This irreverent, satirical look at the never-ending flying saucer controversy lampoons the full spectrum of the UFO "invasion," from the ancient astronaut theories to the evolution of today's alien abduction "epidemic."
From the first chapter, "Wheelbarrows of the Gods," readers see how a close look at prehistoric myths from around the world reveal common threads in each account. McHugh relates how Noah and his sons inadvertently caused aliens to flood the Earth for forty days and nights; how extraterrestrials gave Nostradamus his power, and how they influenced the success of the 1969 New York Mets. He traces the evolution of the alien abduction epidemic and offers a tongue-in-cheek quiz to determine if you have been abducted without realizing it.

The magnificent beast that once roamed from Alaska to the Carolinas "in numbers numberless" is splendidly memorialized in The Time of the Buffalo, which begins with its genesis in the Ice Age, traces its evolution and natural history, observes its patterns of behavior, and records its life-and-death relationship with three cultures of man. Here are the ways in which the buffalo crucially affected (and was affected by) the hunters of the Pleistocene epoch and, in our era, the life of the Plains Indians and nineteenth-century frontiersmen. Here is the creature itself--seen as an integral part of a rich ecological and cultural tapestry.

Combining extensive field research on live herds with the study of historical records, Tom McHugh offers a rare closeup of the buffalo's habits and life cycle, detailing such aspects as mating, calving, stampedes, play, and aggression. In equally fascinating detail he tells how the Plains Indians used the buffalo for food, clothing, and shelter, and endowed it with spirit; how the European settlers viewed it first as an object of awe and then as a source of plunder and how, by nearly exterminating this single species, they destroyed all the Plains cultures. An account of the movement to save the buffalo completes this informative and moving work--the 1972 winner of the Western Writers of America Spur Award in the nonfiction category as well as being voted the year's best western historical book by the National Cowboy Hall of Fame.