Jack Nisbet first told the story of British explorer David
Thompson, who mapped the Columbia River, in his acclaimed book
Sources of the River, which set the standard for research and
narrative biography for the region. Now Nisbet turns his
attention to David Douglas, the premier botanical explorer in
the Pacific Northwest and throughout other areas of western
North America. Douglas's discoveries include hundreds of western
plants--most notably the Douglas Fir. The Collector tracks
Douglas's fascinating history, from his humble birth in Scotland
in 1799 to his botanical training under the famed William
Jackson Hooker, and details his adventures in North America
discovering exotic new plants for the English and European
market. The book takes readers along on Douglas's journeys into
a literal brave new world of then-obscure realms from Puget
Sound to the Sandwich Islands. In telling Douglas's story,
Nisbet evokes a lost world of early exploration, pristine
nature, ambition, and cultural and class conflict with