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Willa Hammitt Brown

Gentlemen of the Woods: Manhood, Myth, and the American Lumberjack is one of those rare gifts: A book I never knew I needed, but is now indispensable. Willa Hammitt Brown's work here is transcendent, a narrative and analysis that both illuminates the past while explaining our present world. It is sharp, ceaselessly fascinating, and leaves the reader transformed in how they see the past, the world, and themselves.

—Jared Yates Sexton, author of American Rule and The Man They Wanted Me to Be 

Gentlemen of the Woods: Manhood, Myth, and the American Lumberjack

Coming from University of Minnesota Press

February 18, 2025

From go-devils to road monkeys to agropelters, Willa Hammit Brown shows us the vast Northwoods workscape of America's lumberjacks. Were itinerant "jacks" heroes or villains? Neither, says Brown, but understanding their dangerous work lives, diverse backgrounds, and colorful saloons helps us see the Gilded Age at its brutal cutting edge. Filled with first person narratives and legends, this beautifully-written book breaks new paths in labor, gender, and environmental history, and the history of capitalism.

—Scott Reynolds Nelson, author of Steel Drivin’ Man: John Henry, the Untold Story of an American Legend

In this nuanced and insightful work, Brown deftly weaves together cultural history and memory studies to give an intimate and revealing portrait of the Northwoods lumberjack, an American icon shrouded in layers of folklore. Gentlemen of the Woods takes the reader on a fascinating journey beyond the legend of Paul Bunyan to understand life in a logging camp—with all its discomfort and danger—and the process of mythmaking in American popular culture.

—Eric Rutkow, author of American Canopy: Trees, Forests, and the Making of a Nation

You’ll never think about lumberjacks the same way thanks to Willa Hammitt Brown’s Gentlemen of the Woods. From their complicated and hidden narratives to their significant historical impact and larger-than-life lore, the restless ghosts of the North Woods are finally getting their due.

—Susan Marks, author of Finding Betty Crocker: The Secret Life of America’s First Lady of Food

The story of the lumberjack is the story of America. It’s a story of road monkeys, bull cooks and river pigs. It’s a story of capitalism, conquest and controversy. Willa Hammit Brown's Gentlemen of the Woods interrogates the lumberjack’s many identities: Was he a dignified, mythic strongman? Was he an exploited itinerant tramp? Was he a degenerate, violent outcast? At last we have a book that pulls the lumberjack from the mists of memory, and vividly paints him in his true, wild, filthy glory.

—Mark Cecil, author of Bunyan and Henry and host of The Thoughtful Bro podcast

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Willa Hammitt Brown is a historian, speaker, and writer who has appeared on NPR and the CBC, and written for The Atlantic, Environmental History, and Western History Quarterly. Her first book, Gentlemen of the Woods: Manhood Myth and the American Lumberjack, is forthcoming from University of Minnesota Press. She holds a PhD from the University of Virginia and a BA from Oxford University and has taught history, gender studies, and writing at the University of Virginia, onboard Semester at Sea, and at Harvard University. She lives in Minneapolis with her husband and their excellent dog.

 

SELECT Public Appearances & Talks

“Second Nature: memory, myths, and the legacy of lumberjacks in the Northwoods” - Deer Lake Association, June 2024

“The True and Genuine Story of Paul Bunyan: Commercializing the Lumberjack Image, 1900-1920,” American Historical Association conference, January 2020.

“Poverty, Pizza, and Palaces: Case Studies in Southern Italian Public History,” Boston By Foot, September 2019.

“The Seasonal Round: the Anishinaabe and Itinerant Labor in the Northwoods,” Western History Association, Las Vegas, NV, October 2019.

“Rebels, Remingtons and Vishnu Tattoos: Race, History and the Middle Class Search for Authenticity,” Summer Tits Arts Workshop, Woodstock, VT, August 2015.

"Dishonor Code" - HearSay from the Headlines, WHRV, November 25, 2014.

"Why Lumbersexuals are Coming Out of the Woodwork," Q, CBC, December 12, 2014

To contact Willa for a speaking engagement, podcast appearance, interview, or article pitch please email:

willa.hammitt.brown@gmail.com