Columbus, Ohio: Two Centuries of Business and Environmental Change: Trillium Books
Autor MANSEL G. BLACKFORDen Limba Engleză Paperback – 10 iul 2017
Columbus, Ohio: Two Centuries of Business and Environmental Change examines how a major midwestern city developed economically, spatially, and socially, and what the environmental consequences have been, from its founding in 1812 to near the present day. The book analyzes Columbus’s evolution from an isolated frontier village to a modern metropolis, one of the few thriving cities in the Midwest. No single factor explains the history of Columbus, but the implementation of certain water-use and land-use policies, and interactions among those policies, reveal much about the success of the city.
Precisely because they lived in a midsize, midwestern city, Columbus residents could learn from the earlier experiences of their counterparts in older, larger coastal metropolises, and then go beyond them. Not having large sunk costs in pre-existing water systems, Columbus residents could, for instance, develop new, world-class, state-of-the-art methods for treating water and sewage, steps essential for urban expansion. Columbus, Ohio explores how city residents approached urban challenges—especially economic and environmental ones—and how they solved them.
Columbus, Ohio: Two Centuries of Business and Environmental Change concludes that scholars and policy makers need to pay much more attention to environmental issues in the shaping of cities, and that they need to look more closely at what midwestern metropolises accomplished, as opposed to simply examining coastal cities.
Precisely because they lived in a midsize, midwestern city, Columbus residents could learn from the earlier experiences of their counterparts in older, larger coastal metropolises, and then go beyond them. Not having large sunk costs in pre-existing water systems, Columbus residents could, for instance, develop new, world-class, state-of-the-art methods for treating water and sewage, steps essential for urban expansion. Columbus, Ohio explores how city residents approached urban challenges—especially economic and environmental ones—and how they solved them.
Columbus, Ohio: Two Centuries of Business and Environmental Change concludes that scholars and policy makers need to pay much more attention to environmental issues in the shaping of cities, and that they need to look more closely at what midwestern metropolises accomplished, as opposed to simply examining coastal cities.
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Specificații
ISBN-13: 9780814253700
ISBN-10: 0814253709
Pagini: 248
Ilustrații: 14 b&w, map 2, table, 1
Dimensiuni: 152 x 229 x 18 mm
Greutate: 0.34 kg
Ediția:1
Editura: Ohio State University Press
Colecția Trillium
Seria Trillium Books
ISBN-10: 0814253709
Pagini: 248
Ilustrații: 14 b&w, map 2, table, 1
Dimensiuni: 152 x 229 x 18 mm
Greutate: 0.34 kg
Ediția:1
Editura: Ohio State University Press
Colecția Trillium
Seria Trillium Books
Recenzii
“In this beautifully written and carefully researched book, distinguished historian Mansel Blackford focuses on the politics of water and land use in Columbus during the twentieth century. ‘Politics,’ Blackford reminds us, ‘always mattered.’ Here is an eminently readable volume that merits the attention of urban and political historians, policy makers, and every Buckeye.” –Mark H. Rose, Florida Atlantic University
“In this study of aspects of the history of Columbus, Ohio, Mansel Blackford introduces us in an engaging way to that place. With an occasional sly wit, he also makes the droll topics of water and land use policy rather interesting. In all it is a good story well-told.” –Ed Lentz, author of Columbus: The Story of a City
"Highly recommended." –Choice
Notă biografică
Mansel G. Blackford is Professor Emeritus at The Ohio State University.
Extras
In 1908 members of a city-planning commission headed by Charles Mulford Robinson, a nationally known urban planner, drafted a design for Columbus. In their introduction they astutely observed, “The city of Columbus represents the mingling of two distinct types of cities.” Continuing, they noted, “It is at once a capital city and an industrial city, and, secondarily, it is an educational center.”1 Had they lived another fifty years, they might have added that Columbus had become a major center for insurance and finance. In fact, Columbus has been a multifaceted city throughout its history. The capital of Ohio, Columbus has been a center of commerce, industry, finance, and education at various times, with those roles often overlapping. This history of Columbus examines how and why the city developed as it did economically and what the environmental consequences have been over two centuries of time, 1812 through 2012. It is a complex story, rife with unexpected twists and turns, as well as developments that might have been foreseen in a growing midwestern metropolis. No single factor explains the history of Columbus, but the development and implementation of water-use and land-use policies, and interactions among those policies—topics upon which this volume focuses—reveal much about the evolution of the city.
Two major themes run through my work’s analysis. One is the tension that was present from the city’s earliest days between business growth and environmental change, with the two often at cross-purposes. For instance, industrial development contributed to the pollution of water supplies, which in turn hurt businesses needing supplies of clean water. The second theme is the interaction between private enterprise and public policy in the making of Columbus. There was never a period of laissez-faire in the history of the city. Politics at city, state, and national levels always mattered. This history focuses on interactions among individuals, their many organizations, and their businesses in the evolution of Columbus. Men and women made Columbus what it became. However, they usually did so not as lone individuals but as leaders and members of business firms, business organizations, and various types of civic bodies.
Of course, similar themes run throughout the histories of many, perhaps most, American cities—and, indeed, throughout the history of the United States as a whole. Public and private efforts have often jointly spurred economic development, and there have been frequent conflicts between that development and environmental preservation. In these respects, Columbus’s story is America’s story, and much of this study is devoted to explaining how and why those stories evolved as they did. Yet Columbus residents were sometimes unusually innovative in their approaches to uses of water and land. Precisely because they lived in a midsize, midwestern city, they could learn from the earlier experiences of their counterparts in larger coastal metropolises and then go beyond them. Not having large sunk costs in preexisting water systems, Columbus residents could, for instance, develop new state-of-the-art methods of treating water and sewage—not always, certainly, but often enough to make their city stand out from many others.
...
Over the past decade or so, a growing number of scholars have argued for the value of “deep history,” “big history,” and “planetary history.” These types of history span continents and thousands, even millions, of years. They address nonhuman as well as human matters. Yet even advocates of such approaches to history are uneasy about getting too far away from localities, primary sources, and human agency. My study of Columbus is a microhistory, especially where it examines regions and neighborhoods in the city. However, it also ties development in Columbus to that in the Midwest, elsewhere in the United States, and in Europe to present a larger macrostudy.
My history of Columbus thus lies at intersections between important fields of study: urban history, environmental history (especially urban environmental history), business history, and midwestern history. It adds to and modifies scholarship in those fields, sometimes in small ways, at other times in larger ones, particularly in matters having to do with urban environmental history.
Two major themes run through my work’s analysis. One is the tension that was present from the city’s earliest days between business growth and environmental change, with the two often at cross-purposes. For instance, industrial development contributed to the pollution of water supplies, which in turn hurt businesses needing supplies of clean water. The second theme is the interaction between private enterprise and public policy in the making of Columbus. There was never a period of laissez-faire in the history of the city. Politics at city, state, and national levels always mattered. This history focuses on interactions among individuals, their many organizations, and their businesses in the evolution of Columbus. Men and women made Columbus what it became. However, they usually did so not as lone individuals but as leaders and members of business firms, business organizations, and various types of civic bodies.
Of course, similar themes run throughout the histories of many, perhaps most, American cities—and, indeed, throughout the history of the United States as a whole. Public and private efforts have often jointly spurred economic development, and there have been frequent conflicts between that development and environmental preservation. In these respects, Columbus’s story is America’s story, and much of this study is devoted to explaining how and why those stories evolved as they did. Yet Columbus residents were sometimes unusually innovative in their approaches to uses of water and land. Precisely because they lived in a midsize, midwestern city, they could learn from the earlier experiences of their counterparts in larger coastal metropolises and then go beyond them. Not having large sunk costs in preexisting water systems, Columbus residents could, for instance, develop new state-of-the-art methods of treating water and sewage—not always, certainly, but often enough to make their city stand out from many others.
...
Over the past decade or so, a growing number of scholars have argued for the value of “deep history,” “big history,” and “planetary history.” These types of history span continents and thousands, even millions, of years. They address nonhuman as well as human matters. Yet even advocates of such approaches to history are uneasy about getting too far away from localities, primary sources, and human agency. My study of Columbus is a microhistory, especially where it examines regions and neighborhoods in the city. However, it also ties development in Columbus to that in the Midwest, elsewhere in the United States, and in Europe to present a larger macrostudy.
My history of Columbus thus lies at intersections between important fields of study: urban history, environmental history (especially urban environmental history), business history, and midwestern history. It adds to and modifies scholarship in those fields, sometimes in small ways, at other times in larger ones, particularly in matters having to do with urban environmental history.
Cuprins
List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Introduction Columbus throughout Two Hundred Years
Chapter 1 Two Centuries of Business Development
Chapter 2 The Role of Water in Shaping Columbus
Chapter 3 Water and the Development of Columbus
Chapter 4 Land Use in a Changing City
Chapter 5 Land Use and Urban Development
Conclusion Columbus in 2012
Appendix Populations of Ohio: Columbus and Other Cities, 1800–2010
Bibliographic Essay
Index
Acknowledgments
Introduction Columbus throughout Two Hundred Years
Chapter 1 Two Centuries of Business Development
Chapter 2 The Role of Water in Shaping Columbus
Chapter 3 Water and the Development of Columbus
Chapter 4 Land Use in a Changing City
Chapter 5 Land Use and Urban Development
Conclusion Columbus in 2012
Appendix Populations of Ohio: Columbus and Other Cities, 1800–2010
Bibliographic Essay
Index