Book Review of Under the Stars: how America fell in love with camping by Dan White (Henry Holt & Co., 2016)

by Sam Demas

This is a pretty good popular-level introduction to the development of recreational camping in the USA, which the author characterizes as “a Victorian passion that got out of hand.”  Unfortunately, a significant part of the author’s methodology is to take the reader along on a series of camping trips that he believes allow him to come close to living through what the people of the era experienced.  While Dan White is an experienced hiker and a very good story teller, I personally found the device of including his personal camping stories a bit tedious and beside the point.  Others will disagree. Continue reading →