Vendor
	Mohrbooks Literary Agency Sebastian Ritscher
Original language
English
Categories
Memoirs

STAND UP THAT MOUNTAIN

Jay Erskine Leutze

The Battle to Save One Small Community in the Wilderness Along the Appalachian Trail

STAND UP THAT MOUNTAIN is the true story of a landmark environmental law case. It is the story of an outdoorsman living alone in Western North Carolina who teams up with his Appalachian “mountain people” neighbors and environmental lawyers to save a treasured peak from the mining company intent on tearing it down.

One day Jay Leutze got a call from a young woman, Ashley, and her Aunt Ollie. Ashley and Ollie said they had evidence that Clark Stone Company was violating the Mining Act of 1971 up on Belview Mountain, behind their house, one of the most remote and wildest places in the eastern United States. They wanted the author, a non-practicing attorney, to sue the company, to put a stop to their mining operation. Given his own interest in seeing the project halted, Leutze jumped at the challenge. Upon meeting Ashley and Ollie, Leutze knew he was embarking on a course that would change his life. Fourteen-year-old Ashley assured him she had accumulated a stack of evidence “as big as that mountain” detailing the mine owner's misdeeds. Leutze quickly became convinced that this was a case he could win; he formed a plaintiff group and sued the state of North Carolina for violations of its own mining laws. He and Ashley's family were eventually joined by several national conservation groups seeking to save Belview Mountain and protect the Appalachian Trail in one of its most scenic and fragile stretches. Although they encountered a series of legal setbacks, they persevered and ultimately won, setting a legal precedent that stands today. The mine is gone and the mountain stands preserved.

Jay Erskine Leutze was born in Virginia in 1964. He now lives in the Southern Appalachian mountains of North Carolina. Trained as an attorney, he has become a leading voice for state and federal conservation funding for investment in public lands. He is a Trustee for Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, one of the nation's most established land trusts.

Available products
Book Published 2012-06-05 by Scribner
Book Published 2012-06-05 by Scribner

Comments

Starting with a phone call from a neighbor, Jay Erskine Leutze describes an epic fight to save the landscape from utter destruction. Telling the story through the characters in his Appalachian community, he brings the mountain people alive with their speech, history, and values. As the group takes their case from the county to the state’s highest court, Stand Up That Mountain celebrates the power of grass roots political action in America at a time when grass roots efforts are essential to protect our land.

Even Jay Leutze could not possibly make these people up. From the brilliant Ashley Cook to the unmovable mine owner, Stand Up That Mountain is populated with riveting real characters from a world apart. Leutze lets us listen as they speak and tells their story —and his own —with an expert hand. He has given us a glimpse of Appalachia that is both heartbreaking and inspiring.

Jay Erskine Leutze has long been a passionate defender of the priceless natural resources of the Southern Appalachian Mountains. His love of those mountains and the small communities they harbor has found expression in many ways, including the permanent protection of thousands of acres of land. In the case of the Putnam Mine, Jay also demonstrated his pit-bull tenacity in the face of seemingly impossible odds. All those who appreciate these mountains, both residents and visitors alike, including the many thousands each year who traverse that area along the Appalachian Trail, owe Jay a debt of gratitude for his unswerving defense of those all-too-fragile mountain landscapes.

Stand Up That Mountain is not just a page-turner, but a testament of how deeply place and community can instruct us. Jay Leutze, a naive young law-school graduate, living "intentionally" in the Southern Appalachian Mountains, has the modesty to be instructed by a mountain, by the Appalachian Trail, and by mountain people who lead him with hillbilly humor and unstoppable ardor in a fight to save their homes. Gentle, funny, affectionate, smart, and self-effacing, Jay Leutze leads us gingerly through a tangle of lawsuits and small-town run-ins that would have delighted Faulkner, to a dramatic and surprising end.