Frontiers: Post to Modern

The history of the United States’ and American landscapes are convoluted, violent and often misunderstood. Recent readings help to solidify this notion and make understood the intricate stories that were unfolding all over the Western hemisphere during this pivotal time in human history.

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Growing up as a child in the United States, I remember being taught mainly of the United States’ conflicts abroad and at home. The history lessons were U.S.-centric, singularly focused and therefore misleading – at least they only taught a small portion of the whole story. By using the term “singularly focused” I mean that the lesson plans described the United States’ independence was the most important event to everyone in the world of the time. While it probably did rock many corners of the world, it was interesting to read Herbert E. Bolton’s Wider Horizons of American History that helped to put the event in context of what else was taking place in the world – much of which was in the Americas. Bolton downplays the American Revolution by stating,  “Then came the American Revolution. This too was by no means a local matter. It lasted half a century – from 1776 to 1826 – and it witnessed the political separation of most of American from Europe” (19-20).

Bolton does an excellent job of explaining the revolutions that occurred throughout the Americas during the seventeen and eighteen hundreds, what preceded them, and how they were interconnected.  His explanations show that the frontier was not simply a border moving across the country with time, but rather pockets of intense fighting and political upheaval.  

Frontiers are interesting places of study because they are often where cultures smash together - often violently for resources and political power. Walter Prescott Webb helps us envision these frontiers as dangerous places full of political strife in The Great Frontier. New ideas and economic principles came from the frontiers of the Americas. For instance, Europe was richer than ever before due vastly to resources coming from American frontiers. There was so much money that national banks had to be set up. Commodities were circulating faster than precious metals, which meant that eventually money would be scarce. People would soon need a substitute for gold and silver (235-6). Obviously, this would become the paper currency that we know and love today. Furthermore, John Law established the idea of credit, but he was ultimately ruined by watering his stock – also a new concept.

Many think of frontiers as a distant phenomenon in human history – a place that represented a different world, one of mystery, danger, wildness and adventure to the unknown. However, Brian Davis helps us understand that modern frontiers may well exist, and be a lot closer than we think.  American frontiers exist today in the remnants of old industrial cities where abandoned water fronts and large warehouses possess their own environmental constraints, problems and opportunities. They are places where danger lurks in the form of crime, falling debris and dilapidated structures. These are often places of political disfigurement and at locations in cities where cultures clash. As designers, the modern frontier possesses great challenges but also vast opportunity to provide economic and environmental rejuvenation in these areas. 

Technology, in our DNA?

Whether you like it or not, technological advances have always captured our imagination in folk lore and reality. Last Saturday I saw John Oliver from the Daily Show at Bailey Hall perform his stand-up comedy routine. In the midst he described a hilarious bit in which he ruined Fox News’ telecast of the last space shuttle launch in Florida by accidentally cursing in front of their camera. Oliver confessed his obscenities were simply the only reaction he could muster to the most amazing thing he had ever witnessed. He explained that “It was almost ungodly” to witness people fighting gravity and even God to venture into the heavens where humans aren’t naturally built to inhabit.

Visualizing Oliver’s rant made me consider several points from the readings this week. Cosgrove’s article made me think about whether the American landscape was an American invention or a European imposition on the landscape? I think early urban centers where people congregated were European in their ancestry, but as the U.S. won its independence, the most democratic allocation of power was to plot the land in a decentralized way through grid systems and using natural barriers such as large rivers. Even if lands were not completely explored, wealth was awarded through property.

Cosgrove’s article made me think about the give and take that occurs between technology and landscape. Large American rives enabled deforestation on massive scales that caused vast environmental degradation, but also helped the United States attain economic and militaristic superiority. As the U.S. grew, the vastness of the continent created enormous infrastructural problems. To overcome these hardships created by landscape, I would argue that people’s fortitude, creativity and ambition was put to the test. The railroad and telegraph are closely associated with moving west. These two advances enabled people to experience the landscape and send information, resources and people like never before.

Another increase in technology has been the airplane. No other vehicle, besides its cousin the spaceship, has allowed mankind to view our planet like never before. The plane has cut travel by severe margins, making trips that took months and years in the past to mere hours. The airplane has allowed us to rationalize our actions on a global scale.

While landscape can provide the hardship and vehicle by which human ingenuity propels technological advancement, a culture’s mode of production is the driver. For instance in the Web article, the author describes how several ranchers, Joseph Glidden and Jacob Haish, invented barbed wire as a response to the lack of wood needed for fence building. In this wonderful case of technological discovery, the landscape presented a particular challenge for these ranchers. Because their mode of production was incumbent on creating a productive landscape for monetary and social prowess, they invented ways to propel this within the constraints of the landscape that they were in. People had lived on the plains for thousands of years, but did not invent the barbed wire fence – not because they weren’t smart enough, but because they were not driven to as part of a capitalistic society.

The question has to be asked then, is humankind smart enough to prevail over everything nature can throw at it? It seems that at our core essence, landscape presented a challenge to human ancestors when they first climbed down from the trees in search of food. Just as it does today, the landscapes of then presented many challenges. Those early hominoids had the presence of mind to be creative and overcome. Today this continues in the face of environmental disaster. Technological advancement has not only created a mess environmentally, but has also given us the means to understand the scale of this destruction. Inevitably, our creative ability to use our minds to create ways to overcome hardships we encounter in the landscapes we inhabit will probably save us – if history is any indication. Perhaps it’s simply in our DNA?

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The Ancient Man was a Romantic

I found the readings for class to be very enjoyable this week, evoking thought about how we “measure” landscapes. The readings showed that landscapes are often a reflection of a society’s values measured by very technical instruments to dominate and control the natural world (Corner, MacLean). For ancients, the numerical and proportional values of things proved evidence of divine creation, but Corner and MacLean argue that today precise instruments have moved the focus from existential and imaginative bases for human inhabitance.

Corner and MacLean make interesting arguments that modern society places an increased efficiency and utility in that “if things are not profitable, useful, or of immediate and measurable benefit, they are often deemed to belong to the domain of the romantic and deluded” (Corner, MacLean, xviii). The consequences of this has led to the despoliation of natural resources and homogenization of life (Corner, MacLean).

The final point I found most interesting in the article was that the numerical and instrumental values that guide the use of a measuring tool convey various levels of ethical and social propriety. The authors show that a landscape can divulge a “society’s ethos, expressed most poignantly in the interplay of appearance, usage, and cultural codes of representation” (Corner, MacLean xviii).

The authors make the claim on page xviii that number and utility can be conjoined with beauty and virtue, which I whole-heartedly agree with. Landscape architecture has vast potential to be the nexus of art, architecture, environmentalism, political activism and socio-economical issues. Therefore, designers must consider all these facets of society when designing space. No space is simple to design when the layers involved are pealed back and studied.  The world is overpopulated and human activity is increasingly a detriment to humans themselves and the rest of the planet. It would be irresponsible for any designer to craft place without creating a productive landscape environmentally, economically and socially.

That said I somewhat disagree with Corner and MacLean in that they argue ancient societies understood that number and utility may be conjoined with beauty and virtue, but is forgotten today (Corner, MacLean, xviii). I think what Corner and MacLean are trying to say is that our attention today has become so focused on precision and getting utility from the land we do not value human experience as much as the ancients. In this sense I disagree because I do not feel that ancient civilizations, in general, valued human experience and social well-being at all. For many ancient cultures life was about providing for the divine and those most associated with the divine like kings. Cultures of the past and today are products of the types of societies we live in and what those societies value. The major culture of the U.S. is to earn money and provide for the family. In this sense, the landscape reflects that. As stated earlier, an ancient civilization like the Incas were much more concerned about pleasing deities and attaining a satisfying afterlife.

The other readings from this week including “North America’s Wars” by Heather Pringle showed that people of the past fought extensively for natural resources meaning that resources would often “run dry.” Entire cities were built to protect these resources often violently. There is much evidence in the Americas of extensive logging and deforestation by the ancient people that ruined vast ecosystems and probably ultimately caused much hardship. Therefore, I think the idea of ancient man understanding the importance of human existence and being one with the earth is somewhat of a romantic idea. Their beliefs in the connection of the earth with the divine lead them to create landscapes that encompassed this notion and probably lead to a romantic idea about ancient life. These are very broad generalities about ancient life of course.

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I found Pringle’s article interesting in her discussion of ancient sites that were centered around water wells. Peoples then built their dwellings several stories high around these wells for fighting off offensive onslaughts by warring tribes. I could not help envision the modern plaza with buildings rising several stories high circumscribing a large fountain or water feature. I find it interesting to think these beloved spaces were originally designed for war-like scenarios – not for bettering the life of the civilians. Perhaps then and lasting throughout the modern world these plazas provide a sense of protected space and access to basic resources.