National park booklets

from Steve’s apprenticeship

After working as a national park ranger at Colorado’s Great Sand Dunes in 1974, Steve wrote the text for a booklet about the park’s natural and human history—his first book, and a benchmark of professionalism in interpretive publications for national parks.

In subsequent years, he wrote and photographed for park natural history associations across the West, winning a series of National Park Service Cooperating Association Biennial Publication Awards. He was lucky to serve his apprenticeship as a writer and photographer with these books—and delighted to have the honor and privilege of exploring such magical places.

Trimble’s park books include:

• Great Sand Dunes: the shape of the wind (Western National Parks Association, 1975)

• Rock Glow, Sky Shine: the spirit of Capitol Reef (Capitol Reef Natural History Association, 1977)

• Joshua Tree: desert reflections (Joshua Tree National Park Association, 1979; revised and updated in 2003)

• Point Reyes: the enchanted shore (Point Reyes National Seashore Association, 1980)

• Rim of Time: the canyons of Colorado National Monument (Colorado National Monument Association, 1981)

• Timpanogos Cave: window into the earth (Western National Parks Association, 1983)

• Earth Journey: a road guide to Petrified Forest (Petrified Forest Museum Association, 1984)

• Point Reyes: a wildlife journal (Point Reyes National Seashore Association, 1989)