Geoffrey J. M artin (USA)
PA R A D IG M C H A N G E : A STU D Y IN TH E H ISTO RY O F G E O G R A P H Y IN T H E U N IT E D STATES, 1892-1925
The history o f geography in the U nited States lends itself to dissection by way of the imploded K uhnian concept paradigm . The writer has else where elaborated a history o f the paradigm in U nited States geogra p h y ,1 tentatively characterized in the following m anner... prior to 1859, “teleological theodicy” ; 1859-1892, “D arw inian natural science” ; 1892—
1925, “physiography and causation” ; 1925-1957, “field and region” ; 1957- present, “eclectic pluralism ” . It is the third o f these postulated modes which is the subject o f this essay.
In 1892 the C olum bian Exposition was opened, and the first International Geographical Congress in the U nited States (funded by the N ational Geographic Society) was held on Exposition grounds the following year. The first doctorate in the history of American geography was awarded in 18932 and economic geography was established at the W harton School, University o f Pennsylvania. Geography was established at the University o f Chicago in the same year, (William Rainey H arper, first president o f th at university, had unsuccessfully, attem pted to persuade H alford J. M ackinder to jo in his ^faculty): geography was on the brink o f becoming a “profession”. Perhaps o f largest significance however, was the establishm ent o f the “Com m ittee o f T en”, presided over by H arvard President Charles E lio t.3 The report
1 A d d ress given b efo re the U niv ersity o f M in n e so ta G eo g rap h y D e p a rtm e n t, M ay 18, 1984. 2 E m o ry R . J o h n s o n . Inland W aterw ays: Their R elation to Transportation (U n iv ersity o f P en n sy lv an ia, 1893).
3 M em b ersh ip o f th e su b -co m m itte e o n g eo g rap h y in clu d ed : T h o m a s C . C h a m b e rlin (U niversity o f C hicago), G eo rg e L. C ollie (Beloit C ollege, W isconsin), W . M . D av is (H a rv ard U niversity), D elw yn A. H a m lin (R ice T ra in in g S chool, B o sto n ), M a rk W . H a rrin g to n (W eath er B u re a u , W ash in g to n . D . C .), E dw in J. H o u s to n (C en tra l H ig h School, P h ilad e lp h ia ), C h arles F. K in g (D e arb o rn S chool, B oston), F ra n c is W. P a rk e r (P rincipal, C o o k C o u n ty N a tio n a l Sch o o l, E nglew ood, Illinois), G . M. P h ilip s (Principal, S ta te N o rm a l S chool, W est C h ester, Pen n sy lv an ia). Isreal C . R ussell (U n iv ersity o f M ichigan).
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o f the meeting, published in May 1893,4 established a schedule for geography and geographer in the ten year pre-university schooling. Physiography emerged dom inant. This physiography could embrace D arw inian natural science, was the end product o f the geologic skein, and was advanced by Davis in the form o f the geographical cycle (the first U nited States geographic analogue model processional to D arw in’s work) as the foundation o f discipline. In these nascent nineties Davis tutored a num ber o f students on the H arvard Y ard who were to become moving forces in the geographic enterprise as for exam ple... Sumner W. Cushing (Salem State N orm al School), Richard E. Dodge (Teachers College, Colum bia University), H erbert E. Gregory (Yale University), M ark S. W. Jefferson (Michigan State Norm al College), Curtis F. M arbut (University o f Missouri), and R obert DeC. W ard who was retained on the H arvard faculty.
Physiography stum bled along in the grade-schools, but was already begin ning to lose favor with both students and teachers. Teachers, superintendents and book companies began to urge a m ore hum an form o f geography consequent to which further comm ittee work began to revise the posture o f the Com m ittee o f Ten. Davis had by 1902, urged “the study o f the relation o f the earth and its in hab itan ts... It is the relationship between the physical environm ent and the environed organism, between physiography and ontography (to coin a word) th at constitutes the essential principles o f geography today.” 5 In a letter to Bowman, Davis urged.6 “The chief thing I wish to emphasize is th at you should develop geography proper, physiography and ontography properly combined, and not simply physiography (as I have done too m uch).” Later J. Russell Smith observed:7 “no one had m ore to do with the un-Davising of geography than did Davis himself. He went up and down the land between 1899 and 1903 laying out the point that geography was a relationship between the earth and the organisms that lived upon it.” This other h alf o f the subject which Davis called ontography was apparently m inted by Davis in 1902, though ontogeny (the history or science o f the development o f the individual being) and ontology (the science or study o f being) preceded D avis’s ontography. Davis was legitimately concerned to exercise the geographic faculties o f the geographers gathered into the Association, o f American G eographers: in 1906 he w rote,8
as a n ex p erim en t, su p p o sed we classify by general su b jects, an d ro ta te o rd e r o f subjects y ear by year e.g., P h y s io g r a p h y ..., O n to g r a p h y ... T e c h n ic a l... E d u ca tio n a l. I w ould n ot
4 U nited S ta te s B ureau o f E ducation: R eport o f the C om m ittee on Secondary School Studies. W ash in g to n , G o v e rn m e n t P rin tin g Office, 1893.
5 W illiam M o rris D avis, “ S ystem atic G e o g ra p h y ” , Proceedings o f the A m erican Philosophical S o c ie ty , 1902, pp. 235-259.
6 W illiam M o rris D av is to Isa ia h B o w m a n , M a rch 18, 1906.
7 J. R ussell S m ith to G eoffrey J . M a rtin , Ju n e, 1962 (day n o t given). 8 W illiam M o rris D avis to A lb ert P. B righam , D ecem b er 1, 1906.
a n n o u n ce the a b o v e h e a d in g s— especially O n to g ra p h y , fo r I am n o t su re it is a ccep tab le to m em b ers in general. In o rd e r n o t to be to o p h y sio g rap h ic, su p p o se we begin w ith o n to g ra p h y th is year.
One year later he urged Brigham to 9 “address personal letters to such members as you think would represent unusual topics, and thus try to get their topics represented e.g. Historico-geography, commercial geography, anthropogeography, climatology etc.” And days later, he wrote to B righ am 10 “my own topic for a roundtable would be Terminology and definition o f geography and its subdivisions.” Some o f D avis’s students were to infuse ontography with meaning, they included more particularly R. LeM oyne Barrett, Isaiah Bowman, W alter S. Tower, Ellsworth H untington and Vilhjalmur Stefansson. Earlier students o f Davis, e.g. Jefferson, and some who had not studied with Davis e.g. Ellen Semple, J. Russell Sm ith and R ay H. W hitbeck also contributed to this “other h alf o f the subject”. The inspiration for ontography was the principle o f causation. Here was an alternative to the concept o f a Designed E arth instituted by the C reator for M an. The Darwinian principles o f evolution and selection were embraced, hierarchies o f racial competence could be explained, indeed the entire gam ut o f hum an perform ance could be com prehended by reference to environm ental authority. A nd geographers were in the business o f parsing the environm ental self and its mechanisms; mechanisms o f organism response were not studied, thus excluding biologists, zoologists et. al. though perform ance o f organisms was assessed, impressionistically, by Semple, and m easured statistically by H unting ton. It is too easy and simplistic to dismiss these undertakings collectively as determinism, for there were specialized variants thereof, as for example “climatic determ inism ” (causative) and the role o f physiographic locale (determinative). The concept served as an intellectual construct for geographers in the first quarter o f the twentieth century. The dimensions o f the fundam ent had been studied and appreciated, if not fathom ed and plumbed. But now, m an as a reservoir o f indeterm ination had been m ade p a rt o f the synthesis. The large question as to whether driving factors in the history o f life have been autogenetic, i.e., internal to the organisms, or ectogenetic, i.e., external to them, and therefore environm ental, was posed. M organ was busy trying to unravel the mysteries o f genetics with his fruit flies ensconced in their num erous glass jars in the laboratory. And he discovered m utation. But unlim ited quantities o f the past collided with an emergence o f the endlessly new. A nd geographers withdrew from com m itm ent to the necessity o f parsing the genesis o f ability, i.e., biological or environm ental. For the m ost part, the geographic academy accepted m an as an ape, with m any extra tricks to his credit to be sure. Recognized was the tru th th at life can only be understood backward, but th at it must be lived forward. The whole became
9 W illiam M o rris D av is to A lb ert P. B righam , Ja n u a ry 2, 1907. 10 W illiam M o rris D av is to A lb e rt P. B righam , J a n u a ry 15, 1907.
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difficult—perhaps too difficult. Failure to form ulate satisfactory m ethods of pursuing the nature of the determ ination of organism by environm ent, coupled with inadequate statistical means to measure the supposed extent o f such determ ination, were perhaps reason for the passing o f this genre o f thought. When Ellen Semple wrote (1911) o f m an who lived along the coast “who had vigorous development o f chest and arm to handle his paddle”, she was applauded for acuity o f vision; posthum ously this same observation won for her severe criticism. Brigham, too, was to receive criticism. Yet when Ellsworth H untington m easured the variables involved, and evolved from climatic determinism a carefully w rought physiological climatology, geographers began to shrink from his findings, namely th at cabbages grow larger under high tension wires, bank deposits and qualities of civilization were higher in the path o f the variable cyclonic westerlies, the optimum climates for physical and intellectual labor were found in the temperate latitudes, and civilization itself was higher in the middle latitudes than elsewhere. Differences in m atters as daily economic performance, num ber of non fiction books borrow ed from libraries, inventions, and death rates, all pointed to optim a in tem peratures, barom etric pressure and variability. Once climates were ranked in energizing capacity, Caucasoid peoples from the middle to northing latitudes were considered to be the m ost intelligent and productive hum ans available to society. Restriction leagues and imm igration policies were developed with this in mind. Certainly at the extremes environmental determ inist doctrine spoke sooth, “one c an ’t grow pineapples at the N orth Pole”. The environm ent does set limits. Y et overstatem ent o f determinism could lead to extreme and indefensible positions.
Meanwhile geography in Am erica was enjoying halcyon years. Epic works o f causal persuasion as Brigham ’s Geographic Influences in American History (1903), Semple’s American History and Its Geographic Conditions11 (1903) and
Influences o f Geographic Environment (1911), and H untington’s The Pulse o f Asia (1907), and Civilization and Clim ate12 (1915), bestrode the groves of
academe. M an the actor, playing out the dram a o f life on the environmental platform , was a disciplinai spectacle o f particular interest to the historian. In 1914 George B. R o o rb a c h 13 was able to conclude from a symposium
11 T h is b o o k w as p e rh a p s less feted th a n Influences o f Geographic E nvironm ent (1911). H ow ever it did sell c. 25.000 copies 1903-1913. (Ellen C . Sem ple to D r. H o w ard , Septem ber 9, 1913), a n d “ w as a d o p te d fo r the ships lib raries in the U .S. N avy. I t is n o w used as a te x tb o o k in v a rio u s A m erican U n iversities, b o th in d e p a rtm e n ts o f h isto ry an d geography, an d it has been a d o p te d by the E d u c a tio n C o m m issio n s o f a d o zen o r m o re states in the req u ired re ad in g o f the p ublic sch o o l te a ch e rs.” (Ellen C . Sem ple to J. S c o tt K eltie, O c to b er 30, 1912).
12 G eoffrey J. M a rtin , “C iv ilizatio n an d C lim a te R e v isite d ” , G eography and M a p Division, S pecial L ibraries Association Bulletin, N o . 96, (June, 1974), p p . 10-17.
13 G eo rg e B. R o o rb a c h , “T h e T re n d o f M o d e rn G e o g ra p h y ” , B ulletin o f the Am erican G eograpical S o c ie ty, V ol. 46, 1914, pp. 801-816.
(conducted by correspondence), th at “there is nearly unanim ous agreement as to what geography is” ... “geography concerns itself with the study o f the relationship between earth and life, particularly hum an life”. Roorbach noted “alm ost general agreement that the aim o f geographic work o f whatever kind is to establish the facts of, and deduce the principles underlying, this relationship between the physical earth and its inhabiting organism s.” Yet within the precincts o f the geographical com m unity some doubt concerning the legitimacy of the causal posture was beginning to emerge.
Disciplinally two other developments were arising as alternate lines of intellectual development. Physiographic provinces, as a progenitor to region, was an immediate derivative from Davisian physiography; it was exemplified in Bow m an’s Forest Physiography (1911) and Joerg’s “The Subdivision of N orth Am erica into Physiographic Regions” . 14 In 1915 the Association o f American Geographers established a Com m ittee on Physiographic Provinces whose task was the “delimitation o f physiographic provinces” (Nevin M. Fen- neman, chairm an, M arius R. Campbell, Douglas W. Johnson, Francois E. M atthes, and Eliot B lackw elder15). This thrust unfolded itself as the origin o f a num ber o f regional investigations. The other disciplinal thrust functioning as alternative to the causal notion was the emergence o f an economic geography. This derived from the work o f Emory R. Johnson at the W harton School, University o f Pennsylvania. In the years 1899-1901, he, and his assistant, J. Russell Smith, m ade a cost-benefit study o f the alternate routes for a canal across the isthmus of Central A m erica.16 A route through N icaragua was favored, but Johnson and Smith opted for a route through Panam a. The exercise brought attention to the W harton School and the succession of geographers passing through this molding departm ent, including J. Russell Smith, J. Paul Goode, and W alter S. Tower. This practical type o f study had a wide appeal, and such courses quickly found their way into college and university curricula. Initially the spread o f this work was facilitated by use o f George G. C hisholm ’s Handbook o f Commercial Geo
graphy, (1889; much reprinted and revised) and further facilitated by the
publication of Cyrus C. A dam s’s Commercial Geography (1901) and J. Russell Sm ith’s Industrial and Commercial Geography of 1913. Curiously those institu tions which had developed an offering in commercial, industrial or economic geography (as it was variously called) seemed to have been able to develop more substantial program s than those institutions advocating the Davisian model. In any case both of these intellectual postures provided alternatives to a geography of determinism (though causation could find application
14 Annals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, Vol. 4, 1914, p p . 55-84.
15 N ev in M . F e n n e m a n , “P h y sio g rap h ic D iv isio n s o f th e U n ite d S ta te s” , Annals o f the A ssociation o f Am erican Geographers, V ol. 6, 1916, pp. 19-98.
16 R eport o f the Isthm ian C anal C om m ission, 1 899-1901. (W ash in g to n : G o v e rn m e n t P rin tin g Office, 1904). See the A rchives o f th e U niversity o f P en n sy lv an ia fo r d etails co n cern in g J o h n s o n ’s w ork on the p ro p o se d canal.
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within the physiographic region or within the range of economic geography). The development o f economic geography seems to have been a logical reaction to a people becoming ever m ore urban and increasingly reliant upon public transportation and employ in m anufacturing. The wilderness- -conquest experience o f the pioneer had been reduced, and the urban- -economic experience was becoming the norm. The dirigible, car, train, central heating, and other indices o f technology were providing m an with a hitherto unknow n dom inion over his circumstances. The hum an condition seemed m uch less determ ined than had previously been thought.
W hat was indigenous was supplemented by thought imported more particularly from Germany, France, and Britain. Am erican geographers who studied in G erm any in this paradigm period included Ellen C. Semple (Friedrich Ratzel, 1892-1893, and 1895), Charles T. M cFarlane (Albrecht Penck, 1898), J. Russell Smith (Friedrich Ratzel, 1901-2), W ellington D. Jones (Alfred H ettner, 1913), Eugene Van Cleef (Joseph Partsch, 1913-1914), and S. Van Valkenburg (Albrecht Penck, 1915-1916).17 R obert DeCourcy W ard and Carl Sauer both spent some years o f their youth in Germany, W. M. Davis was visiting professor in the University of Berlin during 1908-1909. In turn M artha K rug Genthe, first doctoral student of H ettner came to teach in H artford, C onnecticut; Albrecht Penck was visiting professor at Columbia University, 1908-1909 (his son, W alther, studied geography at Yale University during those m onths) and Eugen O berhum m er and Eduard Bruckner (Uni versity o f Vienna) made visits to the U nited States; the former lectured for a semester at Colum bia University, 1914-15. From the German publica tions of this period W ard ’s translation o f Julius von H ann, Handbook o f
Climatology (1903), and Semple’s rendering o f Ratzel, Influences o f Geographic Environment (1911) are am ong the best known. And Davis led his Liverpool-
-Rom e Geographical Pilgrimage in 1911, and the AGS Trans-Continental Excursion in 1912. Here were two extended excursions, lasting a total of m ore than 17 weeks, in which geographers of many nations including the United States, Germany, France and Britain were brought together in what were virtually travelling seminars. G erm an geography exerted two influences on Unites States geographical thinking. Firstly there was a strong regional com ponent to the offering, and secondly there was a strong anti-Davisian thrust to he work. Pursuant to D avis’s lectures in Berlin both Hettner and Passarge entered into opposition to the “Davische System”, 18 additionally W alther Penck opposed Davisian thought with much intensity. This opposition
17 O th e r A m erican academ ics w ho were to c o n trib u te to g eo g rap h y , w ho studied in G e rm an y p rio r to 1892, included C leveland A bbé, Sr., R ic h a rd T. Ely, W illiam H. H o b b s, L in d ley M . K easbey, C h arles T. M c F a rlan e , C h arles A. M c M u rry , F ran c is W. P ark er, R o llin D . S alisbury, E d w a rd V an D . R o b in so n , an d E d w ard L. Stevenson.
18 The H isto ry o f the S tu d y o f Landform s or the D evelopm ent o f Geomorphology. V olum e T w o : The L ife and W ork o f W illiam M o rris Davis. By R ich a rd J. C horley, R o b e rt P. B eckinsale a n d A n to n y J. D u n n : 1973. See especially c h ap ters 22 an d 23.
culm inated in Die Morphologische Analyze, 19 written by W alther and edited by Penck pere. Correspondence reveals th at W alther was bitter concerning “allied atrocities”, a feeling doubtless exacerbated when his father, Albrecht, was confined to London for several weeks early in 1915 (entertained by an embarrassed Sir John Scott Keltie o f the Royal Geographical Society) and allowed to depart only pursuant to the Falkland Islands episode and destruction o f the Em den.20 In sum G erm an geographical thinking was not supportive o f Davis or his elaboration o f the causal posture. And the criticism was emerging at a time when Davis had departed the H arvard Y ard and in consequence was not producing further student disciples... while other individuals and institutions were accomplishing this (most notably the departm ents o f geography at the W harton School o f Finance, University o f Pennsylvania, and the University o f Chicago).
French geography, perhaps inspired by the thought of Bergson and D escartes,21 and tutored if not molded by the experienced vision o f La Blache, offered the vision o f a possibilism. Again this was a geography not supportive o f the causal mechanism notw ithstanding D avis’s visiting professorship at the Sorbonne, Paris, 1911-1912. La Blache’s work was known and appreciated in N o rth America but it was probably Brunhes’
La Geographie Humaine which attracted m ost attention at the university
level; it was on the reading lists o f num erous institutions. Bowman later wrote of the book, it “was one of my greatest discoveries and I used the book at Yale University for y e a rs... Since then it has profoundly influenced Am erican geography.”22 A t the University o f W isconsin in 1914 Ray H. W hitbeck informed Lawrence M artin he would like to translate Brunhes’ book. M artin wrote to Brunhes about the m atter, but when Brunhes agreed to a translation W hitbeck had comm itted him self to other tasks. Then M artin learned o f Bow m an’s interest in a translation. M artin wrote to Bow m an,23 and Bowman arranged m atters with Richard E. Dodge (geography editor for Rand M cNally Company), then had his friend Irville Charles LeCompte,
19 G eoffrey J. M a rtin , “ A F ra g m en t o n th e P en ck (s)-D av is C o n flict”, Special Libraries A ssociation, Geography a n d M a p D ivision Bulletin 98, p p . 11-27. In cid en tally , th is b o o k was widely read an d discussed by g ra d u a te stu d e n ts a n d facu lty in A m erican u n iv ersity d e p artm e n ts o f geology an d g eo g rap h y . C o n seq u en tly in 1936 O. D . v o n E ngeln in itiate d an in fo rm al g ro u p tran sla tio n , w hich, it was an tic ip a te d , w ould b e m im eo g rap h ed o r p e rh a p s “p u b lish ed by E d w ard s B rothers, A n n A rb o r, M ic h ig a n ” . T hose w ho p a rtic ip a te d in th is u n d e rta k in g included L au ren ce M . G o u ld , G e o rg e D . H u b b a rd , K irk B ry an , a n d J o h n L. R ich. See: O. D . von E ngeln to L au ren ce M . G o u ld , M a rc h 8, 1937, a n d G eo rg e D . H u b b a rd to C a rl O . Sauer, M ay 7, 1936.
20 J. S co tt K eltie to W illiam M o rris D avis, 15 M arch , 1915.
21 R o b e rt P. B eckinsale, “ W. M . D av is a n d A m e ric an G e o g ra p h y : 1880-1934” , p. 107, in The Origins o f A cadem ic Geography in the U nited S ta tes, ed. B rian B louet, 1981.
22 Isaiah B o w m an to M ad a m e R . D e lam arre , A u g u s t 27, 1930. 23 L aw rence M a rtin to Isaiah B ow m an, M a rch 16, 1914.
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an accomplished French litterateur and Yale colleague begin the translation. By Novem ber 3, 1914 Bowman could w rite:24
W e a re n o w in th e m id st o f th e c o rre c tio n o f th e tra n s la tio n an d will co n tin u e to w o rk o n it th ro u g h th e w inter. It is a h u g e task. W e a re alterin g the b o o k co nsiderably to m eet A m erican needs and im p ro v in g it to such an e x te n t th a t we th in k the a u th o r will p ro b ab ly w an t to m ak e a tra n s la tio n o f o u r tra n s la tio n . W e ex p ect to have it finished by the end o f th e college year.
The work was interrupted by the reduction o f the Yale Geography D epartm ent, Bow m an’s assum ption o f the D irectorate o f the Am erican Geo graphical Society (July 1, 1915), activities associated with the war, and the fact th at LeCom pte left Yale for a professorship o f Rom ance languages at the University o f M innesota (1917). Additionally, Richard Dodge, whose geography program at Teachers College, Colum bia University, was faltering, was shortly to retire from the post into farm ing in W ashington, Con necticut: he was very slow to expedite passage o f the translation which became a m atter o f very considerable vexation to Bowman. When chided Dodge could only claim eye strain and urged Bowman, “D o n ’t grow old. It is a nuisance.” 25 The published translation o f Brunhes’ appeared in 1920. W hen La Geographie de L ’Histoire by Brunhes and Camille Vallaux came to Dodge, he w rote:26
W h a t a stim u la tin g an d orig in al m an he [Brunhes] is. W hile th e rest o f us are m ostly m illin g ro u n d in the sam e old c o rra l he goes o u t a n d reo rg an ize s th e w hole science in an e p o ch m ak in g w a y ... B ru n h es is th e m aste r in th e field an d all m u st follow . T h e new b o o k is as m aste rfu l as the Hum an G eography an d sh o u ld have wide usage.
These two books m uch respected in U nited States academic circles, were followed in 1922 by Lucien Febvre’s La Terre et VEvolution Humaine (translated as A Geographical Introduction to History, 1925) and P. Vidal de la Blache’s Principes de Geographie Humaine (translated as Principles o f
Human Geography, 1926). Both o f these books could be found on graduate
student reading lists in the United States into the 1960’s.
From Britain came, more notably, region and regionalism in the work of H erbertson and M ackinder. Determinism had no t been repudiated, but it was not the geography which came to represent Britain in America. It is a curiosity to recognize that Cam bridge University considered Huntington for the chair in geography, 1907;27 and o f Oxford University, Semple could w rite:28
I lectu red o n th e p rin cip les o f a n th ro p o -g e o g rap h y a t O x fo rd U niv ersity th ro u g h o u t the su m m er term in A u g u st o f last sum m er, a n d h eld a bi-w eekly sem inar. M y au d ien ce was co m p o sed o f tw o h u n d re d stu d en ts, m an y o f th em g ra d u ates. T h ere was never an em pty seat
- 4 Isa iah B ow m an to C . F. N ew k irk , N o v em b er 3, 1914.
25 R ich a rd E. D o d g e to Isa ia h B ow m an, M a rch 1915 (day n o t given). 26 R ich a rd E. D o d g e to Isa iah B ow m an, O cto b er 6, 1921.
27 S co tt K eltie to W illiam M o rris D avis, D ecem b er 20, 1907.
28 E llen C. S em ple to D r. H o w ard , S ep tem b er 9, 1913. (This p erso n m ig h t well have been A. D . H o w ard , S u n d a y E d ito r, N ew Y o rk T rib u n e.)
in the hall, an d freq u en tly n o sta n d in g ro o m , a n d w hen 1 left the stu d e n ts gave m e an o v atio n . H ow ever, the lecture fo rm o f th e average E nglish U n iv ersity p ro fesso r is so p o o r th a t the A m erican finds it easy to m ak e an im p ressio n by m ere c o n tra st.
Yet determinism was left in the U nited States without international support; even there it was subjected to criticism. Perhaps the leading skeptic o f this posture was M ark Jefferson. Two examples o f his opposition (revealed most frequently in correspondence) m ust here suffice. D uring the 1912 AGS Trans-Continental Excursion, he wrote to his w ife:29
R u sk in in M odern P ainters has tw o c h a p te rs o n “ M o u n ta in S p le n d o r” a n d “T he M o u n ta in G lo o m ” a n d I m ad e reference to the them e he th en develops th a t m an m ay lead a life o f m ean a n d so rd id ra n g e o f th o u g h t an d feeling in th e p resence o f th e scenery th at w ould o rd in arily b e called m o st in spiring. T h e tra d itio n a l view is, o f co u rse, the o p p o site one, b eau ty o f en v iro n m en t is su p p o sed to h av e inspired G re e k a p p rec ia tio n o f scenery in general, desp ite th e fact th a t five cen tu rie s o f th e sam e e n v iro n m en t h av e n o t seem ed to m ak e any im p ressio n on th e T urks.
F inally a fte r m u ch useless d iscussion I b e th o u g h t m e to ask th em the n a m e o f som e S panish “ m a s te r” (offhand o f course), th e n a D u tc h , a F ren ch , a n Italian an d th en , w ickedly, a Swiss “ m as te r,” w ho sh o u ld have been inspired by the m o st b eau tifu l scenery in E u ro p e! T h en I h ad the p ru d e n c e to c h an g e th e s u b je c t... T he g eo g rap h ic p o in t o f view still h as m uch way to m ake.
On the occasion o f his presidential address— “Some Considerations on the Geographical Provinces o f the U nited States” —presented to the Association of American Geographers, he w ro te:30
A n th ro p o g e o g ra p h y . . . It a tte m p ts to explain the c h a ra c te r an d h a b its o f a peo p le by th eir en v iro n m en t. T his field has special p erils. A g reat p a rt o f w h at h as been w ritten is vague an d fanciful ra th e r th a n c a u tio u s a n d w ell-based. If n o o th e r e x p lan atio n o f q u alities is available one m ay alw ays refer, to the “c lim ate ” .
Brigham had urged more care and precision in identifying and m easuring influence in his A A G presidential address,31 and in his correspondence. Bowman, who at one time had shared room s and classes with H untington at Yale had increasingly distanced him self from the point o f view in the second decade o f this century, largely by em bracing the regional viewpoint. By 1919 Bowman had repudiated the looser forms o f determinism then ram pant in American geography. Perhaps that was in part due to his affiliation with the Inquiry and Am erican Commission to Negotiate Peace at Paris. Here were Titans changing the shapes and extent o f nations. The power and influence of governments was so immediate, so direct, and so close to Bowman that the physical environm ent came to seem much m ore remote to him in the
29 M a rk S. W. Jefferson to T h e o d o ra Jefferson, S ep tem b e r 5, 1912, (also: G . J. M a rtin , M a rk Jefferson: Geographer, 1968, p. 140).
30 Annals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican G eographers, Vol. 7, 1917, pp. 3-15. 31 “P ro b lem s o f G eo g rap h ic In flu en ce” , A n nals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, Vol. 5, 1915, pp. 3-2 5 . A lso p u b lish e d (with m o d ificatio n s) in Science, F e b ru a ry 19, 1915, pp. 261-280.
270 G eoffrey J . M a rtin
room s o f the Quai D ’Orsai than it had astride a mule in the Atacama. From Paris he wrote o f Ellen Semple’s w ork:32
I th o u g h t very well o f it at one tim e b u t as a m a tte r o f fa ct a n d sp eak in g qu ite fran k ly , the Sem ple b u b b le — if I m ay so p u t i t — is fo rev er p u n c tu re d so fa r as I am co n cern ed . T h is is q u ite co n fid en tial. I d o n o t believe in th a t ty p e o f geography. It is vague, generalized, a n d m ostly w ro n g ... m y a p p re c ia tio n o f H e rb e rts o n ’s w ork is in creasin g with every c o n ta c t th a t I have w ith his ideas, an d in ju s t th a t p r o p o rtio n m y a p p re c ia tio n o f M iss S em p le’s w ork is d im in is h in g ...
A nd he wrote to his friend James Truslow A dam s:33
In 1905 I b e g an to teach g e o g rap h y at Y ale a n d th ere w as a lo t o f d eterm in ism in it. I g ot steadily aw ay fro m it. T h e clo ser to th e facts I g o t th e less im p o rta n ce I a tta c h e d to geo g rap h ical e n v iro n m en t. T h e o th e r side o f the p ictu re is th a t th ere a re m an y a u th e n tic cases o f g eographical c o n tr o l ... B ut th a t Society as a w hole is guided p re d o m in an tly by any one o f these th in g s is to m e sheer ru b b ish . T o m e th e evidence is overw helm ing.
By the late teens there had developed a more sophisticated appreciation o f the causative thesis. “Determ inism ” had given way to m ore conciliatory term s which included “control” , “influence”, “adjustm ent”, and “geographic factor”. The philosophical posture was to reason from the environm ent to the environed organism : recognized was the deficient absence o f a measured reciprocity effective by the organism. And the thesis o f determinism forbade b oth recognition of com petition between organisms and the selective process. The deficiency had already been recognized elsewhere: H enry C. Cowles at the University o f Chicago had developed plant ecology, from which it seems J. Paul Goode developed the notion o f hum an ecology (1907),34 which H arlan H. Barrows elaborated in “Geography as H um an Ecology” (1922).35 It is notew orthy that Barrows had revised the title of his noted course from “Influence o f Geography on Am erican H istory” (1904) to “Historical G eography o f the U nited States” (1923).36 The Ecological Society o f America was founded in 1916 and included geographers on its roster. The anthropo logists, including more notably perhaps Lowie and Wissler, began to question the intellectual bases o f the deterministic posture.37 M eanwhile the conservation movement considered reciprocity o f environm ent and environed in its posture. The work o f George Perkins M arsh was known but not widely read at this tim e: Gifford Pinchot, Charles E. Van Hise (President o f the University o f Wisconsin) and Theodore Roosevelt, each with a keen geographic interest,
32 Isaiah B ow m an to G ladys W rigley, M a rc h 15, 1919. 33 Isaiah B o w m an to Ja m e s T ru slo w A d am s, A u g u st 2, 1924.
34 “A C ollege C o u rse in O n to g ra p h y ” , Annals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, V ol 1, 1911, p. 111.
35 T h e ad d ress w as given, A n n A rb o r, M ich ig an , 1922. It w as p u b lish ed in the Annals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, Vol. 13, 1923, p p . 1-14.
36 W illiam A. K o e lsch , L ectu res on the H isto rica l Geography o f the U nited S ta te s, 1933: H arlan H . Barrows, 1962. A lso, “ H a rla n H . B arrow s, 1877-1960”, by C h a rle s C. C olby an d G ilb ert F. W hite, A nnals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, Vol. 51, 1961, pp. 395-400
37 W illiam W. S p eth , H istoricist Anthropogeography : E nvironm ent and C ulture in Am erican A nthropological Thought from 1890 to 1950. Ph. D . d isse rtatio n , U n iv ersity o f O reg o n , 1972.
had emerged to cham pion the cause o f conservation (Roosevelt had been adm itted to m embership o f the Association o f Am erican Geographers in 1915).38 These stirrings were recognitions th at environm entalism was in need o f revision... that reciprocity twixt environm ent and organism was an indispensable attribute o f meaningful thought. Also recognized was the fact that one cannot build discipline on the study of relationships.
The W ar gave a stimulus to economic geography and mineralogy, led to the employ o f geographers in m any agencies and bureaus o f government, made demands on cartographers and encouraged regional investigation. This war-related activity by geographers reached its acme in the work o f the Inquiry and Am erican Commission to N egotiate Peace in Paris, 1918-1919. The experience helped skew the direction o f U nited States geography, helped perhaps develop closer relationships between some U nited States geographers and British and French geographers; relationships with G erm an geographers were impaired.
Yet new ideas were emerging. W ard dem onstrated the m eaning o f applied geography in a series o f rem arkably detailed articles concerning weather and the w ar.39 W hitbeck wrote of m ental m ap s.40 G oode wrestled with the problem o f m ap projections. Political geography came o f age with Bow m an’s
The New World which experienced four revisions,41 (and was adopted in
geography, history and political science courses) and W oodrow Wilson, who had learned to respect this variety o f geography a t the Paris Peace Conference, took mem bership in the American Geographical Society in 1921. W hat was later to be called m ilitary geography was given impetus by D. W. Joh n son’s Battlefields o f the World War, Western and Southern Fronts:
A Study in M ilitary Geography, (1921). Studies in population and urban
geography were becoming m ore frequent and m ore seriously considered. Oliver E. Baker was developing ideas concerning agricultural economics, and Curtis F. M arbut informally translated K onstantin D. G linka on soil science from the G erm an in 1914 (the translation was later published).42
38 M in u tes o f th e A sso ciatio n o f A m erican G e o g rap h e rs. D e p o sited w ith the A m erican P h ilo so p h ical Society, Box I. F o r a list o f A sso ciatio n h o ld in g s see: “A rchives o f the A sso ciatio n o f A m erican G e o g ra p h e rs” , H isto ry o f G eography N ew sletter, N o. 2, D ecem b er 1982, pp. 24-31.
39 T h e W e a th e r F a c to r in th e G re a t W ar. A series o f articles p u b lish ed in th e Journal o f G eography fro m F e b ru a ry 1915 to A pril 1918.
40 R a y H u g h e s W hitbeck, “ T h e C o u n tr y ’s C all fo r G e o g ra p h e rs T o -d ay a n d T o -m o rro w ”, School and S o ciety, V ol. IX , F e b ru a ry 22, 1919.
41 The N ew W orld: P roblem s in P o litica l Geography. F irst p u b lish ed in 1921, a su p p le m e n t w as ad d ed in 1923; revised in 1924, 1926 an d 1928. T h e b o o k w as also p u b lish ed in C hinese, F ren ch a n d B raille editions.
42 M a rb u t tran s la ted D ie Typen der B odenbildung by K . D . G lin k a (1914), in th a t sam e year. T h is unofficial tra n s la tio n w as p u b lish ed as T he G reat S o il Groups o f the W orld and Their D evelopm ent, by E d w a rd s B ro th ers, A n n A rb o r, M ich ig an , 1927. See L ife a n d W ork o f C. F. M arbut, a m em o rial volum e p u b lish e d by Soil Science Society o f A m e ric a (successor to A m erican Soil Survey A sso ciatio n ).
272 G eoffrey J. M a rtin
It was in this context o f intellectual growth that Rollin D. Salisbury’s noted seminar at the University of Chicago was to play a significant role. Wellington D. Jones, with the approval o f Salisbury, had worked with Bailey Willis in a field survey o f N orthern Patagonia, then studied with H ettner at Heidelberg (1913). U pon his return he presented a paper in the Salisbury seminar which appealed to Sauer. Sauer had commenced doctoral study at the University o f Chicago in 1909 after transferring from geologic study at Northw estern University (which he felt emphasized petrography too much for his taste). He had an apparent preference for study at the University of Heidelberg with Alfred H ettner but circumstances had forbidden.43 (To Whittlesey he later w ro te:44 “I began to browse on my own in libraries and discovered that there was another geography—in G erm an litera tu re ... My aberration destroyed a p art o f Salisbury’s confidence in me and saved me from being appointed to the staff at Chicago, I believe, for he had told me to look forw ard to such an event.”) Sauer developed a propinquity with W. D. Jones (they corresponded intermittently until Jones died in 1957). In 1915 Jones and Sauer published “Outline for Field W ork in G eography” 45 which was an outgrow th o f seminar discussion. 46 This article inaugurated a geography notably devoid of the search for influence and offered an intellectual posture removed from the dom inant mode. There followed by Sauer, “Proposal o f an Agricultural Survey on a Geographic Basis” 47 (1917), “A Soil Classification for M ichigan” 48 (1918), “M apping the Utilization of the L and” 49 (1919) and “Geography as Regional Economics” a paper delivered at the Chicago meeting of the Association o f American Geographers in December 1920.50 In reply to a letter written to him about this paper by J. Russell Smith, Sauer replied:51
M y m ain a rg u m e n t w as th a t G eo g rap h y is suffering fro m a c o n fu sio n o f p u rp o se s an d I m ad e the p lea fo r a c o n c e n tra tio n o f effort on so m eth in g th a t lies c en tral to the subject, has m ajo r significance, a n d m ay supply a definite focus. I also o bjected to th e special p lead in g th a t is b o u n d to co m e o u t o f an in te rp re ta tio n o f g eo g rap h y as the stu d y o f g eo g rap h ic influence. I p ro p o se d the stu d y o f areas in term s o f th eir econom ic p erfo rm an ce, w ith due em p h asis on th eir o p p o rtu n itie s , h a n d ic ap s, an d stage o f developm ent, b u t w ith o u t
43 G o ttfrie d Pfeifer to M rs. W. H ess, J a n u a ry 9, 1956. 44 C a rl O. S auer to D e rw e n t S. W hittlesey, M a rch 23, 1929.
45 Bulletin o f the A m erican G eographical S o ciety, Vol. 47, (1915), p p . 520-526.
46 W ellin g to n D. Jo n es to C arl O. S auer, D ecem b er 22, 1939. T his letter confirm s p re se n ta tio n to the se m in a r; it also confirm s th e fact th a t th ere w as n o t a senior a u th o r ... th e nam es Jo n e s an d S au er w ere a rra n g e d alp h ab etically .
47 M ich ig an A cadem y o f Science, 19th A n n u a l R e p o rt, 1917, p p . 79-86. 48 M ich ig a n A cadem y o f Science, 20th A n n u a l R e p o rt, 1918, p p . 83-91. 49 Geographical Review , V ol. 8, 1919, pp. 47-54.
50 A b s tra c t p u b lish ed in A nnals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, Vol. 10, 1920, pp. 130-131.
any p a rtiality to th e c o n sid era tio n o f physical fa c to rs. W e c an evelop discipline fo r this type o f w o rk th a t will rid us o f th e o d iu m o f try in g to m ak e o u t a case for o n e set o f influences.
Sauer later explained to William W. S p e th :52
M y d issa tisfac tio n w ith the e n v iro n m en ta list te n e t c am e m ainly fro m listen in g to M iss Sem ple a n d J. P a u l G o o d e , b o th d elightful p erso n s, a n d h e a rin g B arro w s d istin g u ish betw een g eographic a n d n o n -g e o g ra p h ic fa cto rs. T h a t w asn ’t w h a t I h a d co m e f o r to g eo g rap h y . In th e years I w o rk ed in T h e L o o p I re a d G e rm a n g e o g rap h e rs evenings w ho w ere d o in g w h at I w an ted an d w hen I cam e to B erkeley I p u t it to g eth e r as th e M o rp h o lo g y o f L an d scap e.
Yet it is possible that Sauer took m ore from Chicago thinking than he realized. From Salisbury he had learned to appreciate the role o f time as an indispensable attribute o f physiographic reality. This was contraposed to the theoretical properties o f the Davisian m odel of the cycle from which Sauer was to distance himself. From Barrows he took an existing, perhaps nativistic, respect for ecology. Sauer’s program m atic writings, accum ulating as an alternate viewpoint to the causal notion, continued with “The Problem o f Land Classification” 58 (1921) and “The Survey M ethod in G eography and its Objectives” 54 (1924) as prelude to “The M orphology o f Landscape” 55 (1925). The latter (written at Berkeley) added the dimension, time, to geography and transform ed a pragm atic regional economics into an historicism o f landscape m orphology.56 Later he was to reject such writing as “a habit- -forming drug”, 57 feeling perhaps that any restrictive definition hampered original work. John B. Leighly has w ritten58 “Sauer soon saw his m ethodo logical writing from the twenties as negligible and embarrassing, and eventually publically disavowed them .” Yet the publication had an impact later characterized by Preston E. Jam es:59
S a u e r’s p u rp o se w as to m ak e a clean b re ak w ith th e tra d itio n a l g eo g rap h y in h erited fro m the p e rio d b e fo re W o rld W ar I . . . S a u e r’s p a p e r w as like th e c le a r n o te s o f a bugle call to th e y o u n g e r m em b ers o f th e p ro fe s s io n ... by 1925 th ere w as en o u g h skepticism c o n ce rn in g the c o n te n t o r m eth o d they h a d been ta u g h t to m ak e the y o u n g er g en eratio n read y to accept a ch an g e o f p a rad ig m .
In this period, 1892-1925, geography in the United States, as institution and learning, underw ent rem arkable change. It was, after all, as Sauer has
52 C a rl O. S au er to W illiam W . S peth, M a rch 3, 1972.
53 A nnals o f th e A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, V ol. 11, 1921, pp. 3—16.
54 A nnals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican G eographers, V ol. 14, 1924, p p . 17-33. 55 P ublications in G eography, B erkeley, U n iv ersity o f C alifo rn ia, V ol. 2, p p . 19-53. 56 “ T he F o u rth D im en sio n o f G e o g rap h y ” , p. 191, A nnals o f the A ssociation o f A m erican Geographers, Vol. 64, 1974, pp. 189-195.
57 C a rl O. S auer to Jo sep h E. Spencer, D ecem b er 8, 1934. 58 Jo h n B. L eighly to R ic h a rd H a rtsh o rn e , N o v e m b er 6, 1975.
59 P re sto n E. Jam es, A ll Possible W orlds: A H isto ry o f Geographical Ideas, 1972, p . 401.
274 G eoffrey J . M a rtin
written, “a springtime, the only good one we’ve had in this country.” 60 There were rare stimuli operating at this tim e : imperialism manifested itself globally, exploration o f the polar world excited the public imagination, wars both stim ulated and required geographial researches, and geographical societies were being form ed in the larger cities. Initially geography was natural science, a physiography deriving from the last epoch of geologic history. It underw ent transform ation as thougth shifted from the fundam ent to the play of the fundam ent upon the organism, then to the play o f a spatial behavior o f the collective organism through time, the subject becoming m oored largely in the social sciences.
Gradually, geography found a place for itself in the school system and in the colleges and universities: departm ents were initiated at Berkeley, California and Teachers College, Colum bia University, in 1898. The concepts o f discipline and profession began to emerge. Both came at a time when Davis was in his mid-forties, newly established, and awake to opportunity. He was both authoritarian and authoritative, had a rem arkable vision o f the field, was widely respected as a scientist, and was affiliated with one o f the prem ier universities in the country. H e helped organize the profession by founding groups (most notably the Association o f Am erican Geographers, 1904), supporting journals, organizing field trips, and writing droves o f letters to encourage and direct the labor o f m any individuals. His own graduate student following, m any o f whom rem ained professionally active, was large indeed. H e was in the rem arkable position o f being able to supervise the evolution o f his own geographic scheme. M uch o f the geographical activity o f the country was then in the East. W ith the retirem ent o f Davis from H arvard and academic life in 1912 his professional and managerial (though not intellectual) influence began to pass. D epartm ental geography was effective ly term inated at Yale University in 1915 and Richard Dodge retired both himself and his program a t Teachers College, Colum bia University, in 1916. These were serious losses to Davis who had been able to arrange and foster program s, lecture series, visiting professorships, and to win the attention of University presidents elsewhere by cooperation within the three institutions. Davis, too, was perplexed and perhaps disappointed concerning new develop m ents in geography. He wrote o f consolation in being absent from a meeting o f the Association o f American G eographers (1922) because he noted “how largely the program was directed to economics; geographical economics if you lik e ;... the papers seemed to m e ... like that one o f [W. D.] Jones a year a g o ... which he s a id ... would have been given unchanged if he had been addressing an audience o f economists.” 61 He recom mended “an inquiry as to w hat values should be included and how far they shd be p u rsu e d ...
60 C a rl O. S a u er to L e o n a rd S. W ilson, A p ril 6, 1948. 61 W illiam M o rris D a v is to Is a ta h B ow m an, M ay 2, 1922.
I have long wished the Association at least m ight devote m ore time to considering what they are trying to d o ... the members each seem to be occupied in their own specific s tu d ie s...” 62 \V ntten in 1922, this letter is one o f several by Davis extant, revealing the two geographies which had begun to co-exist.
All o f this came at a time when geography was flourishing at the Universities o f Chicago, Michigan, N ebraska, and Wisconsin, and a num ber o f other institutions in the Mid-West. The population was moving west. A younger generation o f professional geographers had here emerged from university departm ents with a different geographical viewpoint. They came together in field conferences and began to assume m embership and positions o f authority in the Association o f American G eographers.63 In 1922 Richard E. Dodge was replaced as secretary of the Association by Charles C. Colby, an act which initiated the “M id-W est take-over” (as the phenom enon has been termed). A new viewpoint, initially advocated by Jones and Sauer, then adum brated by Sauer, inspired a new geography by this younger group who rested the locus of their field from the older established Davis-inspired geographers. This new group devoid o f the presence o f Sauer after 1923 (the year in which he departed the University o f M ichigan, and assumed his post at Berkeley, California) searched for a new form ulation o f the field, and developed its own program o f action. In this undertaking Sauer’s p u blications and correspondence were to play a significant role. New geography program s emerged and departm ental binominalism (geology and geography) was in retreat. Institutions o f the M id-W est seemed m ore ready to accept the newly emerging field, geography, than the older established institutions o f the East which had been able to accept it viewed as an extension o f geology. Additionally there were a num ber o f presidents o f M id-W estern institutions o f higher education who were keenly interested in the geographic undertaking. Yet a leader o f D avis’s drive, organizational ability, and determ ination did not emerge am ong this group. Perhaps creative, intellectual energies were given freer reign, but a new intellectual synthesis did not readily emerge to replace the causal model.
Edward L. U llm an wrote of the post 1925 period, “worse than determinism is nihilism and th a t’s what resulted.” 64 Sauer referred to it as a period o f “great retreat”. “Since the old days o f physiography, I think that the geographers have lacked foci o f observation.” 65 The Wisconsin geographers felt it necessary to render a definition o f the field in the form of a “working
62 Ibidem . D avis freq u en tly used a sim plified spelling: hence shd (should).
63 P resto n E. Ja m es an d C o tto n M a th er, “T h e R o le o f P erio d ic F ield C o n feren ces in the D ev elo p m en t o f G e o g rap h ic al Id eas in th e U n ite d S ta te s”, The Geographical R eview , V ol. 67, N o. 4, O c to b e r 1977, pp. 446^161.
64 E d w ard L. U llm a n to J o h n K . W right, M a rch 29, 1961. 65 C a rl O. S au er to P re sto n E. Jam es, M a rch 16, 1940.
276 G eoffrey J. M a rtin
creed” .66 Almon E. Parkins sought definition via his questionnaire67 and Bowman felt obliged to write Geography in Relation to the Social Sciences. From this complexity o f intellection came growth. The price was the perturbation o f the norm al m ode o f inquiry and the establishment o f another “new geography” .
66 U niv ersity o f W isconsin M e m o ran d u m , u n d a te d , b u t p ro b a b ly w inter, 1930-1931. 67 “ T he G e o g rap h y o f A m erican G e o g ra p h e rs ”, Journal o f Geography, 33, (1934), p p . 221-230.
