About this item
Award-winning investigative environmental journalist Jonathan P. Thompson digs into the science, politics, and greed behind the 2015 Gold King Mine disaster, and unearths a litany of impacts wrought by a century and a half of mining, energy development, and fracking in southwestern Colorado. Amid these harsh realities, Thompson explores how a new generation is setting out to make amends.As shocking and heartbreaking as the Gold King spill and its aftermath may be, it's merely the tip of the proverbial iceberg. The disaster itself was the climax of the long and troubled story of the Gold King mine, staked by a Swedish immigrant back in 1887. And it was only the most visible manifestation of a slow-moving, multi-faceted environmental catastrophe that had been unfolding here long before the events of August 5, 2015.
About the Author
When the river that his ancestors had settled next to in the 1870s turned orange with mining-related pollution in 2015, Jonathan Thompson knew he would write a book about it. After all, he had been researching the core issue - pollution from extractive industries - for most of his 20 years as a journalist. He worked at and then owned the Silverton Standard & the Miner newspaper over the course of a decade. Then in 2005 he hired on at High Country News, an independent magazine covering the issues of the American West, where he has served as associate editor, editor-in-chief, senior editor, and is now a contributing editor and writer. Thompson received his Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy and Mathematics at St. Johns College in Santa Fe, was a Ted Scripps Fellow at the Center for Environmental Journalism at University of Colorado, Boulder, and has also worked as an artisan baker, bike mechanic, janitor, and seed-germination technician. He currently lives between Colorado and Bulgaria with his wife Wendy and daughters Lydia and Elena. jonathanpthompson.com
