That was one small deception in a tapestry of self-serving projections and outright lies that have characterized the irrigation of the West. 582 pages, $19.95.) Midway through the present century it was argued that reclamation services-the Army Corps of Engineers, the United States Reclamation Serv ice, plus various state agencies-would encourage small, family farms and thus the American Dream, by providing inexpensive water as Don Villarejo has shown, precisely the opposite has occurred in California’s San Joaquin Valley, perhaps the world’smost thoroughly and precariously irrigated region, where massive corporate holdings have expanded and continue doing so. STEVEN PUGMIRE Seattle, Washington Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water. This may be an intended paradox, for the blue themes of Ultramarine-death, love, choice, and the nature of relation ships-tend to make simple stick figures of us all. The depth of the insights jar against the simplicity of the characters as drawn, including the character of the author himself. What is revealed doesn’t seem to be enough. The natural resources of the West, sparse to begin with, have been stretched, exploited and depleted.In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:ġ78 Western American Literature a weakness. Without the bureau, without Hoover, Shasta and Grand Coulee, the West as we know it would not exist.CADILLAC DESERT is bleak about the future. Their success gave birth to federal aid programs, principally the Bureau of Reclamation. Only the Mormons stayed, carefully tending a system of irrigation canals that tempered perpetual drought. But there was not enough water to sustain them, and they drifted on. CADILLAC DESERT recounts this dramatic saga.The early settlers were lured by free land. The story of the American West is the story of the relentless quest to control and allocate nature's most common, and the West's most precious, resource: water. Read Or Download Cadillac Desert By Marc Reisner Full Pages.
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