UA PRESS PUBLISHES BOOK ON PREDATORS AND POLITICS IN DENALI PARK
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 11, 2001
Fairbanks, Alaska - The University of Alaska Press has published, "Changing Tracks: Predators and Politics in Mt. McKinley National Park" by Timothy Rawson, faculty member with Alaska Pacific University.
The book describes the first attempt from the National Park Service to preserve wolf populations in the 1930s. The new ideas of ecology clashed with attitudes toward predators and the existing notion of parks as game refuges. When the park service attempted to apply this new policy, in what was then known as Mt. McKinley National Park, it met fervent opposition from Alaskans and the nation's sportsmen and from many within the park service.
The book chronicles the evolving views of both the role of wolves in natural ecosystems and the purpose of the parks. Over the years, the debate has engaged federal administrators, game managers, conservationists, tourists and trappers. It also involved scientists, notably Adolph Murie, the first to systematically study wolves to find out if they were to blame for the demise of the favored Dall sheep.
"Rawson has told an essential Alaska story, but the issues are of national importance in conservation history, national park philosophy and attitudes toward wolves," said UAF biologist David Klein. "The book is a timeless and valuable reference."
Wolf management remains a controversial subject in Alaska and the lower 48. Rawson's work offers an examination of the history of animal domestication and predator control, from the ancient age through the Alaska gold rush and into the 20th century, and the establishment of Mt. McKinley National Park where a dramatic change in policy became the cornerstone for the modern wolf controversy.
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CONTACT: Dan Ferguson, UA Press at (907) 474-2776 or e-mail: dan.ferguson@uaf.edu, or David Klein, UAF Biology Dept. at (907) 474-6674 or e-mail: ffdrk@uaf.edu.
CJB/07-11-01/02-002