Wrecks of Human Ambition

Paul T. Nelson is a native Utahn and lifelong lover of canyon country, having climbed, rafted, and hiked through the region extensively. He holds a PhD in American history from Southern Methodist University.

"Nelson chronicles how generations of missionaries, explorers, traders, settlers, gold seekers, and premodern tourists approached, perceived, passed through, settled, and were confounded by the otherworldly red rock deserts of southern Utah and northern Arizona. Readers will come away with fresh insights into old tales, having themselves experienced the canyon country with new eyes. A skilled story teller, Nelson has produced a fine work of western American history." -Jedediah S. Rogers, author of Roads in the Wilderness (University of Utah Press, 2013) "The book makes a significant contribution. With the historical landscape as seemingly jumbled and twisted as the physical landscape, the book presents a coherent, easy-to-follow summary of the area's history. It offers new historical interpretations and a fresh way of looking at the region's history." -Kent Powell, editor of Nels Anderson's World War I Diary (University of Utah Press, 2013). "A fascinating read and a comprehensive take on European and American efforts to explore, settle and cultivate the canyon country of southeastern Utah."-Deseret News "Nelson is a promising young scholar whose first book makes me eager to read his next effort. This book will appeal to the professional as well as the lay reader interested in Utah's backcountry. Go buy it."-Western Historical Quarterly "A thought-provoking book... Nelson has opened a discussion on an important aspect of Utah's history that should be looked at from a variety of perspectives. Wrecks of Human Ambition is a good starting point."-Utah Historical Quarterly "A well-researched and documented book."-Westerners Roundup "Long before the likes of Yosemite and Yellowstone captured the American imagination, Canyon Country proved more difficult to love. Nelson deftly weaves together the dissonant tales of Spanish and Mormon disillusionment and alienation with that of modern reverence for wild and remote places to render an absorbing portrait of a deeply paradoxical landscape."-Montana: The Magazine of Western History