Jeffrey's Reviews > Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West

Very interesting book, although at times it could get boring. I suppose if you are reallyinterested in economic history then it you may like it better. Here's the paper I wrote for class on it:

In Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West, author William Cronon presents the reader with a new way of looking at the historical relationship between urban and rural society. As opposed to the “persistent rural bias of western history” (xv) that has usually focused on the distinct separation of rural and urban communities, Cronon contends that the relationship between a metropolitan city and the vast rural area that surrounds it are, in fact, so interdependent that it is impossible to separate the two. As evidence, he offers an extensive look at the simultaneous rise of the western United States and the city of Chicago during the 19th century. Focusing mostly on economic routes between Chicago and the farming communities of states like Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa, Cronon seeks to “tell the city-country story as a unified narrative” (xvi) and show that the city could not exist without the countryside and vice versa.
Cronon’s main argument is that the rise of a great metropolitan city like Chicago cannot happen without the support of a vast, tributary rural empire feeding resources and services into the city, an area he calls the “hinterland”. At the same time, however, all the small rural, farming communities of that make up that hinterland could never exist without a great metropolitan city in which to sell their goods. In essence, the whole idea that a city and the rural communities around it could exist as separate, individual entities is wrong. They are all part of a single, economic system in which both parts are vital. “A rural landscape which omits the city and an urban landscape which omits the country are radically incomplete as portraits of their shared world.” (51) To prove his point, the author focuses on the economic commodities of grain, lumber, and meat, as well as lines of credit. The flow of these commodities between Chicago and its hinterland show how interconnected and, ultimately, how reliant all these communities were on each other.
Before Chicago was even considered a town, people began touting its location as a perfect spot for a city that could connect the Eastern seaboard with farmland in the interior of the continent. Despite several other cities claiming themselves as a better location, and despite several real estate booms and bust in Chicago, it was eventually established as a prime market for shipping goods between the large cities of the East and the population of the Great West. Initially using waterways, and later an extensive system of railroads, Chicago positioned itself to be the primary collection point for grain and crops traveling from western farms to eastern cities, for lumber traveling from northern forests to western towns and farms, and for cattle and pigs to be butchered, dressed, and packed to places all over the country. By staying on top of the latest innovations, like grain elevators and refrigerated rail cars, and organizing systems to maintain quality, like establishing uniform grades of grain and the Chicago Board of Exchange, Chicago was able to beat out other major western cities vying for control of those same western lands.
Beyond just these physical commodities, Chicago was also able to gain a large amount of influence over financial and intellectual matters throughout its hinterland. Chicago banks were the main source of lines of credit for many farmers and business owners all across the western U.S. Through the study of bankruptcy records, Cronon points out that even in communities closer to cities like St. Louis and Minneapolis, Chicago banks owned the majority of debt. Eastern cities like New York and Boston had such a vested interest in Chicago, that they opened their lines of credit to investors in the city thus ensuring its success.
Another of Cronon’s major themes is a look at the perception of what is “natural” when it comes to man’s relationship with the world around him. For centuries, western thinkers had viewed cities as an unnatural place and “the ultimate symbol of ‘man’s’ conquest of ‘nature’” (18) while viewing rural areas as being more in touch with the nature around them. Cronon disputes this idea by claiming that the distinction between “first nature” – the landscape and environment as it existed before human intervention – and “second nature” – the product of humans trying to improve the land around them to better suit their needs – are rather arbitrary. In the case of Chicago, “boosters” claimed aspects of first nature (i.e. Lake Michigan, the Chicago River) and second nature (i.e. dredging the mouth of the river, the Illinois and Michigan Canal) were natural advantages of Chicago’s location. Much like the perceived urban/rural barrier, the “artificial mental wall between nature and un-nature” (18) was based less on fact than people opinions.
Cronon makes an important point in comparing his view of an interdependent city/country system against those of Frederick Jackson Turner and Johann Heinrich von Thunen. Compared to von Thunen’s central place theory, Chicago seems to offer a rather convincing real-world case study. Von Thunen’s ideas of specialized, zoned areas seems to hold up pretty well, with the obvious exception of the areas’ location being affected by rivers and other access points. A community’s main export crop is shown to be largely affected by its vicinity to Chicago, both in distance and time. In many ways, however, Cronon’s theory is in direct contradiction to Turner’s. While Turner viewed the west as an empty, primitive area ready to be conquered by civilization, Cronon takes a much subtler view of the Great West’s connection to the established “civilization” of the east. He stresses that cities, no matter big and industrious, are still products of the natural world they inhabit. Rather than untouched nature and concrete-filled cities being opposites, they are merely different points on the same spectrum. I think one of the most important ideas to come out of Cronon’s work is the possibility of an entire paradigm shift away from the views of Turner and towards a more holistic view of the city/country split. I think I agree with Cronon when he calls it a “hybrid system, at least as artificial as it was natural.… At the heart of this new system was the twin birth of city and hinterland. Neither was possible without the other.” (264)