Von Thünen, an economist, was focused on the economic viability of production, particularly as dictated by the cost of transport of different types of goods produced in different areas. Still, Cronon relies heavily on Johann Heinrich von Thünen’s concentric circle analysis, from 1826, of the zones that surround a city, from intensive agriculture closest to the city to wilderness at the farthest extent. And much of his book is an attempt to remove an artificial sharp distinction between rural and urban areas. Cronon clearly thinks that while the theory has value, central place theorists make claims of systematization that are inaccurate at best the real world is a messier place than a mathematical theory allows for. Famous people are not the focus culture and politics are only addressed in passing and where actually relevant and, fortunately, ideology and political correctness make no appearance at all.Ĭronon repeatedly refers to, and reacts to, “central place theory”-attempts to systematize and base in mathematics the growth of urban-rural systems such as Chicago. This shaping is primarily viewed through commodity flows, including the commodities themselves and how they were transported. Rather, it is a story about how the city shaped the Great West, while being shaped itself by the Great West. As he takes pains to make clear, Nature’s Metropolis is not a comprehensive history of the city or the Great West. This sounds like a cliché, but it is not one in Cronon’s hands. Rather, they are all an interdependent whole, each continuously changing the other. If Cronon has an overriding theme, it is that a sharp distinction between city and country, or between humans and nature, is an illusion, and a damaging one. I suppose to some this sounds boring-but as far as I’m concerned Cronon nearly magically retains the reader’s interest throughout. For each topic, he focuses both narrowly on how each developed and changed over time, and more broadly on how each affected the city and the larger Great West.

He does this by analyzing, in fascinating detail, the city and its surrounding territory in three areas: transportation (water and rail), physical commodities (grain, lumber, and meat), and capital. Part history, part sociological study, part economic analysis, and part ecological survey, William Cronon examines the growth of Chicago by studying the city’s 19th Century relationship to the larger “Great West” (more or less the once-sparsely settled regions between the Ohio River Valley and the Pacific).

This is a fantastic book that well deserves its reputation as a classic.

Nature's Metropolis by William Cronon