David Todd

Executive Director of Conservation,
History Association of Texas

“Historical perspective helps us understand a body of water. We can get away from how many cubic feet or gallons or acre-feet and we start thinking about what makes that particular body of water unique, special – native to that place.”

Trained as an urban planner, hydrologist, and attorney, David Todd has helped manage a ranch and beef cattle operation and three environmental grantmaking foundations. He is also the executive director for a nonprofit, the Conservation History Association of Texas, and the co-author of two books on the history of natural resource and public health protection in the state – “The Texas Legacy Project: Stories of Courage and Conservation,” and “The Texas Landscape Project: Nature and People.” Todd is a Mennen Trust Biodiversity Fellow and has received the Lone Star Land Steward award from Texas Parks and Wildlife. He lives in Austin, and is currently working on a last book about Texas environmental history, seen through the frame of our evolving relationship with animals.