Robert Roper
Robert Roper writes novels and biographies and is the author recently of The Savage Professor and Nabokov in America. He lives in the East Bay.
Goodbye, Kroeber Hall
A century ago, Alfred Kroeber opposed racism and eugenics, advocated for Indigenous rights, and almost single-handedly invented cultural anthropology in the West. Yet four years ago, UC Berkeley removed his name from one of its buildings.
Day 5: The Tree of Life
The Alta group reconnect with the Walker expedition route and have their prayers answered.
Day 4: The West Side of the Sierra Nevada
The Alta group hike down in order to go up and bushwhack through jungles of snow-dusted manzanita.
Day 3: Deadwood Peak or Bust
Much like Walker and his men before them, the Alta group must overcome “broken country and battered trees and bare rock and snow.”
Day 2: Into the Snow
The Alta group encounter evidence of avalanches—and bears.
Day 1: The Zombie Forest
Alta Journal’s first expedition retraces a harrowing 1833 crossing of the Sierra Nevada.
Day 6: ‘The Brink of the Mountain’
The Alta group begin their descent at 9,000 feet buffeted by brisk winds. They complete it with thoughts of what the Walker expedition had accomplished—and a hot meal for themselves.
Five Men, Six Days, and 34 Miles Across the Sierra Nevada
In which Alta Journal commissions an expedition to retrace the first east-to-west crossing of the Sierra Nevada by nonnative people. In 1833, the journey was marked by blizzards, frostbite, and near starvation; 189 years later, the wintry conditions are not terribly different.
The ‘Orderly Anarchy’ of Ancient California
Anthropologist Robert Bettinger’s startling discoveries suggest that California-style hunting and gathering spread widely throughout the prehistoric West.
Robert Frost Was a San Francisco Kid
Long before he stopped by woods on a snowy evening, New England’s favorite poet roamed the rough-and-tumble streets of the Barbary Coast.