Tahoma and Its People: A Natural History of Mount Rainier National Park-Book Review

Tahoma and Its People: A Natural History of Mount Rainier National Park, by the author Jeff Antonelis-Lapp, is that and so much more. In his wonderful account, Antonelis-Lapp weaves a beautifully lyrical story of this wonderful landmark of America, braiding into his thousands-year tale elements of geology, botany, anthropology, zoology, and environmental science. Woven throughout the research and science, Jeff gives us numerous treats—glimpses into his firsthand experience as a life-long student of this area he so obviously loves.

This book is the result of years of field studies by a trained natural scientist and educator —and a personal account of one who has harvested bark from the western red cedar with first people master weavers, participated in water environmental monitoring with pollution control teams, learned the native Wahlshootseed language, and as an avid birder was one of the few who have located the nest of the marbled murrelet. As an avid outdoorsman— one who has hiked all the mapped trails of Mount Rainier, and completed the Wonderland trail encircling the higher reaches of Mount Rainier National Park a half – dozen times–Antonis-Lapp writes with authority and passion.

Jeff is a faithful guide, taking the reader through eons of Mountain history and development—at times exhilarating, at times sorrowful. Writing as a personal field guide, science educator, story-teller, and poet, his language moves effortlessly from detailed discussions of the habitat and life cycle of lichens and American beaver, to a lyrical anecdote of an early morning observation of a family of mountain goats dancing upon upper level cliffs and marmots boxing in the lower meadows.

Jeff’s story is large in scope, long in time, and full of well-chosen detail. It is not only the story of a mountain, but how the mountain impacts the valleys below and the people living under its shadow. It is the story of the four main glaciers and how they form river valleys that empty into the Puget Sound. It is the story of the Puyallup, Nisqually, White, and Carbonado rivers, and of industrialization’s impacts on them and all that depend on them.

Tahoma and its People is a sort of “memoir of a mountain”, covering tens of thousands of years—stories past, very past, and current. But his storytelling has its purpose, pointing the reader to what unthinking use of the mountain and its resources has led to and if unabated where it will continue to lead. It is a story of what the reader can do to help preserve the beauty and wonder for all sentient beings who live in the shadow of the mountain.

Antonelis-Lapp’s lyricism makes his account both educational and delightful—a rare quality. I typically approach a scientific account with some trepidation—will it be something I will simply need to slog through, like the hike to Camp Muir, base-camp to climber’s who are intent on submitting Mount Rainier?  His book is not like that at all. It is instead like a day’s journey to Panhandle gap, through lowland forest, past waterfalls, mountain meadows, tundra, and glaciers, pausing along the way to enjoy the mountain goats, black bears, marmots, chipmunks along the way.

In his introduction, Antonelis-Lapp writes;

“It seems that nearly everyone who visits, works, or lives near Mount Rainier develops a special kinship with it, a set of stories about it. This book is for them and many others. It is for those whose personal bonds span decades, for families who have created generations of memories, and those just beginning to collect them. It is for the million-plus annual visitors, some of whom travel great distances while others treat is as their own backyard, and for the native people living around it whose ancestors breathed life into the stories we continue to learn. Tahoma and its People is for anyone who loves this incomparable treasure and wishes to know it better.”

There are ample warnings in Jeff’s account of the History of this region; the wholesale pollution of the rivers born of Mount Rainier’s glaciers, the Puyallup, Nisqually, White rivers, to their termination into Commencement Bay in Tacoma and the Nisqually wetlands North of Olympia. The vanishing and endangered species through deforestation such as the northern spotted owl, who Antonelis-Lapp refers to as the “soul of the forest”, the disappearance of large areas of alpine meadows, and the reckless regard of industrialists for the lifeblood of the mountain valley-our salmon.

A particularly pleasant aspect of this account is Jeff’s animal and bird foray’s: his first hand knowledge of the American beaver, how the beavers hold their breath underwater for over fifteen minutes while they engineer their dam; How pileated wood peckers can drill into hard wood finding their daily meal; and the complicated life cycle of so many species, not least of which is the four species of salmon which Jeff describes in detail almost as a high adventure story over the course of five narrative pages. His discussion on the plight of the streaked horned lark or the marbled murrelet is with the confidence of one who has arrived to sit and wait and look in the pre-dawn hours for the object of his devotion.

Here is his first-hand account of the bull trout spawning:

“We spot a bull trout redd (a nest for fish eggs made in the gravelly riverbed). A mating pair guards it. Light spots freckle their dark bodies; a beautiful cream-colored contrast edges their pectoral fins. The female’s tail appears worn from digging the redd, the male feistily wards off a competitor. He remains nearby to defend the area for up to two weeks after spawning. The fish become sexually mature at five to seven years of age and may breed multiple times either annually or non-consecutively.”

Over the past twenty years, I have made precious memories while hiking many of the trails in Mount Rainier National Park. I have written about my own summit adventure (The Summit of Rainier.) But I must admit after reading Jeff’s book, I feel I have been more of an “interloper”, an aesthetic seeker, a mountain tourist.

Antonelis-Lapp addresses his hopes for this book in one of his appendices:

“The nineteenth century English biologist Thomas H. Huxley wrote, ‘To a person uninstructed in natural history, his country or seaside stroll is a walk through a gallery filled with wonderful works of art, nine-tenths of which have their faces turned to the wall’. With ample preparation, every Mount Rainier outing brings new and exciting discoveries, making its ‘wonderful works of art’ available to us all.”

The poet Mary Oliver wrote: “To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work. It is the beginning of Devotion”.

The poet G.M. Hopkins wrote; “If you look hard at anything, it will look hard at you”

Antonelis-Lapp has given us a gift—the gift of helping us to look hard at this part of our world , allowing it to look back at us with a question–what will you do now? As a result of his book, I have been given a yearning to go back and see for myself in a completely different way. I expect during my next trip to the mountain, I will watch for signs of the saga of the first people who first inhabited the mountain. I will look for the caves they once made temporary homes in while hunting and berry collecting in the fall. I will listen for their whispers as I pass by the great western red cedars and Douglas firs, reminding me to pay attention to where my feet trod—for this is where for thousands of years first people lived in harmony with the trees and ferns and beavers and Chinook salmon and all that makes up this great region.

Antonelis-Lapp concludes his masterful account with a statement of hope mixed with caution:

 “If we imagine the salmon runs of the Puyallup River watershed of 200 years ago, we might see them as part of a complex, detailed mosaic symbolizing the bounty of the region….In our short time here, we have damaged and defiled the precious mosaic. It stands diminished and so do we, made less by our longing for more. Yet, hope lives here. What we know about resilience and restoration of natural systems tells us that we can reverse the trends and repair the mosaic.”

May it be so.