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Author-photographer Josh Jackson grew up camping the Midwest’s state-parks but it wasn’t until he had moved to California, and after the birth of his third child, in 2015—when every California campground was booked solid—that a friend uttered the words “BLM land.” One spur-of-the-moment trip to the Trona Pinnacles cracked open a new universe: 15 million acres of under-sung, “left-over” public land in California alone.
Over the next decade Jackson made pandemic-era pilgrimages to deserts, sagebrush plateaus, and the Lost Coast’s King Range, keeping a field journal, hauling a camera, and gradually uncovering two intertwined stories:

1. A Scrappy, Essential Landscape – Bureau of Land Management parcels host wild‐and‐scenic rivers, endangered species, Indigenous cultural sites, and 60+ first-come camps where solitude still reigns.
2. A Perpetual Target – From the Sagebrush Rebellion to Senator Mike Lee’s 2025 amendments that would auction up to 1.2 million acres, BLM lands survive only by “enduring” repeated sell-off and extraction threats.

The Enduring Wild braids those threads—personal awakening, ecological portraits, Indigenous history, and political urgency—into 100 photographs and 45 k words aimed at turning anonymity into affection. Jackson’s thesis echoes Baba Dioum: “In the end, we will conserve only what we love.” His book is an invitation to know, love, and therefore defend America’s most overlooked public commons.

Come down to the Henry Miller Library - browse and buy your copy ofThe Enduring Wild.

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This podcast is a production of the Henry Miller Memorial Library with support from The Arts Council for Monterey County!

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