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Chapter 10 Visualizing the Enlarged Homestead Act: Mapping Power and Place in Early Twentieth-Century US Land Policy

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Mapping Nature across the Americas
This chapter is in the book Mapping Nature across the Americas
223chapter tenvisualizing the enlarged homestead actmaPPing Power and Place in early TwenTieTh- cenTury uS land PolicySara M. GreggThe transformative years of the Progressive Era brought seismic shifts in US resource management policies, as the Department of the Interior sought to internalize the economic and political costs of existing land poli-cies. Political leaders and government scientists acknowledged that change was afoot across the country, and the US Geological Survey’s chief reported in 1913: “With advancing years a wise nation, like a prudent man, learns to husband its resources. Land values are now recognized, the purpose in both legislation and administration has changed, and highest development alone is sought.”1 As nation-states throughout the Americas aspired to mas-tery over land and raw materials, politicians from across the political spec-trum reconsidered the responsibilities of government for managing natu-ral resources. This project led scientists and surveyors to gather data about the natural advantages and disadvantages of formerly uncharted areas of the continent.2In 1909 the US Congress institutionalized land classification with the Enlarged Homestead Act, which embedded in its reform of federal land policy the mandate that the secretary of the interior locate environmen-tal information within the West. This reconceptualization of the Ameri-
© 2021 University of Chicago Press

223chapter tenvisualizing the enlarged homestead actmaPPing Power and Place in early TwenTieTh- cenTury uS land PolicySara M. GreggThe transformative years of the Progressive Era brought seismic shifts in US resource management policies, as the Department of the Interior sought to internalize the economic and political costs of existing land poli-cies. Political leaders and government scientists acknowledged that change was afoot across the country, and the US Geological Survey’s chief reported in 1913: “With advancing years a wise nation, like a prudent man, learns to husband its resources. Land values are now recognized, the purpose in both legislation and administration has changed, and highest development alone is sought.”1 As nation-states throughout the Americas aspired to mas-tery over land and raw materials, politicians from across the political spec-trum reconsidered the responsibilities of government for managing natu-ral resources. This project led scientists and surveyors to gather data about the natural advantages and disadvantages of formerly uncharted areas of the continent.2In 1909 the US Congress institutionalized land classification with the Enlarged Homestead Act, which embedded in its reform of federal land policy the mandate that the secretary of the interior locate environmen-tal information within the West. This reconceptualization of the Ameri-
© 2021 University of Chicago Press

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents v
  3. List of Illustrations vii
  4. Introduction 1
  5. Part One: people’s nature
  6. Chapter 1 Staking Claims on Native Lands: The Symbolic Power of Indigenous Cartographic Conventions in the Ayer Map of Teotihuacan Mexico (1560) and Its Copies 19
  7. Chapter 2 Into the Interior: Reading the Native Landscape of the Great Lakes in European Maps, 1612–1755 41
  8. Chapter 3 Currents of Influence: Indigenous River Names in the American South 65
  9. Chapter 4 Oysters and Emancipation: The Antebellum Shellfish Industry as a Pathway to Freedom 88
  10. Part Two: Reinventors’ nature
  11. Chapter 5 Transcending the Alps in the Andes: Charles Marie de La Condamine, Pierre Bouguer, and the Graphic Invention of the Mountain Range 115
  12. Chapter 6 On the Trail with Humboldt: Mapping the Orinoco as Transnational Space 135
  13. Chapter 7 Palms and Other Trees on Maps: Exoticism, Error, and Environment, from Old World to New 157
  14. Chapter 8 Beyond the Map: Landscape, History, and the Routes of Cortés 180
  15. Part three: the state’s nature
  16. Chapter 9 Nature Knows No Bounds: Mapping Challenges at the US-Mexico Border 209
  17. Chapter 10 Visualizing the Enlarged Homestead Act: Mapping Power and Place in Early Twentieth-Century US Land Policy 223
  18. Chapter 11 Mapping Canadian Nature and the Nature of Canadian Mapping 239
  19. Chapter 12 Seeing Forests as Systems: Maps of North American Forest Conditions and the Emergence of Visual-Ecological Thinking 270
  20. Epilogue The View from across the Pond 291
  21. Acknowledgments 299
  22. Appendix Critical Map Reading for the Environment 303
  23. List of Contributors 307
  24. Notes 313
  25. Index 373
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https://doi.org/10.7208/chicago/9780226696577-012

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Contents v
  3. List of Illustrations vii
  4. Introduction 1
  5. Part One: people’s nature
  6. Chapter 1 Staking Claims on Native Lands: The Symbolic Power of Indigenous Cartographic Conventions in the Ayer Map of Teotihuacan Mexico (1560) and Its Copies 19
  7. Chapter 2 Into the Interior: Reading the Native Landscape of the Great Lakes in European Maps, 1612–1755 41
  8. Chapter 3 Currents of Influence: Indigenous River Names in the American South 65
  9. Chapter 4 Oysters and Emancipation: The Antebellum Shellfish Industry as a Pathway to Freedom 88
  10. Part Two: Reinventors’ nature
  11. Chapter 5 Transcending the Alps in the Andes: Charles Marie de La Condamine, Pierre Bouguer, and the Graphic Invention of the Mountain Range 115
  12. Chapter 6 On the Trail with Humboldt: Mapping the Orinoco as Transnational Space 135
  13. Chapter 7 Palms and Other Trees on Maps: Exoticism, Error, and Environment, from Old World to New 157
  14. Chapter 8 Beyond the Map: Landscape, History, and the Routes of Cortés 180
  15. Part three: the state’s nature
  16. Chapter 9 Nature Knows No Bounds: Mapping Challenges at the US-Mexico Border 209
  17. Chapter 10 Visualizing the Enlarged Homestead Act: Mapping Power and Place in Early Twentieth-Century US Land Policy 223
  18. Chapter 11 Mapping Canadian Nature and the Nature of Canadian Mapping 239
  19. Chapter 12 Seeing Forests as Systems: Maps of North American Forest Conditions and the Emergence of Visual-Ecological Thinking 270
  20. Epilogue The View from across the Pond 291
  21. Acknowledgments 299
  22. Appendix Critical Map Reading for the Environment 303
  23. List of Contributors 307
  24. Notes 313
  25. Index 373
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