John Muir (1838-1914), whose writings about the natural world have shaped the conservation and environmental movements for more than a century, wrote this autobiographical account near the end of his life about his childhood in Dunbar, Scotland, his immigration to America (1849), his adolescence on a pioneer farmstead near Kingston, Wisconsin, and his student years at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. The Story of My Boyhood and Youth reveals the evolution of Muir’s scientific curiosity and the beginnings of his reverential attitude towards nature. Treating his encounters with wildlife as high adventure, he gives especially informed attention to bird life in both Scotland and Wisconsin.
- Summary from American Memory site.