Totch: A Life in the Everglades

Rating:
Summary: South Florida revisited
Review: Any south Florida history buff will want to add "Totch' to their collection.

Rating:
Summary: South Florida revisited
Review: Any south Florida history buff will want to add "Totch' to their collection.

Rating:
Summary: Totch a Life in the Everglades
Review: Don't be misled by Peter Matthiessen's forward, this one is not for the ecologically friendly faint-of-heart. Totch was a one man ecological disaster, constantly on the move wrecking havoc on the wildlife wherever he went. His life of slaughtering animals for personal profit was a willful life choice, hardly dictated by the times, as he claims in his self-serving attempts to justify his pogrom against nature. His self-indulgence was carried to the extreme by illegally poaching thousands of alligators in the protected Everglades National Park in defiance of the laws of man and nature. The purpose for his illegal acts was personal profit, to skin the animals, only using their hides. Their dead carcasses, several hundred in a period of a few days, were dumped into the water to rot. This was hardly an act of survival. He did this because he wanted to, not because he had to. There are several other books, more accurate, better written, and less self-centered, that better describe the early pioneers of Southwest Florida. Rather than augment Totch's bloody legacy by buying his book, I encourage readers interested in the Everglades to look elsewhere, and leave Totch's book describing his carnage against nature to rot, like one of his skinned alligator carcasses, on the ash pile of despicable acts by the self-indulgent.

Rating:
Summary: Totch a Life in the Everglades
Review: Don't be misled by Peter Matthiessen's forward, this one is not for the ecologically friendly faint-of-heart. Totch was a one man ecological disaster, constantly on the move wrecking havoc on the wildlife wherever he went. His life of slaughtering animals for personal profit was a willful life choice, hardly dictated by the times, as he claims in his self-serving attempts to justify his pogrom against nature. His self-indulgence was carried to the extreme by illegally poaching thousands of alligators in the protected Everglades National Park in defiance of the laws of man and nature. The purpose for his illegal acts was personal profit, to skin the animals, only using their hides. Their dead carcasses, several hundred in a period of a few days, were dumped into the water to rot. This was hardly an act of survival. He did this because he wanted to, not because he had to. There are several other books, more accurate, better written, and less self-centered, that better describe the early pioneers of Southwest Florida. Rather than augment Totch's bloody legacy by buying his book, I encourage readers interested in the Everglades to look elsewhere, and leave Totch's book describing his carnage against nature to rot, like one of his skinned alligator carcasses, on the ash pile of despicable acts by the self-indulgent.

Rating:
Summary: Totch's Daughter
Review: I am the daughter of Loren Totch Brown I would like to make a correction of a comment that,[e-mail] made. My dad is not a mouthpeice for Everglades National Park. What he was doing before he died in May of 96 was trying to get the Park to change some of their views on certain issues, like burnning the marshes to bring back the wildlife that has gone,because the natives no longer could burn and in no way was he trying to harm the locals by discussing ways to help the everglades, he would have given his life to have the glades back like it was before it became a Nationl Park, to enjoy and have the legal right to all it's beauty and wildlife. The alligator will never become extinct in this area, if you had lived with them like we have and to know all about them you would understand. The type of fish that was commercialized here will never be extinct either we were not out to catch the sports fish we made nets to catch only what we wanted, to us it was a problem to catch anything other than mullet or pampano it took longer to remove what we call sports fish and we were not after them, our nets were designed to catch one type of fish and it was not the sports fish it's a shame the Sports fisherman and the Commercial Fisherman couldn't learn to work together. Whats going to happen now is eventually sportsman and us natives will no longer be able to fish in the Everglades National Park only under extreame conditions, so I guess we all will loose. Personal Rep.for Loren Brown Lorna Rewis

Rating:
Summary: A wonderful account of yesterday's Everglades & its people!
Review: Peter Matthiessen, author of "Killing Mr. Watson," and a master in is on right, is definitely on the mark in describing Loren G. "Totch" Brown as "a natural-born story-teller." A wonderful account of yesterday's Everglades & its people, "Totch, A life in the Everglades" is so colorful and entertaining you'll almost feel the need to keep the mosquito repellent handy while reading it.

Rating:
Summary: An Amazing Life Story
Review: This book is a wonderfully informative and touching story of a great and honorable man. Through Totch we learn of a nearly forgotten way of life and we see the Everglades as it used to be. I appreciate his honesty and plainspokeness and I'm thankful Totch made this book to preserve an important history. I also recommend the three movies made about him: Totch Brown's tales of the Everglades and 10,000 islands, The Everglades outlaw Totch Brown, and Yesterday's Everglades.

Rating:
Summary: An Amazing Life Story
Review: This book is a wonderfully informative and touching story of a great and honorable man. Through Totch we learn of a nearly forgotten way of life and we see the Everglades as it used to be. I appreciate his honesty and plainspokeness and I'm thankful Totch made this book to preserve an important history. I also recommend the three movies made about him: Totch Brown's tales of the Everglades and 10,000 islands, The Everglades outlaw Totch Brown, and Yesterday's Everglades.

Rating:
Summary: A view into the past...
Review: Totch is a fascinating book written in a natural writer's style illustrating how it really was down in the islands.The chapters not only offer us the life of Totch Brown but share photos and history unmatched in any other source I have found. Any reader interested in Florida history and/or anyone who was mesmerized by Peter Matthiessen's trilogy (Killing Mister Watson, Lost Man's River, and Bone by Bone) will revel in this book's information. The photographs add so much to the story offering a glimpse at this rather mysterious corner of Southwest Florida (where else, for example, can one see a photo of Ted Smallwood's store as it looked at the turn of the century?). I read it cover to cover without putting it down, and I turn to it often for Florida history/environmental/sociology information. A great find for any lover of Florida history! Totch offers us all a real glimpse into the lives and lore of inordinately tough, brave people who were real pioneers in a little known and enigmatic part of America.

Rating:
Summary: Totch- Saint or Devil?
Review: Totch was a devil most of his life, even by his own standards. It is interesting that he repented and claims to have tried to save the very same Everglades that he harvested most of his life. I do understand the reasons. My family is from Everglades City and did the very same things. They, however, have not tried to explain their way of life away and become one of the Park Service's mouthpieces. The book gives an accurate and in depth look at life as it was in a remote and still wild area of America.