He specializes in urban, environmental, and Western North American history. He is the author of Emerald City: An Environmental History of Seattle (2007), winner of the OAH Ray Allen Billington Prize. A former high school history teacher, he has received Bowdoin’s Sydney B. Karofsky Prize for teaching excellence. He was also a fellow and former trustee of the Environmental Leadership Program. His current research project, funded by an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation New Directions Fellowship, explores the environmental and social history of diabetes and chronic disease in America from the late nineteenth century to the present day. He is particularly interested in connecting scholarly research to contemporary environmental concerns as well as primary and secondary history education.