The early luxury of free forage on unclaimed western public domain allowed the building of fortunes in cattle and sheep and offered opportunities to successive waves of settlement. But the western public lands could not last. The range became overgrazed, overstocked, overcrowded. Animals were lost, much range was irreversible damaged, and even violence occurred as cowmen, sheepmen, and settlers competed for the best forage. Congress intervened by designating the U.S. Forest Service as the pioneer grazing control agency. The Forest Service's controls represent not only attempts to protect...
The early luxury of free forage on unclaimed western public domain allowed the building of fortunes in cattle and sheep and offered opportunities to s...
On their remarkable journey across the North American continent, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark's "Corps of Discovery" traveled almost 10,000 miles, about 9,000 of them on rivers--the Ohio, Mississippi, Missouri, Jefferson, Beaverhead, Clearwater, Snake, Columbia, Yellowstone--or their associated forks, creeks, and tributaries. With an expert's eye, Verne Huser tells us what it was like to mount and carry out an expedition that was "basically a river trip." From the construction of the boats in 1803 to the negotiation of the last miles home three years later, the explorers were tied...
On their remarkable journey across the North American continent, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark's "Corps of Discovery" traveled almost 10,000 mile...
Depending on who is telling it, the history of Euro-American farmers on the Great Plains has been a story of either agricultural triumph or ecological failure--an optimistic tale of taming nature for human purposes or a dire account of disrupting nature and suffering the environmental consequences. In both stories, human beings dominate the narrative, whether as subduers or as destroyers of the natural processes that define this grassland ecosystem. In "On the Great Plains," author Geoff Cunfer poses an alternative scenario: that people were not the masters of nature on the Great Plains....
Depending on who is telling it, the history of Euro-American farmers on the Great Plains has been a story of either agricultural triumph or ecological...
Depending on who is telling it, the history of Euro-American farmers on the Great Plains has been a story of either agricultural triumph or ecological failure--an optimistic tale of taming nature for human purposes or a dire account of disrupting nature and suffering the environmental consequences. In both stories, human beings dominate the narrative, whether as subduers or as destroyers of the natural processes that define this grassland ecosystem. In "On the Great Plains," author Geoff Cunfer poses an alternative scenario: that people were not the masters of nature on the Great Plains....
Depending on who is telling it, the history of Euro-American farmers on the Great Plains has been a story of either agricultural triumph or ecological...
