Sign-In
Cart
Magnificent Failure: A Portrait of the Western Homestead Era
Paperback
Technology & Engineering19th Century United States HistoryAgriculture
Currently unavailable to order
Please enter your email and a message will be sent to you when this product becomes available on our website.
ISBN13: 9780804738873
Publisher: Stanford Univ Pr
Published: Feb 20 2002
Pages: 200
Weight: 1.52
Height: 0.53 Width: 10.58 Depth: 8.60
Language: English
In words that are as clean and precise as his haunting, starkly beautiful photographs, the author vividly recreates the life and times of the Western Homestead Era, that period beginning around 1885 when the prairie lands lying westward from the longitude of the western Dakotas became available to pioneering farmers. Some 70 black-and-white duotone photographs, with detailed captions, record the bleak landscapes and the abandoned farms, outbuildings, farm implements, and hand tools that are mute testimonies to the failed hopes of several million families who settled on these arid and semi-arid lands.
The author explains how their failure resulted from a deadly combination of natural and economic causes. Neither the federal government nor the homesteaders themselves were aware that some of the western homestead land was so dry that artificial irrigation often was required. But irrigation was unavailable to most of these farms, and many thousands of them failed within a few years. On most of the homestead lands, however, dry farming--by which crops are watered by falling rain and snow--permitted the newcomers to plant and reap a variety of crops. For several decades, these regions produced flourishing farms, towns, railroad lines, and dirt and gravel roads.
Meanwhile, and again unanticipated by both government and the prospering farmers, the climate of these productive regions was becoming increasingly dry. This was the natural phenomenon that culminated in the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, which was coincidentally accompanied by the Great Depression. Crops went begging for lack of water, banks closed, railroads were abandoned, and the formerly prosperous homesteaders went broke by the several millions.
Historians of the Western United States have largely ignored the homesteaders. There is little romance in farming, especially when compared with that attached to cowboys, Indians, explorers, and fur traders. Still, the homesteaders were heroes in their own right. Theirs was the last great endeavor in the opening of the West, and this book, with its moving text, historical introduction, and stunning photographs, tells their story.
1 different editions
Also available
Magnificent Failure: A Portrait of the Western Homestead Era
Karsmizki, Kenneth W.
Campbell, John Martin
Paperback
Also in
19th Century United States History
A Manufactured Wilderness: Summer Camps and the Shaping of American Youth, 1890-1960
Van Slyck, Abigail A.
Hardcover
Secret History of the Wild, Wild West: Outlaws, Secret Societies, and the Hidden Agenda of the Elites
Duke, Daniel J.
Paperback
The Wreck of the Mentor: A True Story of Death, Despair, and Deliverance in the Age of Sail
Dolin, Eric Jay
Hardcover
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America
Larson, Erik
Paperback
The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War
Larson, Erik
Paperback
They Stole a City: Wilmington's White Supremacist Coup and the Families Who Live with Its Legacy
Collins, Lauren
Hardcover
The Rush: California Gold, the Civil War, and the Making of the Modern World
Philbrick, Nathaniel
Hardcover
Empire of the Summer Moon: Quanah Parker and the Rise and Fall of the Comanches, the Most Powerful Indian Tribe in American History
Gwynne, S. C.
Paperback
A Perfect Coincidence: The Extraordinary Friendship and Astonishing Deaths of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson
Rasenberger, Jim
Hardcover
Glorious Country: How the Artist Frederic Church Brought the World to America and America to the World
Johnson, Victoria
Hardcover
Empire of Ink: The Printers, Rogues, and Radicals Who Invented the American Newspaper
Wright, Alex
Hardcover
Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West
Ambrose, Stephen E.
Paperback
The Demon of Unrest: A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War
Larson, Erik
Hardcover
Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President
Millard, Candice
Paperback
Brothers of the Gun: Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and a Reckoning in Tombstone
Gardner, Mark Lee
Hardcover
Chasing Lewis's Monkeyflower: The Amazing Afterlife of the Lewis and Clark Expedition's Wild Plants
Adelman, Elizabeth
Hardcover
Centennial: The Great Fair of 1876 and the Invention of America's Future
Bordewich, Fergus M.
Hardcover
The Flag Was Still There: A History of the American Experiment in Five Anniversaries
Bennett, M. Todd
McKean, David
Hardcover
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex (National Book Award Winner)
Philbrick, Nathaniel
Paperback
The Undiscovered Country: Triumph, Tragedy, and the Shaping of the American West
Hutton, Paul Andrew
Hardcover
Jefferson's Wolf: A Founding Father's Troubling Answer to the Problem of Slavery
Dierksheide, Christa
Guyatt, Nicholas
Hardcover
Midnight on the Potomac: The Last Year of the Civil War, the Lincoln Assassination, and the Rebirth of America
Ellsworth, Scott
Hardcover
The Murder of the Century: The Gilded Age Crime That Scandalized a City and Sparked the Tabloid Wars
Collins, Paul
Paperback
We Pointed Them North: Recollections of a Cowpuncher
Smith, Helena Huntington
Abbott, E. C. Teddy Blue
Paperback
How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America
Richardson, Heather Cox
Paperback
The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West
McCullough, David
Paperback
We've Been Here Before: How Rebellion and Activism Have Always Sustained America
Days, Michael I.
Dodson, Angela P.
Hardcover
The Rush: California Gold, the Civil War, and the Making of the Modern World (Large Print Edition)
Philbrick, Nathaniel
Paperback
Mornings on Horseback: The Story of an Extraordinary Family, a Vanished Way of Life and the Unique Child Who Became Theodore Roosevelt
McCullough, David
Paperback
Ghosts of Gold Mountain: The Epic Story of the Chinese Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad
Chang, Gordon H.
Paperback
Out Where the West Begins: Profiles, Visions, and Strategies of Early Western Business Leaders
Anschutz, Philip F.
Hardcover
America: The Last Best Hope (Volume I): From the Age of Discovery to a World at War
Bennett, William J.
Paperback
The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America
Larson, Erik
Hardcover
Vengeance: The Last Stands of Custer, Crazy Horse, and Sitting Bull (Large Print Edition)
Clavin, Tom
Hardcover
Mountain Man: John Colter, the Lewis & Clark Expedition, and the Call of the American West
Marshall, David Weston
Paperback
John Doe Chinaman: A Forgotten History of Chinese Life Under American Racial Law
Lew-Williams, Beth
Hardcover
Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth
Burrough, Bryan
Tomlinson, Chris
Stanford, Jason
Paperback
Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant Volume 1/2: Large Print Edition (Large Print Edition)
Grant, Ulysses S.
Hardcover
Black, White, Colored: The Hidden Story of an Insurrection, a Family, a Southern Town, and Identity in America
Noble, Leeanet
Noble, Lauretta Malloy
Hardcover
The Man Behind the Cane: Preston Brooks, Political Violence, and the Road to the Civil War
Quigley, Paul
Hardcover
When America First Met China: An Exotic History of Tea, Drugs, and Money in the Age of Sail
Dolin, Eric Jay
Paperback
Wilmington's Lie (Winner of the 2021 Pulitzer Prize): The Murderous Coup of 1898 and the Rise of White Supremacy
Zucchino, David
Paperback
Wakara's America: The Life and Legacy of a Native Founder of the American West
Mueller, Max Perry
Hardcover
Out Where the West Begins, Volume 2: Creating and Civilizing the American West Volume 2
Anschutz, Philip F.
Hardcover
Contempt of Court: The Turn-Of-The-Century Lynching That Launched a Hundred Years of Federalism
Curriden, Mark
Phillips, Leroy
Paperback
Scenes of Subjection: Terror, Slavery, and Self-Making in Nineteenth-Century America
Hartman, Saidiya
Paperback
Glitz, Glam, and a Damn Good Time: How Mamie Fish, Queen of the Gilded Age, Partied Her Way to Power
Wright, Jennifer
Hardcover
The First to Go West: American Ambition, Bloody Conquest, and the Fateful Journey of Jedediah Smith
Clavin, Tom
Drury, Bob
Paperback
Reminiscences of My Life in Camp with the 33D United States Colored Troops, Late
Taylor, Susie King
Paperback
Last Seen: The Enduring Search by Formerly Enslaved People to Find Their Lost Families
Giesberg, Judith
Hardcover
The Improbable Victoria Woodhull: Suffrage, Free Love, and the First Woman to Run for President
Collinsworth, Eden
Hardcover
Appetite for America: Fred Harvey and the Business of Civilizing the Wild West--One Meal at a Time
Fried, Stephen
Paperback
The Heart of Everything That Is: The Untold Story of Red Cloud, an American Legend
Drury, Bob
Clavin, Tom
Paperback
Nothing Like It in the World: The Men Who Built the Transcontinental Railroad 1863-1869
Ambrose, Stephen E.
Paperback
For the Hope of this Land: A Visual Learner's Workbook for Early American History
Newhouse, Amy
Paperback
An American Genocide: The United States and the California Indian Catastrophe, 1846-1873
Madley, Benjamin
Paperback
I Am Murdered: George Wythe, Thomas Jefferson, and the Killing That Shocked a New Nation
Chadwick, Bruce
Paperback
Saving Yellowstone: Exploration and Preservation in Reconstruction America
Nelson, Megan Kate
Hardcover
Last Seen: The Enduring Search by Formerly Enslaved People to Find Their Lost Families
Giesberg, Judith
Paperback
Slavery by Another Name (Pulitzer Prize Winner): The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II
Blackmon, Douglas A.
Paperback
Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant Volume 2/2: Large Print Edition (Large Print Edition)
Grant, Ulysses S.
Hardcover
Bandit Heaven: The Hole-In-The-Wall Gangs and the Final Chapter of the Wild West
Clavin, Tom
Paperback
The Last Stand: Custer, Sitting Bull, and the Battle of the Little Bighorn
Philbrick, Nathaniel
Paperback
Native American History: Accurate & Comprehensive History, Origins, Culture, Tribes, Legends, Mythology, Wars, Stories & More of The Native Indigenous
Alive, History Brought
Paperback
Trail of Tears: A Captivating Guide to the Forced Removals of Cherokee, Muscogee Creek, Seminole, Chickasaw, and Choctaw nations
History, Captivating
Hardcover
Death in the Haymarket: A Story of Chicago, the First Labor Movement and the Bombing That Divided Gilded Age America
Green, James
Paperback
American Infidelity: The Gilded Age Battle Over Freethought, Free Love, and Feminism
Green, Steven K.
Hardcover
Acts of Love: Black Performance and the Kiss That Changed Film History
Field, Allyson Nadia
Paperback
Until Justice Be Done: America's First Civil Rights Movement, from the Revolution to Reconstruction
Masur, Kate
Paperback
Ghosts of the Wild West: Stories from Deadwood, Tombstone, and the Old Frontier
Fowler, Natalie
Freeburg, Jessica
Paperback
No God But Gain: The Untold Story of Cuban Slavery, the Monroe Doctrine, and the Making of the United States
Chambers, Stephen
Paperback
The War on Illahee: Genocide, Complicity, and Cover-Ups in the Pioneer Northwest
Carpenter, Marc James
Hardcover
Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America
Kendi, Ibram X.
Hardcover
The Man from the Train: Discovering America's Most Elusive Serial Killer
James, Rachel McCarthy
James, Bill
Paperback
Vested Interests: Trusteeship and Native Dispossession in the United States
Connolly, Emilie
Hardcover
Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West
Stegner, Wallace
Paperback
How the South Won the Civil War: Oligarchy, Democracy, and the Continuing Fight for the Soul of America
Richardson, Heather Cox
Hardcover
African American History: A Captivating Guide to the People and Events that Shaped the History of the United States
History, Captivating
Paperback
The Rise and Fall of the Second American Republic: Reconstruction, 1860-1920
Sinha, Manisha
Paperback
Lewis and Clark Through Indian Eyes: Nine Indian Writers on the Legacy of the Expedition
Josephy, Alvin M.
Paperback
Where Custer Fell: Photographs of the Little Bighorn Battlefield Then and Now
Brust, James S.
Pohanka, Brian C.
Barnard, Sandy
Paperback
Orphans Preferred: The Twisted Truth and Lasting Legend of the Pony Express
Corbett, Christopher
Paperback
Thunder in the Mountains: Chief Joseph, Oliver Otis Howard, and the Nez Perce War
Sharfstein, Daniel J.
Paperback