Nature's Metropolis By William Cronan

Chicago - a land of opportunity. Today one might chuckle at the thought, but during the nineteenth century it was very much the case. William Cronan’s Nature’s Metropolis was published in 1991 and still remains one of the greatest books ever written about the city of Chicago. Cronan uses the book to describe the rise of Chicago and how it played a role in the flourishing of economics in the country as a whole; thus, using Chicago as an example of the interconnectedness between city and country. Beyond that however, Cronan’s oxymoron title is descriptive to how Chicago, and our country as a whole, was built from nature.
He describes two different kinds of nature. First nature and second nature. First nature is nature in its most original form,
It didn’t have to be Chicago. If things didn’t work out there, it was inevitably going to happen elsewhere. Some city would be the gateway to the west, but there was no denying the convenience of its location. Every smart entrepreneur will tell you that “location, location, location” is the most important part of starting a business. Conveniently located at the corner of the Chicago River and Lake Michigan, Chicago had just that. As previously mentioned, Chicago wasn’t perfect to begin with. It was terraformed to be successful. They dug through Mud Lake and made, essentially, an access road (Illinois & Michigan Canal) from the east coast all the way down the Mississippi River. This changed everything about the way things were done in the Midwest. This began the urbanization in the west and what really led to the interconnectedness between city and country. The eastern industrialization really pushed for the expansion of Chicago and it was their ideology that Chicago was the path to the west. Chicago was the logical place. This can be evidenced when Cronan says “Despite the booster arguments, Chicago’s location at the southwestern corner of Lake Michigan carried no automatic geographical significance. What gave the site its importance was the emerging commercial and industrial primacy of the American Northeast” (pg. 63). In a way, you can consider Chicago as an investment by the folks in the Northeast. They needed a
There were three major happenings in the meat industry at the time and the first is the extinction of bison and how it negatively impacted the Native American’s. The ease of transportation via refrigerated rail cars as previously mentioned allowed for a higher demand in resources. This led to the slaughter of bison which limited food for the Native American’s, eventually pushing them further west and to their own sort of extinction. The disappearance of buffalo allowed for the grasslands to slow down and trees to move in – thus affecting the lumber market as well. The second happening was the generation of feed lots and the disassembly lines. This meaning slaughter houses and animal farms that raise animals strictly for butchering and production. This again is a matter of devaluing nature and turning it purely into a commodity. The question that still plagues us is the morality of it versus the wealth gained. Lastly, the most obvious effect of the new meat market is how the American diet changed. Meats became more accessible and abundant, therefore meat was consumed more. Previously as a society, we generally ate more grains and white meats. This diet change set us up for habitual overconsumption of red meat which can lead to negative health implications, but that’s an argument for another