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Journal ArticleDOI

The Comstock Urban Network

01 Aug 1997-Pacific Historical Review (University of California Press Journals)-Vol. 66, Iss: 3, pp 337-362
TL;DR: This paper pointed out that urban historians rarely look beyond the outskirts of cities to the hinterlands beyond; western and frontier and even environmental historians usually concentrate far more attention on rural and wild places than on urban ones.
Abstract: Historians of the nineteenth-century urban West have largely focused on major cities such as San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland, Denver, and Salt Lake City. This approach has correctly portrayed these cities as the engines of subregional growth and political power. However, with the exception of Mel Scott, John Reps, and a few others, the tendency has been to acknowledge only briefly the importance of hinterland towns as support structures or to treat them merely as a given.' In this vein, William Cronon has justifiably complained that "urban historians rarely look beyond the outskirts of cities to the hinterlands beyond; western and frontier and even environmental historians usually concentrate far more attention on rural and wild places than on urban ones."2
Citations
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Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: Matthews worked the next two years laying pipe for the Hollister Water Company and earned $18.70 from "the Water Co." that month as discussed by the authors, but was laid off after thirty-eight days and died six months later from a work-related accident.
Abstract: Joseph Warren Matthews experienced the industrial Far West late in life. Seeking wages, the fifty-one-year-old Californian took a temporary job at Claus Spreckels's Watsonville sugar refinery in 1893 but soon left for the better pay offered on a nearby ranch. Matthews worked the next two years laying pipe for the Hollister Water Company. "This is my birthday," Matthews scribbled in his diary on June 6, 1896. "I am 54 years old. I worked all day filling in [the] ditch." He earned $18.70 from "the Water Co." that month. Eventually laid off, Matthews sought employment during the following three years wherever it could be found: mining quicksilver in California; wage labor in the Alaskan goldfields; road work for a Pacific Northwest lumber company; smelting ore for the San Jose Copper Company; and finally, an irrigation job in the San Joaquin Valley for Miller & Lux, the massive land, cattle, and water company. Now fiftyseven years old, Matthews drew less than a dollar per day "plus found" working on one of the firm's night irrigation crews. He left Miller & Lux's employ after thirty-eight days and died six months later from a work-related accident.1

20 citations

01 Jan 2004
TL;DR: Cos Cosby et al. as mentioned in this paper examined the growth of Los Angeles from a regional perspective, called the Los Angeles city-system, which consists of Angeles and its hinterland, by examining the spatial distribution of population within the region between 1769 and 2000.
Abstract: FROM MISSION TO MEGACITY: THE CHANGING CONCENTRATION OF THE LOS ANGELES CITY-SYSTEM Kerri L. Cosby Department of Geography Master of Science Having an understanding of when, where, and why people settle in an area is crucial in explaining the growth course of a city. However, this cannot be done by looking at a city in isolation. Its surrounding region has a tremendous impact on its development. The purpose of this thesis is to examine the growth of Los Angeles from a regional perspective, called the Los Angeles city-system, which consists of Los Angeles and its hinterland. Connections are made between the history and the geography of the Los Angeles city-system by examining the spatial distribution of population within the region between 1769 and 2000. The Hoover Index of Population Concentration is used to determine the population concentration, and major shifts in the concentration are illuminated by the geography and historical events of the Los Angeles area. The main factors contributing to the changing concentration were the region’s physical geography, the introduction of transportation innovations, the region’s economic structure, historical and political events, and migration trends. It was found that the counties in closest proximity to Los Angeles County are becoming more alike, while the more peripheral counties are becoming more different. This has led to a greater understanding of urban/periphery growth economics.

2 citations


Cites methods from "The Comstock Urban Network"

  • ...As already mentioned, I-5 connect Los Angeles with San Francisco, which also went through Kern County....

    [...]

  • ...Stagecoach lines (see Appendix D) connected Los Angeles and San Francisco resulting in settlements along routes in counties like Ventura County in 1868 (Robinson 1955)....

    [...]

  • ...---- 2001b. Industry builds the city: the suburbanization of manufacturing in the San Francisco Bay Area, 1850-1940....

    [...]

  • ...The city had acquired major metropolitan status, not only in terms of population – San Francisco was passed by in 1920 – or transportation, but in the diversified industries and businesses that contributed impressively to the region’s economic growth” (Grenier 1978, 33)....

    [...]

  • ...San Francisco: Fearon Publishers....

    [...]

References
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Book
01 May 1991
TL;DR: An American frontier study focusing on the fastest growing city of 19th-century America -Chicago as mentioned in this paper, shows the land as it was when inhabited by Indians and a few white settlers, and the frenzy of development of the meatpacking industry, the grain emporiums and the lumber markets which followed.
Abstract: An American frontier study, focusing on the fastest growing city of 19th-century America - Chicago. It shows the land as it was when inhabited by Indians and a few white settlers, and the frenzy of development of the meat-packing industry, the grain emporiums and the lumber markets which followed.

1,741 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: The "settling" of the American West has been perceived throughout the world as a series of quaint, violent, and romantic adventures as discussed by the authors. But in fact, Patricia Nelson Limerick argues, the West has a history grounded primarily in economic reality; in hardheaded questions of profit, loss, competition, and consolidation.
Abstract: The \"settling\" of the American West has been perceived throughout the world as a series of quaint, violent, and romantic adventures. But in fact, Patricia Nelson Limerick argues, the West has a history grounded primarily in economic reality; in hardheaded questions of profit, loss, competition, and consolidation. Here she interprets the stories and the characters in a new way: the trappers, traders, Indians, farmers, oilmen, cowboys, and sheriffs of the Old West \"meant business\" in more ways than one, and their descendents mean business today.

649 citations

Book
01 Jan 1987
TL;DR: The "settling" of the American West has been perceived throughout the world as a series of quaint, violent, and romantic adventures as discussed by the authors. But in fact, Patricia Nelson Limerick argues, the West has a history grounded primarily in economic reality; in hardheaded questions of profit, loss, competition, and consolidation.
Abstract: The "settling" of the American West has been perceived throughout the world as a series of quaint, violent, and romantic adventures. But in fact, Patricia Nelson Limerick argues, the West has a history grounded primarily in economic reality; in hardheaded questions of profit, loss, competition, and consolidation. Here she interprets the stories and the characters in a new way: the trappers, traders, Indians, farmers, oilmen, cowboys, and sheriffs of the Old West "meant business" in more ways than one, and their descendents mean business today.

503 citations

Book
01 Jan 1967
TL;DR: The history of Los Angeles from its beginnings as an agricultural village of fewer than 2,000 people to its emergence as a metropolis of more than 2 million in 1930 is described in this paper.
Abstract: Here with a new preface, a new foreword, and an updated bibliography is the definitive history of Los Angeles from its beginnings as an agricultural village of fewer than 2,000 people to its emergence as a metropolis of more than 2 million in 1930 - a city whose distinctive structure, character, and culture foreshadowed much of the development of urban America after World War II.

140 citations