This edition of Forest Life and Forest Trees includes all the original illustrations, allowing the reader the fullest comprehension of John S. Springer's life as a lumberjack.
John S. Springer was a logger and author, who spent his career venturing around the forested wilderness of North America during the 19th century. In this biographical account of his working life, he examines many of the landscapes, trees and the lifestyle of his fellow woodsmen and lumberjacks.
An evocative look into a world forgotten in the wake of machinery and industrialised logging, we find in John Springer's account a person with a marked sensitivity for the natural world and its forests. Although Springer's profession consisted of felling trees, the text can be considered conservationist in tone; Springer divulges a profound love of the rugged wilderness, and is thankful for the memories and beauty he beheld in life.
Originally published in the mid-19th century, the book was inspired partly by the lack of experience or accuracy regarding lumberjacks in the popular press of the day. Keen to give readers an authentic account of what the career entailed, Springer succeeded by writing a book which is accessible, fresh and insightful even to this day.
