George Perkins Marsh Prize, American Society for Environmental History
VSNY Book Award, New York Metropolitan Chapter of the Victorian Society in America
Hornblower Award for a First Book, New York Society Library
James Broussard Best First Book Prize, Society for Historians of the Early American Republic
With pigs roaming the streets and cows foraging in the Battery, antebellum Manhattan would have been unrecognizable to inhabitants of today’s sprawling metropolis. Fruits and vegetables came from small market gardens in the city, and manure piled high on streets and docks was gold to nearby farmers. But as Catherine McNeur reveals in this environmental history of Gotham, a battle to control the boundaries between city and country was already being waged, and the winners would take dramatic steps to outlaw New York’s wild side.
“[A] fine book which make[s] a real contribution to urban biography.”
—Joseph Rykwert, Times Literary Supplement
“Tells an odd story in lively prose…The city McNeur depicts in Taming Manhattan is the pestiferous obverse of the belle epoque city of Henry James and Edith Wharton that sits comfortably in many imaginations…[Taming Manhattan] is a smart book that engages in the old fashioned business of trying to harvest lessons for the present from the past.”
—Alexander Nazaryan, New York Times
A work of natural and environmental history.
That Which Roots Us is a work of natural and environmental history that explores the origins of and resolutions to some of the United States’ environmental problems. Marion Dresner discusses the roots of Euro-American environmental exploitative action, starting with the environmental consequences of having treated Pacific Northwest forests as commodities. She shares her experiences visiting sites where animal-centered ice age culture changed to human-centered culture thousands of years ago with the advent of farming. The book explores the origins of the romantic philosophical movement, which arose out of the debilitating conditions of the industrial era. Those romantic attitudes toward nature inspired the twentieth-century preservation movement and America’s progressively modern conservation attitudes.
The book is centered around environmental issues in the Pacific Northwest, contrasting utilitarian views of nature with Native American practices of respect and reciprocity. The elements that make That Which Roots Us a truly unique and important contribution to environmental literature are the author’s personal recollections and interactions with the landscape. Ultimately, Dresner offers hope for a new stewardship of the land and a focus on science literacy and direct experience in the natural world as the most grounded way of knowing the planet.
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