Coyotes and Town Dogs: 2earth First! and the Environmental Movement

In the late '70s through the '80s, the radical environmental group Earth First! achieved notoriety by its flamboyant activism while provoking widespread debate on environmental issues. In this lengthy, rambling account, reporter Zakin profiles the group and its major figures: Dave Foreman, Bart Koehler, Tim Mahoney, Mike Roselle, Howie Wolke, Louisa Willcos and Judi Bari. Zakin also describes other leading environmentalist figures from John Muir to David Brower. Earth First! members were disappointed with the national organizations and dismayed by Reagan policies. Devotees of Edward Abbey's The Monkeywrench Gang , they followed the principle of ``act now, think later.'' Zakin describes the group's activities in the West as it confronted loggers, miners and road-builders. She chronicles the rise of anti-environmentalist backlash and violence in northern California, FBI surveillance of Foreman and his companions and their subsequent arrest in 1989 for conspiracy to destroy government property. Foreman, who wrote Confessions of an Eco-Warrior in 1991, was released after agreeing to a plea-bargaining deal. (Sept.)