Page, Jake 1936- (James Keena Page, Jr.)

PERSONAL:

Born January 24, 1936, in Boston, MA; son of James Keena (a lawyer) and Ellen Van Dyke (an artist) Page; married Aida de Alva Bound, November 28, 1959 (divorced, 1974); married Susanne Calista Stone (a photographer), March 10, 1974; children: (first marriage) Dana, Lea, Brooke; (second marriage) Lindsey, Sally, Kendall (stepchildren). Education: Princeton University, B.A., 1958; New York University, M.A., 1959.

ADDRESSES:

Home—Northern CO.

CAREER:

Writer and editor. Worked as a ranch hand and hard-rock miner; Doubleday & Co., New York, NY, assistant sales promotion manager, 1959-60; Anchor Books, editor, 1960-62; Natural History Press, editor, 1962-69; Natural History (magazine), editorial director, 1966-69; Walker & Co., New York, editor-in-chief, 1969-70; Smithsonian (magazine), Washington, DC, science editor, 1970-76; Smithsonian Exposition Books, director, 1976-80; Smithsonian Air and Space (magazine), editor, 1985; Live Oak Editions, Placitas, NM, founding editor, 2000.

MEMBER:

International Stop Continental Drift Society, Buzzard Council of America (member of board of directors), Victor Invictus Society.

WRITINGS:

NONFICTION

(Editor, with Malcolm Baldwin) Law and the Environment, Walker & Co. (New York, NY), 1970.

(With Richard Saltonstall) Brown-out and Slow-down, Walker & Co. (New York, NY), 1972.

(With Larry Collins) Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing: Year of the Panda, Doubleday (New York, NY), 1973.

(With Wilson Clark) Energy, Vulnerability, and War: Alternatives for America, W.W. Norton (New York, NY), 1981.

(With the editors of U.S. News Books) Blood, the River of Life, U.S. News Books (Washington, DC), 1981.

(With wife, Susanne Page) Hopi, Harry N. Abrams (New York, NY), 1982, reprinted, 1994.

(With the editors of Time-Life Books) Forest, Time-Life Books (Alexandria, VA), 1983.

(With the editors of Time-Life Books) Arid Lands, Time-Life Books (Alexandria, VA), 1984.

Pastorale: A Natural History of Sorts, illustrated by William Hamilton Gibson, W.W. Norton (New York, NY), 1985.

(With Eugene S. Morton) Lords of the Air: The Smithsonian Book of Birds, Smithsonian Books (Washington, DC), 1989.

Smithsonian's New Zoo, Smithsonian Institution Press (Washington, DC), 1990.

Zoo: The Modern Ark, photographs by Franz Maier, Facts on File (New York, NY), 1990.

(With Eugene S. Morton), Animal Talk: Science and the Voices of Nature, Random House (New York, NY), 1992.

Songs to Birds (essays), David R. Godine (Boston, MA), 1993.

(With Charles B. Officer) Tales of the Earth: Paroxysms and Perturbations of the Blue Planet, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1993.

(With David Adams Leeming) Goddess: Myths of the Female Divine, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1994.

(With Susanne Page) Navajo, Harry N. Abrams (New York, NY), 1995.

The Smithsonian Guides to Natural America: The Southwest—New Mexico and Arizona, photographs by George H.H. Huey, Smithsonian Books (Washington, DC), 1995.

(With Charles B. Officer) The Great Dinosaur Extinction, Addison-Wesley (Reading, MA), 1996.

(With David Adams Leeming) God: Myths of the Male Divine, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1996.

(With Michael Lieder) Wild Justice: The People of Geronimo vs. the United States, Random House (New York, NY), 1997.

Apacheria, Del Rey (New York, NY), 1998.

(With Susanne Page) Field Guide to Southwest Indian Arts and Crafts, Random House (New York, NY), 1998.

(With Bruce Dale) The American Southwest: Land of Challenge and Promise, National Geographic Society (Washington, DC), 1998.

(With David Adams Leeming) The Mythology of Native North America, University of Oklahoma Press (Norman, OK), 1998.

(Editor, with David Adams Leeming) Myths, Legends, and Folktales of America: An Anthology, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 1999.

(With Charles B. Officer) Earth and You: Tales of the Environment, Peter E. Randall (Portsmouth, NH), 2000.

(With Charles B. Officer) A Fabulous Kingdom: The Exploration of the Arctic, Oxford University Press (New York, NY), 2001.

(With Charles E. Little) Sacred Lands of Indian Americans, Harry N. Abrams (New York, NY), 2001.

(With J.M. Adovasio) The First Americans: In Pursuit of Archaeology's Greatest Mystery, Random House (New York, NY), 2002.

In the Hands of the Great Spirit: The 20,000-Year History of American Indians, Free Press (New York, NY), 2003.

(With Charles B. Officer) The Big One: The Earthquake that Rocked Early America and Helped Create a Science, Houghton Mifflin (Boston, MA), 2004.

Dogs: A Natural History, Smithsonian Books/Collins (New York, NY), 2007.

(With Susanne Page) Field Guide to Southwest Indian Arts and Crafts, Rio Nuevo Publishers (Tucson, AZ), 2007.

(With J.M. Adovasio and Olga Soffer) The Invisible Sex: Uncovering the True Roles of Women in Prehistory, Smithsonian Books/Collins (New York, NY), 2007.

(With wife, Suzanne Page) Field Guide to Southwest Indian Arts and Crafts, Rio Nuevo (Tucson, AZ), 2008.

MYSTERIES

Shoot the Moon, Bobbs-Merrill (Indianapolis, IN), 1979.

The Stolen Gods, Ballantine Books (New York, NY), 1993.

The Deadly Canyon, Ballantine Books (New York, NY), 1994.

The Knotted Strings, Ballantine Books (New York, NY), 1995.

A Certain Malice, Ballantine Books (New York, NY), 1995.

The Lethal Partner, Ballantine Books (New York, NY), 1996.

OTHER

Demon State: A Fable, W.W. Norton (New York, NY), 1985.

Cavern (adventure), University of New Mexico Press (Albuquerque, NM), 2000.

Author of columns for Smithsonian, Science, and Country; contributor to magazines, including American Film, Smithsonian, America Illustrated, National Geographic, Mother Earth News, Oceans, and Horticulture.

SIDELIGHTS:

Jake Page's career focuses on the editing, production, and writing of books in the areas of natural history, geography, zoology, geology, and Native American culture. He has also written a number of works of fiction, including a series featuring Mo Bowdre, a blind sculptor living in Santa Fe, New Mexico, who is called upon by the local police whenever they have a case involving stolen art.

Among his nonfiction books is Hopi, in which Page and his photographer wife, Susanne, present "a very successful and satisfying evocation of Hopi history, belief, ritual, and contemporary life," noted a Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries reviewer. Page's Pastorale: A Natural History of Sorts is a "good trip to the country," Bruce Brown wrote in the Washington Post. Pastorale "both relaxes and stimulates," the critic continued. "Here are sunny vistas, good witty company, rural eccentricities, and some unexpected surprises." "While some of his writing comes dangerously close to being too cute," New York Times Book Review contributor Carol Verderese concluded, "Mr. Page has a gift for infusing familiar ideas with a fresh and unifying perspective, and that gift makes Pastorale immensely likeable."

In Wild Justice: The People of Geronimo vs. the United States, Page collaborates with Washington lawyer Michael Lieder in writing the history of the Indians Claims Commission, a government agency that heard Indian grievances and sought to make restitution for wrongdoings. From 1946 until 1978, the commission heard a number of cases involving Indian tribes seeking redress for lands lost during the white settlement of North America. According to Mary Carroll of Booklist, the authors show that the commission "relied on procedures and presumptions that prevented real evaluation of the harm Native Americans suffered through destruction of their cultures, expropriation of lands … and misuse of funds appropriated for their use." Charles V. Cowling in the Library Journal judged Wild Justice to be "an excellent account," while a critic for Publishers Weekly found the book "highly effective in making its arguments."

Page has written a number of books with David Adams Leeming, including The Mythology of Native North America and Myths, Legends, and Folktales of America: An Anthology. In the former, the authors include myths of historical, cultural, and religious origins. In the latter, they offer not only myths, but tall tales and folklore that have sprung from all segments of American society, including black, Asian, and European, as well as Native cultures.

Page has also frequently collaborated with geologist Charles B. Officer, including on the book A Fabulous Kingdom: The Exploration of the Arctic, in which they study the career and explorations of Ernest Shackleton and offer a history of other explorations of that region, from the voyage of Pytheas in 325 B.C. to contemporary excursions. With so much to choose from, they focus on the searches for the Northeast and Northwest Passages and attempts to reach the North Pole. Consequently, the majority of the book focuses on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Isis reviewer Karen Oslund felt that the volume "is briskly written, and the scientific portions are clearly explained."

Page and Officer collaborated again for The Big One: The Earthquake that Rocked Early America and Helped Create a Science. The earthquake that occurred on December 16, 1811, in New Madrid, Missouri, rang church bells in South Carolina, changed the course of the Mississippi River, was felt as far away as Montreal, Canada, and caused entire towns to disappear. Two major aftershocks occurred in January and February. The mystery of the New Madrid quakes, which have continued to a lesser degree until present time, was that they were so far from California and the San Andreas fault. Page and Officer study the geology of the region and speculate on whether and when it might see another "big one." Fifteen hundred people lost their lives in the original quake, but the population of the affected area, the size of Texas, is now in excess of twenty million. The authors provide an overview of the science of seismology and how earthquakes are predicted. "The authors turn in a solid presentation," wrote Gilbert Taylor in Booklist.

In the Hands of the Great Spirit: The 20,000-Year History of American Indians, solely authored by Page, covers the histories of approximately 500 Native American peoples from prehistory to the present time. A Publishers Weekly contributor called it "superlative … a rare combination of readability and reliability." The reviewer wrote that "for Page … it is a magnum opus."

The First Americans: In Pursuit of Archaeology's Greatest Mystery is a study of coauthor J.M. Adovasio's 1973 discovery of a spearhead dated to several thousand years before Clovis Man, till then considered to be the first American, and the archaeologist's theory that the first people were Asians who relied on the skills of their women. Page had the opportunity to work again with Adovasio as well as with archaeologist Olga Soffer to publish the subsequent work, The Invisible Sex: Uncovering the True Roles of Women in Prehistory. The trio proposes that the stereotypical view of a prehistorical society in which women are little more than consumers is male-centric and has its roots in a field of study that has historically been dominated by men. Instead, Page and his colleagues argue that women were at the crux of many cultural advances, including language, transportation, and the use of fibers. A reviewer for Publishers Weekly described the book as "highly readable, well argued, and always fascinating."

In Dogs: A Natural History, Page, the owner of six dogs, provides readers with both a natural history and the evolution of the canine species, an unusual offering in a field crowded with volumes addressing how to train and care for a dog and on the various types of breeds. Page starts out with the wolf and traces this breed as it evolved to the modern-day dog with which most people are familiar. From there he goes on to explain how dogs came to be separated out into so many breeds and such a variety of sizes, power, and appearances. This leads to further information regarding how various breeds are trained and how certain types of canines are more suited for different types of training, as well as a look toward the social traits of different dogs and how this should be taken into consideration when choosing which breed will best serve the owner's particular needs, whether for security or assistance or companionship. Kyrille Goldbeck, writing for Library Journal, commented that "reading Page is a bit like listening to a lecture presented by an enthusiastic but rambling speaker." Nancy Bent, in a contribution for Booklist, found Page's effort to be "an appealing look at our oldest domesticated animal."

Page once commented: "All of my current efforts are happily linked with the photographic and literary efforts of my wife. We are inclined to see important (or merely winsome) answers in such things as birds, the American Southwest and its less extravagant inhabitants, and other nonsensational aspects of life. I write because it seems natural to do so, but I curb my natural impulses in the absence of the promise of money. I'm delighted that writing is now how I make my living.

"My monthly column began as a way of propping open the ads in a young magazine and evolved into an attempt to trick people into reading about science by means of humor. Science, which always seems earnest to the point of stuffiness, is too important to leave only to scientists."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

American Indian Quarterly, fall, 1998, Gregory E. Smoak, review of The Mythology of Native North America, p. 512.

Antiquity, December, 2002, N. James, review of The First Americans: In Pursuit of Archaeology's Greatest Mystery, p. 1126.

Booklist, August, 1997, Mary Carroll, review of Wild Justice: The People of Geronimo vs. the United States, p. 1856; March 1, 1998, Donna Seaman, review of The Mythology of Native North America, p. 1072; April 15, 2003, Gilbert Taylor, review of In the Hands of the Great Spirit: The 20,000-Year History of American Indians, p. 1445; June 1, 2004, Gilbert Taylor, review of The Big One: The Earthquake that Rocked Early America and Helped Create a Science, p. 1681; September 1, 2007, Nancy Bent, review of Dogs: A Natural History, p. 33.

Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, January, 1983, review of Hopi.

Isis, December, 2002, Karen Oslund, review of A Fabulous Kingdom: The Exploration of the Arctic, p. 674.

Kirkus Reviews, May 15, 2002, review of The First Americans, p. 713; January 15, 2003, review of In the Hands of the Great Spirit, p. 131; December 15, 2006, review of The Invisible Sex: Uncovering the True Roles of Women in Prehistory, p. 1249.

Library Journal, July, 1997, Charles V. Cowling, review of Wild Justice, p. 103; November 15, 1998, Richard K. Burns, review of Myths, Legends, and Folktales of America: An Anthology, p. 74; April 15, 2001, Joseph L. Carlson, review of A Fabulous Kingdom, p. 123; July, 2002, Joan W. Gartland, review of The First Americans, p. 94; September 1, 2007, Kyrille Goldbeck, review of Dogs, p. 162.

Mercator's World, May, 2001, review of A Fabulous Kingdom, p. 52.

Natural History, September, 2004, Laurence A. Marschall, review of The Big One, p. 66; May 1, 2007, Laurence A. Marschall, review of The Invisible Sex, p. 50.

New York Times Book Review, May 19, 1985, Carol Verderese, review of Pastorale: A Natural History of Sorts, p. 23.

Publishers Weekly, July 28, 1997, review of Wild Justice, p. 66; March 2, 1998, review of Apacheria, p. 66; March 19, 2001, review of A Fabulous Kingdom, p. 88; June 10, 2002, review of The First Americans, p. 51; February 3, 2003, review of In the Hands of the Great Spirit, p. 63l; May 17, 2004, review of The Big One, p. 47; December 18, 2006, review of The Invisible Sex, p. 56.

Science News, October 19, 2002, review of The First Americans, p. 255; July 10, 2004, review of TheBig One, p. 31; April 21, 2007, review of The Invisible Sex, p. 255.

Washington Post, May 10, 1985, Bruce Brown, review of Pastorale, p. C6.