The Pine Barrens was published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux in 1968. The subject seems improbable: a vast wilderness (over a million acres) in the center of New Jersey — the most densely populated state in America — between Philadelphia and the Atlantic coast. Beneath the sandy soil lies the Cohansey Aquifer, one of the largest bodies of fresh water in the eastern United States. Above ground: endless pine and oak forest, tea-colored streams, and a handful of inhabitants whose families have lived there for generations.
McPhee explores this unlikely wilderness through its people: Fred Brown, an elderly man living alone in a house without plumbing; Bill Wasovwich, a naturalist who knows every plant and animal in the forest; and others who have chosen (or been chosen by) this strange, isolated, beautiful landscape. Through them, he builds a portrait of a place that exists outside the normal categories of American life — neither suburb nor farm nor city nor national park, but something else entirely: a wilderness preserved by accident, by the sandy soil’s unsuitability for agriculture, by the roads that went elsewhere.
The book influenced the preservation of the Pine Barrens: when development pressure threatened the area in the 1970s, McPhee’s portrait helped build public support for the Pinelands National Reserve, established in 1978.
Collecting The Pine Barrens
First edition (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, New York, 1968): Cloth with dust jacket, photographs.
Market values:
- First edition, fine/fine: $150–$400
- Very good: $60–$150
Projected values (2026–2036): Strong appreciation. A classic of nature writing.
New Jersey’s Wilderness
The Pine Barrens (1968) is McPhee’s portrait of the vast, sparsely populated pine forest that covers much of southern New Jersey — a wilderness larger than Yosemite, sitting atop one of the largest aquifers in the eastern United States, surrounded by the most densely populated corridor in America. McPhee profiles the “Pineys” who live there, documents the ecology and history of the region, and argues implicitly for its preservation. The book helped inspire the creation of the Pinelands National Reserve in 1978. It remains one of McPhee’s most beloved and influential books.
Frequently Asked Questions
Did the book help save the Pine Barrens? McPhee’s book brought national attention to a largely unknown wilderness and is credited with building public support for the Pinelands Protection Act of 1979, which created the nation’s first National Reserve.