Gloryland
Page 23
Big Creek singing and the Ohio River too, the Missouri, the Platte, the Pecos, the Red, the Gila, the Colorado, all singing through what was and will always be Indian country, the Tuolumne and the Merced singing through Yosemite, all that water flowing down the lush green of the Philippines, and the Big Water between here and there. All that water singing in me, all of it singing Do Lord, oh do Lord
Do remember me
Do Lord, oh do Lord
Do remember me
Do Lord, oh do Lord
Do remember me
Goin way beyond the blue
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The list of those I must thank for making this book possible begins with my whole family. I want to pay tribute especially to my dad and my brother, who both went to war, and to my mother for being the real warrior. I owe my father, James O. Johnson, Jr., gratitude beyond the power of any word or gift. He served in the U.S. armed forces in this country and overseas for more than twenty years, and he was the template in many ways for Elijah Yancy. After so much war, may he finally be at peace. I’m grateful to my brother, James, for surviving Kuwait and Iraq and coming home alive in body and mind, and to my mother, Shirley Johnson, for her love, strength, quiet grace, and inexhaustible kindness. I thank my grandparents, Anna Mae Yancy and Gilbert Nathaniel Yancy, for being the best that people can be; my Aunt Marna for reminding me how acts of generosity leave a sweetness like chocolate in the hands of children; and my son, Langston, for reminding me that miracles really happen, and to never take myself too seriously.
I could never name everyone who has helped me over the years, in many different ways. So to all my family and friends who have taught and continue to teach by their example, and who supported my efforts with kindness and smiles: thank you for your support. I thank Christine, Maureen, and Robert for being such good friends at a pivotal time in my life. To all my coworkers and friends in Yosemite National Park and Yellowstone National Park, past and present, thank you for wearing the gray and green, the colors of one great family, the National Park Service.
I’m grateful to Pete Devine and Bridget Kerr for their insightful reading of the manuscript early on; to Maxine Hong Kingston for being a great mentor, a steadfast supporter, and a bright example of what it means to be a writer; and to Gary Snyder for his words of encouragement when encouragement was needed. Deepest thanks to all my teachers at the University of Michigan, who offered advice and good criticism when I was their student: Gayl Jones, George Garrett, Richard Tillinghast, and Thomas Garbaty; as well as Andrea Beauchamp of the Hopwood Room; and especially Eric S. Rabkin, who told me once that it mattered.
I wish to acknowledge these friends who made a difference in my life and passed away much too soon: Maynard Gilbert, Derwin Abston, and Alex Smith, gone but never forgotten.
I’m grateful to my editors at Sierra Club Books, Linda Gunnarson and Diana Landau, who helped a manuscript become a novel. Most of all, I’m grateful to Roxann, my wife, soulmate, and anchor, who was always the first to hear and first to respond with intelligence, clarity, and wisdom, and whose words of simple praise made it all worthwhile. You showed me that I didn’t need a road map to follow my heart. Thank you for Gloryland.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Shelton Johnson, a native of Detroit, Michigan, currently serves as a ranger in Yosemite National Park. He has worked for the National Park Service since 1987, also serving in Great Basin National Park and Yellowstone National Park, as well as in parks in and around Washington, D.C. He served with the Peace Corps in Liberia and attended graduate school at the University of Michigan, where he won several writing awards, including a Hopwood Award in poetry. Johnson has presented his original living-history program about a buffalo soldier at venues around the country and has received many honors and awards for this work, which has also been widely covered in the media; and he is featured in the Ken Burns documentary film The National Parks: America’s Best Idea. Johnson and his wife and son live just outside Yosemite National Park.
The Sierra Club, founded in 1892 by author and conservationist John Muir, is the oldest, largest, and most influential grassroots environmental organization in the United States. With more than a million members and supporters—and some sixty chapters across the country—we are working hard to protect our local communities, ensure an enduring legacy for America’s wild places, and find smart energy solutions to stop global warming. To learn how you can participate in the Sierra Club’s programs to explore, enjoy, and protect the planet, please address inquiries to Sierra Club, 85 Second Street, San Francisco, California 94105, or visit our website at www.sierraclub.org.
The Sierra Club’s book publishing division, Sierra Club Books, has been a leading publisher of titles on the natural world and environmental issues for nearly half a century. We offer books to the general public as a nonprofit educational service in the hope that they may enlarge the public’s understanding of the Sierra Club’s concerns and priorities. The point of view expressed in each book, however, does not necessarily represent that of the Sierra Club. For more information on Sierra Club Books and a complete list of our titles and authors, please visit www.sierraclubbooks.org.
Copyright © 2009 by Shelton Johnson
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Published by Sierra Club Books,
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Johnson, Shelton, 1958-
Gloryland : a novel / by Shelton Johnson.
p. cm.
eISBN : 978-1-578-05181-6
1. United States. Army. Cavalry—African American troops—Fiction. 2. United States.
Army. Cavalry, 9th—Fiction. 3. Yosemite National Park (Calif.)—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3610.0383G56 2009
813’.6—dc22 2009020643
Distributed by Publishers Group West