American Chestnut: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree

American Chestnut: The Life, Death, and Rebirth of a Perfect Tree
By Susan Freinkel
Published by University of California Press, 2007
ISBN 0520247302, 9780520247307
284 pages

read: 12/20-24/2008

The Golden Spruce

The Golden Spruce: A True Story of Myth, Madness, and Greed
By John Vaillant
Published by W. W. Norton & Company, 2005
ISBN 0393058875, 9780393058871
255 pages

Read: 12/28-30/2008

The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise

The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise
By Michael Grunwald
Published by Simon & Schuster, 2006
ISBN 0743251059, 9780743251051
450 pages

A social, political and natural history of the Everglades that includes: its geologic formation; the Calusa culture; the Spanish exploration; the Seminole Wars; efforts at drainage and reclamation; the related development of South Florida; and efforts of protection and restoration.

Part 1 - The Natural Everglades Pre-History to 1880
Timeline
1513 Juan Ponce de Leon visits Charlotte Harbor; battles Calusa
1521 Ponce returns to Charlotte Harbor; wounded in battle with Calusa, dies later in Cuba
1564 Menedez de Aviles defeats French in St. Augustine; confronts Calusa chief Carlos at Mound Key

Part 2 - Draining the Everglades 1880 - 1967
Part 3 - Restoring the Everglades 1967 - 2005


















Read a review by Gordon E. Harvey The Swamp: The Everglades, Florida, and the Politics of Paradise.

California Trip 2008

Sunday July 27th - Flight cancelled due to t-storms at JFK. Stayed the night with Aunt Nee and Uncle Blaine. Good company, good dinner and breakfast.
Monday July 28th - Flew to Long Beach, arriving at 10am. Lunch with Leslee in Long Beach. On to Trisha's and Robert's. Then to Del Mar for dinner with Sue on the beach. Stayed the night at Sue's apartment.
Tuesday July 29th - Drove to Trivisons'. 11:44am 5.4 earthquake! Dinner with Robert, Trisha, Jordan and Amy. Picked up car from Enterprise.
Wednesday July 30th - Switched car to Budget. Drove to Mammoth. Checked into Condo #39. Hiked to TJ Lake. Dinner at condo.
Thursday July 31st - Hiked to Sherwin Lakes (2 miles, 860 ft elevation gain). Sat by pool, hiked around Convict Lake.
Friday Aug 1st - Hike from Tom's Place (4+ miles). Returned to Robert's & Trisha's.
Saturday Aug 2nd - Went for hike in Santa Rosa Ecological Preserve. Saw Dark Knight movie with Robert & Jordan. Visited Lauren, Ron, Nancy, Bob, Meredith in Dana Point.
Sunday Aug 3rd - Signed into ESRI IUC in San Diego. Sat in on Remote Sensing Summitt, ArcGIS Mobile SDK session.
Monday Aug 4th - Spent day on the beach in Del Mar. Dinner are Poesidon Restaurant.
Tuesday Aug 5th - Rode Coaster train from Solana Beach to Sante Fe Station in San Diego. Transferred to San Diego trolley. Attended a few sessions. Met cousin Cheryl for dinner at Cafe Zucherro in Little Italy. Took red-eye from San Diego to Dulles.

Soil Exhaustion as a Factor in the Agricultural History of Virginia and Maryland, 1606-1860

Avery Odelle Craven's 1926 book examined the abusive relationship between southern planters and their most valuable resource, the land, from the founding of Jamestown to the Civil War. He addressed the contributing factors of a staple-crop economy (tobacco), colonialism, slavery and Frederick Jackson Turner's frontier thesis.

Outline:

1. Soil fertility and soil exhaustion
2. The Colonial period, 1606-1783
3. The Post-Revolutionary period, 1783-1820
4. The Agricultural Revival ,1820-1860
5. Summary and conclusions

Timeline:
1607 - Jamestown settlement
1614 - The first sample of tobacco sent to England by John Rolfe
1662 - Moratorium of planting tobacco denied by England
1667 - Major flood
1685 - Major flood
1733 - Council of Burgesses petition "The Case of the Planters of Tobacco in Virginia"
1771 - Major flood
1791 - Washington completes survey of agriculture
1803 - John Taylor began publication of his essays on agriculuture
1814 - Arator published by Taylor
1817 - Albemarle Agricultural Society formed
1819 - American Farmer started publication
1832 - Edmund Ruffin publishes 1st edition of An Essay on Calcareous Manures

Notes:

Chapter 1 - Soil fertility and soil exhaustion

"They fall into error when they assume that southern practices were unique and arose from peculaitly southern characteristics and institutions" p. 11

"Washing is not serious while lands are forested, and streams issuing from the woodland bear little sediment, but when the trees are cut and the surface disturbed, then losses begin." p. 16

"Frontier communities are, by their very nature, notorius exhausters of their soils." p. 19

Factors in soil exhaustion:

• physical conditions favoring erosion
• frontier economy (need for cash crop - tobacco; land abundance; labor and capital scarce)
• markets and governmental regulations kept the economy agricultural
• fixed habits that could not be easily changed
• low profits limited improvements
• whole society built upon exploitative agriculture

Chapter 2 - The Colonial period, 1606-1783

"Originally the larger parts of both states was heavily forested and had to be cleared for cultivation could take place - a task so slow and difficult that much of the region was always in timber. Trees grew rapidly and when cultivated lands were abandoned, the forest returned again in a period of a few years. Travelers passing through what appeared to be virgin forest were often surprised to discover the scars of former cultivation and to learn that they were crossing what some twenty years earlier was a tobacco field." pp. 26-27

Advantages of tobacco as a cash crop (pp. 30-31):

• high yield per acre; scarce labor could be concentrated on a few acres
• good keeping qualities
• low weight for shipping
• labor for growing season cultivation could be used for land clearing in winter

"Tobacco growing and land clearing went hand in hand . . ." p. 31

"The planter seldom counted on more than three or four crops from his land before it was abandoned to corn and wheat and then to the pine, sedge and sorrell growths which usually characterized 'sour lands'." p. 32

Tobacco was attended by hand labor and much travel was by water; so the need for horses was not great. Hogs and cattle were purely local commodities and little investment and provision was made for either. So, the tobacco economy had relatively few cattle or horses; few of the associated barns, yards and pastures; and a low supply of manure. (p. 33)

The hoe and hand labor resulting in nearly continuous shallow cultivation keeping the soil clean and loose on the surface. Deeper plowing did not come until late in the colonial period, and shallow cultivation predominated even then. Continuous shallow cultivation and hardpans facilitated erosion. (p. 35)

Corn was shallow cultivated as well, and " ... it added to the work of erosion by introducing a system of cross plowing". (p.36)

Corn was considered an even more exhausting crop than tobacco. (p.36)

English laws and regulations imposed (1) a requirement that all tobacco be shipped only to England, and (2) a duty to the Crown for all tobacco entering England.

"This placed a premium on the raising of high-grade tobacco and the use of only the most fertile fields." (p. 44)

"The eighteenth century saw the large estate grow even larger and the great planter assume an even more dominating position in agricultural production." p. 59 "By the middle of the century estates over a hundred thousand acres were not unknown. ... The story of the rise of the estates of the Byrds, Joneses, Fitzhughs, Masons, Washingtons, Carters, Lees, Epeses, Beverlys, Allens, etc., is one of continual additions by government grant, head rights, or purchases from individuals" p.60

Population growth for Virginia and Maryland combined: 1700- 100,000; 1750-250,000; 1776 - 800,000

Wave of outward migration 1740-1776 filling up the western parts of the two states. (pp. 61-64)

Shift to wheat and corn in the mid 1700's (1740-1770)

"The close of the colonial period found the process of agriculture by soil exploitation and abandoment well extended to its limits." p. 71

Chapter 3 - The Post-Revolutionary period, 1783-1820

Efforts at agricultural reform came from George Washington's letters to Arthur Young, John Taylor's writings (Arator), the formation of Agricultural Societies, and agricultural publications (e.g. the American Farmer). Major elements of reform were:

1. horizontal and deeper plowing
2. manures and inorganics (gypsum, marl)
3. grass crops and crop rotations

Other factors affecting agriculture in this era include:

• decline in tobacco market, increase in wheat market (some in response to Napolenic wars and resulting increased demands from Europe)
• westward migration
• lack of capital as manufacturing favored by federal government, tariffs

Reforms generally failed due to:

• incomplete scientific basis and overblown claims for some methods
• market condiitions, lack of capital, labor situation, shifting markets, tariffs
• large estates and slave labor

Despite failures at reform positive changes that occurred in this period were:

• "The hold of tobacco was now broken and complete dependence of European markets and marketing systems had largely ceased."
• large estates no longer needed or tenable, and was being divided
• better plows allowing deeper cultivation and horizontal plowing were adopted
• gypsum, marl and other fertilizers were being used
• manure now recognized as essential
• grasses, clover and other covers were more widely grown

Chapter 4 - The Agricultural Revival , 1820-1860


Actors:
Avery Odelle Craven (1886-1980) - historian

George Washington - general, president, famer

John Taylor (1753—1824) - Senator, farmer, author of Arator, owner of Hazelwood estate
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Taylor_of_Caroline

Arthur Young (1741-1820) - English agronomist who corresponded with G. Washington

Edmund Ruffin (1794 - 1865) - agricultural reformer, proslavery ideologue, and Southern nationalist. owner of Marlbourne estate
http://www.dhr.virginia.gov/registers/Counties/Hanover/Marlbourne_photo.htm



William Byrd

Keywords:
tobacco - Nicotiana tabacum is a perennial herbaceuous plant. It is found only in cultivation, where it is the most commonly grown of all plants in the Nicotiana genus, and its leaves are commercially grown in many countries to be processed into tobacco.
hogshead - A tobacco hogshead was used in American colonial times to transport and store tobacco. It was a very large wooden barrel. A standardized hogshead measured 48 inches long and 30 inches in diameter at the head. Fully packed with tobacco, it weighed about 1000 pounds.

manure, gypsum, guano, marl, James River, Loudoun County;

The Last True Story I'll Ever Tell

This collection of short stories about the author's experiences during a three-year service with the Florida National Guard in Iraq is a compelling read.

His is the perspective from the "boots on the ground" that patrol the streets of Baghdad; viewed as occupiers with distrust, fear and contempt; and viewing the Iraq's through lenses of fear, disgust, and dehumanization. Occasional flashes of human kindness and compassion flare up, only to quickly disappear without explanation or prologue; likely meant to convey the nature of an occupation with little knowledge of the language or culture of the occupied.

Some notable quotes:

"People pick the army . . . The infantry picks the man: men who do poorly in math, excel at athletics, drink a lot, love their mothers, fear their fathers; men who have something to prove or feel they have proved it all. We were both proud and ashamed of what we were. The stepchildren of the army, infantrymen are like guard dogs at a rich man's house. When people come to visit, the media, the USO, they lock us in the garage and tell us not to bark, but when night falls
and there is a noise outside, everyone is glad we are there."

"I missed my dog a lot. I remember wishing he was lying next to me in the Humvee. He couldn't stop either a tank or a sandstorm, but it is nice to have your dog around when you're in trouble. The Iraqi's we met didn't understand; they're cat people, and Americans are dog people. That was the best reason I could think of for going to war."

Google Books: http://books.google.com/books?id=oAJIAAAACAAJ

Florida Trip - Spring 2008

Dianne and I visited family in Florida over spring break. We flew into Ft. Lauderdale on JetBlue on Saturday March 8th.

On Sunday, Mom had the family over for dinner, serving veal rollotinni from Doris Market. Kathy and Rich, Ed and Caroline, Sue and Johanna joined us.

On Monday night, Mindia and Steve had us over for a dinner of lamb kabobs (http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/236169) in a pomegranate-cumin glaze, served over cooked spinach. Most delicious, and, as would be expected, we were served a couple of bottle of fine wine, Angelina and Mark West pinot noirs.

Tuesday we visited Sue, Josh, Johanna and Ben and went out to a Greek restaurant (Maria's http://www.restaurantplace.com/restaurant-menu.aspx?from=fe10&restId=502) on Coral Way.

Wednesday we drove to Orlando to see Claire at her lacrosse tournament. We stopped on way at Kathy's and Rich's for a wonderful breakfast. We were amazed at the new home theater system they recently purchased. Claire played well in her lacrosse game at Wide World of Sports http://disneyworldsports.disney.go.com/dwws/en_US/home/home?name=HomePage
We ate lunch at the lunch room there. Patrice, a high school friend of Dianne's, joined us for lunch. We dropped Claire off at the All Stars Sports hotel.

Thursday was beach day, with dinner at Tropical Acres Steakhouse with Mom, Ed and Caroline.

Friday finished with a morning walk to the beach and the return flight to Dulles.