Gator!: The Making of America’s Iconic Reptile, from First Encounters to Florida Man

“The swampy environs of Barrow’s boyhood home openly crawled with bellowing, growling, and chomping alligators. That formative landscape helped shape a lifelong passion for environmental history, and in Gator!, one of the field’s leading scholars brings that passion to life. With incisive questions, critical insight, and exhaustive research, Barrow delivers an engaging and authoritative account of a storied American creature.” -- Jack E. Davis, author of “The Gulf: The Making of an American Sea” “In Gator!, Barrow offers an engaging, comprehensive, and sympathetic account of the relationships between humans and the apex predator whose proximity, as he persuasively demonstrates, we have been most willing to tolerate. Of course, that toleration is far from absolute; the relationships run the gamut from affectionate cohabitation to attempted extermination. And some of them are relatively symbolic or abstract. In Florida, the focus of the book and of United States alligator populations, alligators serve as mascots and tourist magnets, as well as intermittently troublesome and appreciated fellow residents.” -- Harriet Ritvo, author of “Noble Cows and Hybrid Zebras: Essays on Animals and History” “A deeply researched and compellingly written history of the ways Americans have come to admire, exploit, fear, and appreciate one of the continent’s largest predators. Gator! glides through works of natural history and science; roadside amusement parks; and the intersections of money, fun, and terror behind mascots, pets, racial slurs, and conservation. This book does not release its hold on the reader!” -- Nigel Rothfels, author of “Elephant Trails: A History of Animals and Cultures”