Jack E. Davis is the author of the award-winning An Everglades Providence: Marjory Stoneman Douglas and the American Environmental Century. A professor of environmental history at the University of Florida, he grew up on the Gulf coast, and now lives in Florida and New Hampshire.
Jack Davis has delivered a unique and illuminating history of the American Southern coast and sea as it should be written: how humanity and the environment evolved over ten millennia as a single system. -- Edward O. Wilson, author of The Social Conquest of Earth All the world was once as stunning and fertile as, say, present-day Alaska. But this vast and well-told story shows how we made the Gulf of Mexico, in particular, into what local activists have begun to call a 'national sacrifice zone,' at enormous cost to its residents of all species. It's a sobering tale, and one hopes that reading it will help us hit bottom and acknowledge the need to change. -- Bill McKibben, author Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet A tremendous book. Jack Davis is not only one of our preeminent environmental historians, but also a first-rate storyteller and prose stylist. Lay readers and scholars alike will be delighted by The Gulf, a lovely evocation of the natural world and the problematic ways our nation has profited from it. -- Blake Bailey, author of Cheever: A Life A very good book, Jack E. Davis' The Gulf takes on troubling environmental issues with a lyrical voice and a steady appreciation of history. -- Mark Kurlansky, author of Paper: Paging Through History