Chicago Environmental Analysis

While many cities shaped our nation’s history, Chicago was perhaps the most influential of them all. Chicago had many popular trading hubs, and three very popular commodities were grain, lumber, and meat. These commodities helped illustrate three very important facts relating to Chicago that Cronon emphasizes; the combination of economic and environmental history, the symbiotic relationship between city and country, and the difference between “first” and “second” nature. I will begin by discussing the combination of economic and environmental history, and how these three commodities played a vital role in that combination. The combination of economic and environmental history is very closely related to the idea of the symbiotic relationship …show more content…
In the wake of the destruction of numerous forests, the lumber market was born. Perhaps the best illustration of the combination of economic and environmental history is summed up in this quote: “lumber became cash, and cash became the wages and provisions that would sustain the next round of logging and milling” (Cronon, 170). The combination of environmental and economic history could not be clearer here, as the lumber that was taken from forests was converted into cash, which was then converted into labor and resources used to obtain more lumber. It was an endless cycle of exploitation of the environment and economic …show more content…
In other words, first nature is what many think of when they hear the word nature (trees, wild animals, etc.) and second nature is what we use first nature to create. Cronon states that, in order for a farm to succeed, farmers had to build many structures, such as a farmhouse for the family, a barn for the animals, a shed for tools and machinery, and fences. “These structures were among the most visible symbols of second nature in the rural landscape…” (Cronon, 101). These are only a few examples of the relationship between first and second nature, as these structures would then be used to plant crops and house animals, which would be classified as first nature. Cronon also describes the problem that lies within this relationship, which he calls the “vice of the prairies’s virtue.” While land that had no trees to be cleared was good land for plowing and building these symbols of second nature, the absence of trees meant that there was no way to obtain lumber from that area. The exploitation of first nature could not go on indefinitely. While farmers initially compromised by staying in between woodland and grassland, this would not be a viable solution