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The Hudson: A History, by Tom Lewis
Free PDF The Hudson: A History, by Tom Lewis
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Flowing through a valley of sublime scenery, the Hudson River uniquely connects America’s past with its present and future. This book traces the course of the river through four centuries, recounting the stories of explorers and traders, artists and writers, entrepreneurs and industrialists, ecologists and preservationists—those who have been shaped by the river as well as those who have helped shape it. Their compelling narratives attest to the Hudson River’s distinctive place in American history and the American imagination.
Among those who have figured in the history of the Hudson are Benedict Arnold, Alexander Hamilton, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, the Astors and the Vanderbilts, and Thomas Cole of the Hudson River school. Their stories appear here, alongside those of such less famous individuals as the surveyor who found the source of the Hudson and the engineer who tried to build a hydroelectric plant at Storm King Mountain. Inviting us to view the river from a wider perspective than ever before, this entertaining and enlightening book is worthy of its grand subject.
- Sales Rank: #761383 in Books
- Published on: 2007-03-28
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 9.14" h x .93" w x 6.24" l, 1.09 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 352 pages
From Publishers Weekly
Lewis (Empire of the Air) examines the Hudson River region in nine short chapters that provide a pleasant read-but not a complete history-of the river. Discovered by European explorers looking for the "Northwest Passage," a fabled shortcut to the wealth of China, the area was passed back and forth between the Dutch and British for several centuries until Britain finally secured control via treaty in the late seventeenth century and maintained its hold of the area and its strategically valuable deep water ports until the American revolution. While much of this is well-known, Lewis has mined the archives for less familiar vignettes of colonial life, including the stories of the first American woman naturalist, Jane Colden, and Amos Eaton, the founder of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. However, Lewis barely touches on or bypasses major events (wars, for instance, are given only cursory mention), making this less a comprehensive history than a collection of essays on topics that, while relevant to the Hudson's history, seem to be picked at random. Thus, there is a chapter on the invention of steamboats, another on the Hudson River school of American art, and another on the rise of environmental consciousness. Lewis writes well, but readers piqued by this spotty history will be left wanting.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From Booklist
A historian of the interstate highways (Divided Highways, 1997), Lewis here sifts through the thick layers of Hudson River history. Avenue of explorers, battlefield for empires, easel for artists, and dump for industry--the waterway has been a stage for epics since its namesake dropped anchor in 1609. Lewis opens, however, with the odd fact that the Hudson's source was not determined until the late 1800s; there was too much moneymaking happening downstream to bother with such trivia. The Hudson as a cockpit of capitalism began, of course, with the Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam at the river's mouth, and over time mercantile victors from the Livingstons to the Vanderbilts dotted the river's bluffs with their mansions, which are still tourist attractions today. The incomparable beauty of the Hudson Valley, somehow surviving the effluent poured into it, connects the individuals and events appearing in Lewis' chronological story, becoming explicit when he takes up the famously ethereal Hudson school of landscape painting. Spanning armies and aesthetics, the versatile, fluid Lewis writes with affection for the river and its history. Gilbert Taylor
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
Review
"Water, per se, is not that interesting but rivers highlight and emphasize
the land and lives and ideas that cram their banks. What Tom Lewis has so
wonderfully done here is willed to life one of the great rivers in our
history, insisting that it offer up its deep secrets and best
tories." --Ken Burns
“Water, per se, is not that interesting but rivers highlight and emphasize the land and lives and ideas that cram their banks. What Tom Lewis has so wonderfully done here is willed to life one of the great rivers in our history, insisting that it offer up its deep secrets and best stories.”—Ken Burns
(Ken Burns)
"Few places in America can match the beauty, the majesty, and the historic significance of the Hudson River. Thanks to Tom Lewis's elegant style, penetrating observations, and marvelous illustrations, we at last have a book worthy of such a grand topic."—Kenneth T. Jackson, Editor of The Encyclopedia of New York City (Kenneth T. Jackson)
"No book I know so beautifully interweaves history, art, writing and commerce."—Robert Richman, New York Post
(Robert Richman New York Post)
"The book is packed with information and free of pedantry, a perfect introduction to the region.”—Brooke Allen, New York Sun
(Brooke Allen New York Sun)
Most helpful customer reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful.
Fascinating though some slow going
By L. Dunkelman
Every student remembers the famous sale of Manhattan Island by the Indians to the Dutch for a few dollars worth of trinkets, but what you may not recall is the native Indians lived in an expanse of territory that strected throughout the Northeast and to them, it was amazing that anyone would pay for one small island. They may have gotten the better deal at the time.
The booked is filled with fascinating pieces of history and you will soon learn that the Hudson River is linked to the very foundations of our country. You will also learn that all those street names and highway names in New York stem from the state's very rich history with the Dutch and the English.
Some parts of the story are a bit dry, no doubt, but the book is worth reading for the highlights.
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful.
How the Hudson Mirrors the Growth and Change in America
By Grey Wolffe
Lewis has written a metaphor for the growth of america from an untamed wilderness, to a economic (water) highway, to an industrial giant, to an environmental success story. Lewis takes us through a series of vignettes that tell the history of the changes to the river. It was first to be the way in which trappers and traders were able to get into the interior of the continent for furs. Later it became the source of bringing lumber down to the mills. It was a major battlefield during the Revolution and by protecting it we were able to keep the British from splitting the colonies in two.
With the building of the Erie Canal it became the conduit to and from the Great Lakes region for raw materials and finished products. The steamboat and railway made the whole area of the hudson river valley available for settlement and the burgeoning of industry along it's shore. Unlike most east coast rivers, it was navigable for hundreds of miles; with great natural resources of streams for mills, wood for charcoal, deposits of clay it became a major industrial area in the nineteenth century (and a major source of pollution).
By the early twentieth century, the river was a polluted nightmare, with large areas unusable and without fish. The river had been polluted with PCB's and the discharge of raw sewage from many of the surrounding towns and cities. In the 1960's when the electric supplier wanted to build a retaining pond for eight billion gallons of water and destroy half of Storm King mountain, people finally began to take notice. The Hudson was the first big victory for the forces of environmental protection that would lead to the creation of the "Superfund".
Today the water is cleaner than its' been in a century and can be looked at as an example of how man and nature can live in harmony again.
13 of 13 people found the following review helpful.
shaping America - an engaging tale of the Hudson river's role
By Amazon Customer
This is a charming book - well written and engaging, and wonderful in how it pulls together so many diverse threads, from geology to military history to environmental policy to art history to economics. And although my eyes glazed over a little when the book discusses intricacies of the Dutch poltroon families upstate (my main interest as a New Yorker is recognizing them as Manhattan street names) I think the work is broad in its appeal. Lewis's argument that the Hudson river has been central to shaping American history and culture is compelling and evocatively set forth.
My main criticism is the lack of visual accompaniment. This river has inspired extraordinary maps, documents, photographs, and paintings - a whole "school" of art for goodness sake - giving us just handful of postage stamp black and white reproductions in the book is a missed opportunity. The paucity of imagery is really a demerit.
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