Foreword, Denis Hayes

Groundtruthing: An Introduction, Penny Harrison

Part I: What Is It About the Pacific Northwest?

Writing West, John Daniel

Otey Island, William Kittredge

Rhapsody for Blackberries, Sandra Dorr

Part II: What Is This Thing Called Fulfillment?

Ballet in Bifocals, Linda Besant

How Do Musicians Do What They Do?, Tom Grant

Deadheading, Lee C. Neff

Life Is a Mountain: Into Thin Air and Beyond, Thomas F. Hornbein

Surgeon's Knots, Richard Rapport

Calling the Past into the Future with Stories, Kim Stafford

Part III: What Do We Know about the Issues We Face?

Land

An Impromptu on Owning Land, Jarold Ramsey

Oregon Land Use Planning: The Fairness Chronicles, Richard P. Benner

Water

From “River Soldiers”, David James Duncan

Water in the West, Charles Wilkinson

A River Runs against It: America's Evolving View of Dams, Bruce Babbitt

Mountains

Poem, Ann Ware

One's View of Mount Rainier, Eric Redman

Volcanoes and Superquakes: Living with Geologic Hazards in the Pacific Northwest, Stephen L. Harris

Wildlife

No Longer a Hunter, John Struloeff

Salmon and the Northwest, Roy Hemmingway

The Endangered Species Act: Thirty-Eight Years on the Ark, Jeff Curtis and Bob Davison

Energy

Night Lights, Robert Sack

The Power of Wind, Sun, and Falling Water, Angus Duncan

Sunshine, Scot Siegel

Transportation

Good Driver!, James Opie

Second Thoughts about Rail Transit in America, Emory Bundy

Part IV: How Do We Use What We Know?

Science and Public Policy: The Twain Must Meet, William D. Ruckelshaus

Lessons from the Land for Protection in the Sea: The Need for a New Ocean Ethic, Jane Lubchenco with Renee Davis-Born and Brooke Simler. Updated by Kirsten Grorud -Colvert

Peace on the River: The Klamath Basin Settlement, Edward W. Sheets

On Judicial Activism, Diarmuid F. O'Scannlain

Fire and Water, Kathleen Dean Moore