The relationship between the city and the country has typically been defined as a boundary where the city represents pristine and unfallen whereas the country is often seen as corrupt and unredeemed. A journey from the country to the city symbolizes, more of less, a journey from pastoral simplicity to cosmopolitan sophistication, from purity to corruption, or even from the past into the future. In no better case was this relationship present than in the city of Chicago. In the book Nature’s Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West, the author, William Cronon, places the city of Chicago at the focal point for the division between the country and the city. Arguing that since the city and country share a common history, their stories are best
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It is here that Cronon’s central thesis comes into play much more prominently, but no less important, than the other chapters In this chapter, Cronon argues that it was in the stockyards that the western frontier met the city, as the place for killing hogs was an ideal meeting location. It was because of the railroad that this relationship began to diminish and many people coming to the city grew to be disconnected from the hinterlands where they were raised. One example of this was how the Chisholm Trail, once used to transport cattle by ranchers across the plains on the backs of horses, was eliminated because of the railroad, which was used to transport cattle from the north to the eastern markets. Moreover, the city of Chicago expanded and revolutionized the industry, notably seen in the creation/invention of the fence, which was used to partition the landscape in order to prevent animal movement. All in all, when examining this section as a whole, the overall theme that can be taken from the books is how interconnected the urban and rural landscapes were in the history of Chicago. As a matter of fact, Chicago was unique, “and really did play a pioneering role in shaping the markets and landscapes of North America as we know them
It is here that Cronon’s central thesis comes into play much more prominently, but no less important, than the other chapters In this chapter, Cronon argues that it was in the stockyards that the western frontier met the city, as the place for killing hogs was an ideal meeting location. It was because of the railroad that this relationship began to diminish and many people coming to the city grew to be disconnected from the hinterlands where they were raised. One example of this was how the Chisholm Trail, once used to transport cattle by ranchers across the plains on the backs of horses, was eliminated because of the railroad, which was used to transport cattle from the north to the eastern markets. Moreover, the city of Chicago expanded and revolutionized the industry, notably seen in the creation/invention of the fence, which was used to partition the landscape in order to prevent animal movement. All in all, when examining this section as a whole, the overall theme that can be taken from the books is how interconnected the urban and rural landscapes were in the history of Chicago. As a matter of fact, Chicago was unique, “and really did play a pioneering role in shaping the markets and landscapes of North America as we know them