Out in Paperback / Indians in Yellowstone National Park

Indians in Yellowstone National Park -- Revised Edition by Joel C. Janetski, Utah UP '02, $15.95, 143 pages, ISBN 0874807247. Source notes, no bibliography or index, b&w images sprinkled through text.

As of this writing, hundreds -- maybe thousands -- of Americans are standing at airline ticket gates to fly to overseas destinations, subjecting themselves to hefty price increases because of dollar devaluation. Ask them if they've ever visited Yellowstone Park, and most shake their heads "no." Take their names and send them a copy of Janetski's book, not simply because of the historical role of Indians the Park but because of its collective wonders.

Brigham Young anthropology professor Janetski examines such matters as when the first humans visited what we now know as the Park, what happened to them, how the Nez Perce escaped U.S. troops in the Park in 1877, and how did Indians perceive the Park's geysers and hot springs.

As one whose son worked as a chef in Yellowstone Park for seven years, I can recommend it for reasons that may not occur to many of us. Following a massive forest fire in the Park, I was astounded to find fallen trees by the thousand lying like random matchsticks in the forest. It made sense only when I realized that it reflected nature's own rhythms and that manmade instincts to tidy it up were, at best, artificial.