I am Distinguished Professor Emerita at Michigan Technological University, where until Dec. 2024, I held appointments in the Energy and Environmental Policy program in the Department of Social Sciences, the Great Lakes Research Center, and the College of Forest Resources and Environmental Sciences.  In 2021, I was awarded the Distinguished Scholar Award from the American Society for Environmental History, the highest honor in the profession.

I am author of six books on climate history, Lake Superior, old growth forests, riparian history, and toxics history. My major research fields include old growth forest history in the inland west and the upper midwest; riparian history in the inland west; Great Lakes environmental history; boreal wildlife histories.

My 6th book, Reindeer: A Tale of Nature and Survival in a Changing North (Yale University Press) is currently in production and due to be published in October 2026. In this book, I explore reindeer conservation across the circumpolar north, asking how people and reindeer have shaped each other in times of rapid environmental and political change. 
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My goals as an environmental historian are to understand the ways that human and ecological communities have influenced each other's histories. While interested in theory, I want my work to be useful to communities trying to improve the health of their watersheds and homes.



Books:

• My first book, Forest Dreams, Forest Nightmares: The Paradox of Old Growth in the Inland West  (University of Washington Press, 1995) examined the cause of the forest health crisis in the Inland West. Forest Dreams won the Forest History Prize for best book in forest and conservation history published 1995-1996.
• Where Land and Water Meet, (University of Washington Press, 2003) explored watershed change in the arid west.
• Toxic Bodies (Yale, 2010) asks how and why endocrine disrupting chemicals have saturated our bodies and our environments.
• Sustaining Lake Superior, (Yale 2017) focused on the interconnected histories of watershed health, human health, and forest health--all in the context of climate change. 
• Climate Ghosts: Migratory Species in the Anthropocene (Brandeis and Chicago, 2021) explored the effects of climate change on three migratory species across the boreal north: sturgeon, caribou, and common loon.

Major awards, honors, and fellowships include:

• Distinguished Scholar Award 2021
• Distinguished Professorship, MTU, 2019-on
• Distinguished Service Award 2018 (ASEH)
• Elected President of ASEH 2007-2009
• King Carl XVI Gustaf Professorship of Environmental Science, in residence at Umeå University.
• Editor of the flagship journal in the field, Environmental History 2010-2013
• Fulbright Research Professorship 2019
• Mellon Foundation Fellowship 2019
• Leopold Hidy Prize 2009, for best article in Environmental History. 
• American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship 2002
• National Science Foundation (5 major grants and awards, 1988-2022))
• National Humanities Center Fellowship 1997
• American Philosophical Society Fellowship 1997
• Marshall Fellowship to Oxford University

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Academic CV

A 2025 CV is available here.

MORE REINDEER/CARIBOU RESEARCH

Additional reindeer/caribou research, storymaps, art, and popular essays that I've written are available here and across the website

Watch my ASEH Distinguished Scholar Lecture on YouTube:

 















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​My previous books include:

• Sustaining Lake Superior: An Extraordinary Lake in a Changing World (Yale University Press, 2017) explores the history of logging, mining, and industrial development in the Lake Superior basin.
• A history of endocrine disruptors titled Toxic Bodies: Hormone Disruptors and the Legacy of DES, (Yale University Press  2010). Toxic Bodies examines the history of synthetic chemicals that disrupt hormones and the struggle for a precautionary principle to protect human and environmental health.
• An environmental history of Malheur Wildlife Refuge titled Where Land and Water Meet: A Western Landscape Transformed (University of Washington Press, 2003). Where Land and Water Meet focuses on dilemmas over riparian management in the West and offers pragmatic solutions to the conflicts that have paralyzed land management. 
• A history of the old growth crisis in the west titled Forest Dreams, Forest Nightmares: The Paradox of Old Growth in the Inland West (UWP 1995).  Forest Dreams examines the causes of the forest health crisis on western national forests. It won the 1997 Forest History Society book prize for best book in forest and conservation history published in the preceding two years.

Since July 2013, I have been a professor at Michigan Technological University, part of the Great Lakes Research Center and the Department of Social Sciences. During 2012-2013, I was the King Carl XVI Gustaf Professor of Environmental Science at Umeå University in Sweden. Before that, I was a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison for 17 years, with appointments in the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies and the Department of Forest and Wildlife Ecology.