Donald C. Jackson – författare

Trundling along in essentially the same form for some 220 million years, turtles have seen dinosaurs come and go, mammals emerge, and humankind expand its dominion. Is it any wonder the persistent reptile bested the hare? In this engaging book physiologist Donald Jackson shares a lifetime of observation of this curious creature, allowing us a look under the shell of an animal at once so familiar and so strange.Here we discover how the turtle’s proverbial slowness helps it survive a long, cold winter under ice. How the shell not only serves as a protective home but also influences such essential functions as buoyancy control, breathing, and surviving remarkably long periods without oxygen, and how many other physiological features help define this unique animal. Jackson offers insight into what exactly it’s like to live inside a shell—to carry the heavy carapace on land and in water, to breathe without an expandable ribcage, to have sex with all that body armor intervening.Along the way we also learn something about the process of scientific discovery—how the answer to one question leads to new questions, how a chance observation can change the direction of study, and above all how new research always builds on the previous work of others. A clear and informative exposition of physiological concepts using the turtle as a model organism, the book is as interesting for what it tells us about scientific investigation as it is for its deep and detailed understanding of how the enduring turtle “works.”

Recounts Thomas Jefferson's role in advocating and shaping the exploration, settlement and development of the trans-Mississippi West. Jackson argues that although he did not travel farther inland than the slopes of the Appalachians, Jefferson must take his place alongside the pioneers.

The massive dams of the American West were designed to serve multiple purposes: improving navigation, irrigating crops, storing water, controlling floods, and generating hydroelectricity. Their construction also put thousands of people to work during the Great Depression. Only later did the dams' baneful effects on river ecologies spark public debate.Big Dams of the New Deal Era tells how major water-storage structures were erected in four western river basins. David P. Billington and Donald C. Jackson reveal how engineering science, regional and national politics, perceived public needs, and a river's natural features intertwined to create distinctive dams within each region. In particular, the authors describe how two federal agencies, the Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation, became key players in the creation of these important public works.By illuminating the mathematical analysis that supported large-scale dam construction, the authors also describe how and why engineers in the 1930s most often opted for massive gravity dams, whose design required enormous quantities of concrete or earth-rock fill for stability.Richly illustrated, Big Dams of the New Deal Era offers a compelling account of how major dams in the New Deal era restructured the landscape - both politically and physically - and why American society in the 1930s embraced them wholeheartedly.

The damming of Hetch Hetchy Valley in Yosemite National Park is widely seen as a watershed event in American environmental history. Passionately opposed by naturalist John Muir and his ardent supporters, the massive undertaking succeeded largely through the efforts of John R. Freeman, one of the most important, influential, and politically adroit engineers of the Progressive Era. In The Man Who Dammed Hetch Hetchy, Donald C. Jackson focuses on Freeman to offer a nuanced account of how the City of San Francisco won the right to transform the bucolic valley into a municipal water supply reservoir that, a century later, continues to serve millions of Bay Area residents. Central to Freeman's work for San Francisco from 1910 to 1913 was his design of a high-pressure aqueduct projected to deliver 400 million gallons of water per day to the Bay Area and generate more than 150,000 horsepower of electricity. Beyond crafting an extensively illustrated 42 -page report detailing his design, he also worked - and succeeded - as a political advocate lobbying for Congressional approval of the project. Jackson draws on a wealth of correspondence, reports, and other documents, including Congressional records, to highlight Freeman's contention that the Hetch Hetchy project would not just provide copious quantities of water and power, but would also enhance the Sierra Nevada environment and increase tourist access to the northern reaches of the national park. His self-avowed goal was not to tear down or destroy Hetch Hetchy but to utilize the valley for the greater public good and to create a system that would serve the city for decades if not centuries to come. Portraying Freeman for the first time in all his provocative complexity, The Man Who Dammed Hetch Hetchy is at once a deeply researched, richly detailed biography and social history and a compelling reinterpretation of a pivotal moment in US environmental culture.

Dams have been used to control water for thousands of years, with the oldest known dam being a small earthen structure in present-day Jordan dating to c.4000 BCE. Since then, cultures throughout the world have practised the art of dam-building and the technology has evolved in myriad ways. The papers selected here examine the key technical issues influencing dam construction from ancient times to the early 20th century. In addition they illustrate why various human societies have built dams and how ’social’ (or seemingly ’non-technical’) factors have influenced the process of dam design. Though hydraulic engineering is the primary focus of the book, it also reveals a keen interest in questions of water resources and environmental history.

A Sportsman's Journey lyrically and spiritually connects readers with the natural world. Donald C. Jackson explores the rhythms and ways of hunting and fishing, particularly in America’s Deep South, and in so doing helps readers understand and find meaning in why hunters and anglers venture far afield. Journeying alongside the author, readers will savor the magic of sunrises and the mystery of twilight. Hearts will quicken as deer drift from shadows and ducks circle a woodland pond. The ocean will challenge them as they fight large fish from the deck of a wave-tossed boat far out at sea. Restless winds will whisper messages during a spring squirrel hunt on a Mississippi farm. Bird dogs, old guns, old friends, and times shared with loved ones will remind anglers and hunters of those special, shared memories. Ancient forests and powerful rivers remind us of our fragile, ephemeral state. Quail hunts strengthen cherished relationships with companions. Encounters with a mountain man will take us into a world thought to have vanished generations ago. A gathering of anglers on a Gulf Coast fishing pier at night reminds us of those hidden communities that exist around us, and are often unrecognized or perhaps even unknown. Jackson reveals how all of us depend on the natural world and share very personal interactions with it and with each other. This book reminds us that rediscovering, resurrecting, and celebrating these primal linkages are the real reasons we explore the world.

A Sportsman's Journey lyrically and spiritually connects readers with the natural world. Donald C. Jackson explores the rhythms and ways of hunting and fishing, particularly in America’s Deep South, and in so doing helps readers understand and find meaning in why hunters and anglers venture far afield. Journeying alongside the author, readers will savor the magic of sunrises and the mystery of twilight. Hearts will quicken as deer drift from shadows and ducks circle a woodland pond. The ocean will challenge them as they fight large fish from the deck of a wave-tossed boat far out at sea. Restless winds will whisper messages during a spring squirrel hunt on a Mississippi farm. Bird dogs, old guns, old friends, and times shared with loved ones will remind anglers and hunters of those special, shared memories. Ancient forests and powerful rivers remind us of our fragile, ephemeral state. Quail hunts strengthen cherished relationships with companions. Encounters with a mountain man will take us into a world thought to have vanished generations ago. A gathering of anglers on a Gulf Coast fishing pier at night reminds us of those hidden communities that exist around us, and are often unrecognized or perhaps even unknown. Jackson reveals how all of us depend on the natural world and share very personal interactions with it and with each other. This book reminds us that rediscovering, resurrecting, and celebrating these primal linkages are the real reasons we explore the world.

Donald C. Jackson’s newest book of outdoor essays, Restless Winds: Memoirs of an Outdoorsman, takes the reader on a journey from America’s Deep South out into the world. Jackson’s essays explore landscapes, waters, and cultures that have defined Jackson’s career and life. Hunting and fishing stories from his Mississippi farm blend with tales from Africa, Alaska, Asia, Australia, Europe, and South America.As a fisheries professor at Mississippi State University, naturalist, conservationist, and former pastor for a small rural church in Kentucky, Jackson injects deeply personal and spiritual experiences into his writings. From the desert of Central Australia, into remote jungles of Malaysia and Vietnam, through the Nepalese mountains, to long walks during misty nights in Uganda, Jackson shows readers how to recapture their humanity in a rush-away world. Whether he is recounting his experience during a military coup in Paraguay or the magic of training a puppy to become a good retriever, Jackson’s encounters rediscover how simple things bring life in the present tense into sharper focus.

Donald C. Jackson’s newest book of outdoor essays, Restless Winds: Memoirs of an Outdoorsman, takes the reader on a journey from America’s Deep South out into the world. Jackson’s essays explore landscapes, waters, and cultures that have defined Jackson’s career and life. Hunting and fishing stories from his Mississippi farm blend with tales from Africa, Alaska, Asia, Australia, Europe, and South America.As a fisheries professor at Mississippi State University, naturalist, conservationist, and former pastor for a small rural church in Kentucky, Jackson injects deeply personal and spiritual experiences into his writings. From the desert of Central Australia, into remote jungles of Malaysia and Vietnam, through the Nepalese mountains, to long walks during misty nights in Uganda, Jackson shows readers how to recapture their humanity in a rush-away world. Whether he is recounting his experience during a military coup in Paraguay or the magic of training a puppy to become a good retriever, Jackson’s encounters rediscover how simple things bring life in the present tense into sharper focus.