45
However, Muir took his journal entries further than recording factual observations. Williams notes that the observations he recorded amounted to a description of "the sublimity of Nature," and what amounted to "an aesthetic and spiritual notebook." Muir felt that his task was more than just recording "phenomena," but also to "illuminate the spiritual implications of those phenomena," writes Williams. For Muir, mountain skies, for example, seemed to be painted with light, and came to "symbolize divinity."[33]:45 He would often describe his observations in terms of light:
". . . . so gloriously colored, and so luminous, . . .[36]:4-5 awakening and warming all the mighty host to do gladly their shining day’s work.[28] . . . to whose light everything seems equally divine, opening a thousand windows to show us God."[28]
Muir biographer Steven Holmes notes that Muir used words like "glory" and "glorious" to suggest that light was taking on a religious dimension: "It is impossible to overestimate the importance of the notion of glory in Muir's published writings, where no other single image carries more emotional or religious weight,"[4] adding that his words "exactly parallels its Hebraic origins," in which biblical writings often indicate a divine presence with light, as in the burning bush or pillar of fire, and described as "the glory of God."[4]:179[28]:115 Muir writes:
I do not understand the request of Moses, 'Show me thy glory,' but if he were here . . . after allowing him time to drink the glories of flower, mountain, and sky I would ask him how they compared with those of the Valley of the Nile . . . and I would inquire how he had the conscience to ask for more glory when such oceans and atmospheres were about him. King David was a better observer: 'The whole earth is full of thy glory.'[36]:24
Happy Earth day, all
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 22, 2010 - 11:42pm PT
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xkyczar,
Thanks for that awesome resource. Pretty neat.
http://library.uop.edu/ha/muir/library.asp
John Muir's Personal Library, housed at the Holt-Atherton Special Collections at the University of the Pacific. This collection comprises approximately half of the books known to have been in Muir's personal library. Any information on additional Muir titles would be welcomed.
From your page you put together there is a link to his personal library and a pdf document of his books by title and another by author.
Here it is by title:
John Muir Book Collection
University of the Pacific Library
http://library.uop.edu/ha/muir/documents/Library_Title.pdf
Very interesting. I count 13 Bibles.
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xkyczar
Trad climber
denver
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Apr 23, 2010 - 09:31am PT
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Klimmer, yeah he did have a pretty amazing collection of bibles. If you look at my listing of them you'll see there were several I could not track down a pub date for. The pdf file you point out is what I used to put together his librarything library.
Because of the age of his books many of them are available in full on books.google so I was able to at least skim through them as I put his library together.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Apr 23, 2010 - 11:39am PT
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It is a couple of weeks late but here is Chapter 1 of The Yosemite.
Chapter 1
The Approach to the Valley
When I set out on the long excursion that finally led to California I wandered afoot and alone, from Indiana to the Gulf of Mexico, with a plant-press on my back, holding a generally southward course, like the birds when they are going from summer to winter. From the west coast of Florida I crossed the gulf to Cuba, enjoyed the rich tropical flora there for a few months, intending to go thence to the north end of South America, make my way through the woods to the headwaters of the Amazon, and float down that grand river to the ocean. But I was unable to find a ship bound for South America - fortunately perhaps, for I had incredibly little money for so long a trip and had not yet fully recovered from a fever caught in the Florida swamps. Therefore I decided to visit California for a year or two to see its wonderful flora and the famous Yosemite Valley. All the world was before me and every day was a holiday, so it did not seem important to which one of the world's wildernesses I first should wander.
Arriving by the Panama steamer, I stopped one day in San Francisco and then inquired for the nearest way out of town. "But where do you want to go?" asked the man to whom I had applied for this important information. "To any place that is wild," I said. This reply startled him. He seemed to fear I might be crazy and therefore the sooner I was out of town the better, so he directed me to the Oakland ferry.
So on the first of April, 1868, I set out afoot for Yosemite. It was the bloom-time of the year over the lowlands and coast ranges; the landscapes of the Santa Clara Valley were fairly drenched with sunshine, all the air was quivering with the songs of the meadow-larks, and the hills were so covered with flowers that they seemed to be painted. Slow indeed was my progress through these glorious gardens, the first of the California flora I had seen. Cattle and cultivation were making few scars as yet, and I wandered enchanted in long wavering curves, knowing by my pocket map that Yosemit Valley lay to the east and that I should surely find it.
Inspiring writing and wonderful to think that Oakland is still a wild place.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
San Diego
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 21, 2011 - 01:21pm PT
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Annual bump for John Muir's Birthday (4-21-1838)!
The day before Earth Day 4-22.
Happy B-Day John Muir: man of the environment, conservationist, mountaineer, naturalist, geologist (amateur who got it right even when the pros didn't), prolific writer, "Father of the National Parks," adventurer, founder of the Sierra Club, world traveller, and man of faith.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 21, 2016 - 06:13am PT
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Happy Birthday John Muir!
April 21, 1838
A true and well loved Renaissance Man :)
What is the true count? How many mountains did he climb? How many were first ascents?
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dirtbag
climber
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Apr 21, 2016 - 08:41am PT
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If you give a sh#t about the environment, then don't vote for trump.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 21, 2016 - 09:38am PT
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Keep this thread about John Muir and Earth Day ...
Don't be bitter.
(Prove to me DT doesn't care about the environment, but post it to the Donald Trump thread)
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dirtbag
climber
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Apr 21, 2016 - 10:07am PT
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Nope. Elections matter.
Trump has repeatedly brushed aside science proving global warming.
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brotherbbock
climber
Alta Loma, CA
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Apr 21, 2016 - 01:31pm PT
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You know why Muir was such a badass?
He was a NEPHILIM!!!!!!
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 21, 2016 - 04:47pm PT
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Wolf,
I've been through JM's house there in your neck of the woods, Martinez, CA
Not far away within a short driving distance, is his grave site in a small oak tree grove. I asked the Ranger about it, and was given a map to get there. They don't often do that. It's surrounded by metal chain link fencing. They don't give out the map very often. Glad I got a chance see where John Muir is actually laid to rest. Sure was nice to be able to experience that with my family.
Sure would like to see ST posters behave on this thread.
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 21, 2016 - 05:19pm PT
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How many of you know that John Muir found an Iron-Nickel meteorite?
True.
Where did he find it?
Where is a portion of this famous Iron meteorite showing Widmanstatten pattern on public display?
Actually, I mis-remembered the story ... He was the go between the native Americans in Alaska and interested science institutions in the U.S. ...
http://m.juneauempire.com/art/2015-05-20/tlingit-dagger-points-hidden-history#gsc.tab=0
"Captain John Vanderbilt of the Northwest Trading Company and his good friend, the nature-loving Scotsman John Muir, had few doubts about the source metal of the Killer Whale Dagger. They knew its stated provenance — “from the sky” — was accurate.
On the 20th of November 1880 the Captain of the steamboat “Favorite” took up pen and wrote Muir about their desire to secure a meteorite belonging to the Tlingits of Chilkat. He stated they would be able to secure it for the sum of $100. He told Muir he’d refrained from inquiring about it fearing the owners would be, “ ...excited in regard to its value.”
In the new science and study of “aerolites” or meteorites, the value of this 96-pound mass of extraterrestrial metal was doubted by no one. The New York Times of 5 July 1881 mentions John Muir and the Northwest Trading Company purchasing the “Chilcat Inlet” meteorite for a financial consideration as “meagre as Esau’s mess of pottage” traded for his birth-right. The California State Mining Bureau acquired the meteorite for a mere pittance.
The article further states that, “The body was seen to fall, a mass of flame, by the father of one of the oldest indians in Chilcat, over a hundred years ago, and was afterward sought out and carried to his hut in triumph.”
Over time, chunks and pieces were whittled off this large treasure and sent to museums and institutes around the world. The origin of the meteorite became a tarnished memory, its metallic content as well. An 1890 study revealed 92.56 per cent iron and 7.11 per cent nickel, easily polished to a bright gleam."
You can see a very nice polished slab of this Iron-Nichel Meteorite showing very nice Widmanstatten pattern on display with a short article of the story regarding its acquisition by John Muir in Alaska at the Mariposa Fair Grounds in the California State Mining and Mineral Museum. This is one of my favorite museums to visit on my way to Yosemite.
http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=588
http://www.parks.ca.gov/pages/588/files/MiningMineralMuseumWeb030810.pdf
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Klimmer
Mountain climber
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Topic Author's Reply - Apr 22, 2016 - 10:31am PT
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Happy Earth Day!
So is there a connection to John Muir's Bday on April 21st and Earth Day on April 22? Coincidence or not?
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