Water and American government : the Reclamation Bureau, national water policy, and the West, 1902-1935 / Donald J. Pisani.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Pisani, Donald J.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

United States. Bureau of Reclamation.

United States.

Reclamation of land--West (U.S.)--History--20th century.

Reclamation of land.

Water-supply--Government policy.

History.

Water-supply.

West (U.S.)--Economic conditions--20th century.

West (U.S.).

Water-supply--Government policy--West (U.S.)--History--20th century.

Physical Description:

xviii, 394 pages, 10 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, maps ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Berkeley : University of California Press, [2002]

Summary:

Donald Pisani's history of perhaps the boldest economic and social program ever undertaken in the United States -- to reclaim and cultivate vast areas of previously unusable land across the country -- shows in fascinating detail how ambitious government programs fall prey to the power of local interest groups and the federal system of governance itself. What began as the underwriting of a variety of projects to create family farms and farming communities had become by the 1930s a massive public works and regional development program, with an emphasis on the urban as much as on the rural West.

Contents:

Saving lost lives : irrigation and the ideology of homemaking

The perils of public works : Federal reclamation, 1902-1909

Case studies in irrigation and community : Twin Falls and Rupert

An administrative morass : Federal reclamation, 1909-1917

Boom, bust and boom : Federal reclamation, 1917-1935

Uneasy allies : the Reclamation Service and the Bureau of Indian Affairs

Case studies in water and power : The Yakima and the Pima

Wiring the new West : the strange career of public power

Gateway to the hydraulic age : water politics, 1920-1935

Conclusion : retrospect and significance.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 299-387) and index.

ISBN:

0520230302

OCLC:

50035410