Levellers Press

We went for the stars in our requests for blurbs for Devil's Den to Lickingwater, launching Tuesday, October 16, 7pm at the Florence Civic Center. Here's what Christopher Clark, author of The Communitarian Moment: The Radical Challenge of the Northampton Association had to say:

"An important book, Devil’s Den to Lickingwater is a fine environmental and industrial history of the Mill River in Williamsburg and Northampton. Its lively text, accompanied by beautiful maps and illustrations, tells a dramatic story of the river’s many transformations through community enterprise and development, ecological challenges, disaster, decline, and rejuvenation. Both as an account of how the Mill River came to be as it is, and as an inspiration for ensuring its healthy future in the life of the region, this book will have lasting influence.”

Book Launch, 7pm, 10/16, Florence Civic & Business Assc.

Devil’s Den to Lickingwater tells the multifaceted tale of the Mill River in Western Massachusetts, from its emergence after the glaciers 20,000 years ago to the present. This is in fact the story of New England, and indeed much of America, as told by environmental historian John Sinton (co-author of Water, Earth and Fire: The New Jersey Pine Barrens and The Connecticut River Boating Guide). Little escapes Sinton’s voracious historical appetite – the creation of the landscape, the disappearance and reappearance of native fish and animals, the Mill River as a Native American crossroads, the contrast between English and Native ways of managing the land, the transformations wrought by war, floods and industrial disasters, the extraordinary role of the Mill River in the U.S. Industrial Revolution, the exceptional personalities, from Sachem Umanchala to Calvin Coolidge. All this is told through the arc of the Mill River’s history—beloved, abused, diverted, and ultimately reclaimed as an integral part of the landscape.

We are with author Gerry McFarland at the Leverett Library for the launch of TT Mann