The weedy west: Mobile nature, boundaries, and common space in the Montana landscape

Western Historical Quarterly

Volumn 36, Issue 1, 2005, Pages 22-47

  Fiege, Mark ^a  

^a Department of Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences

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[No Author keywords available]

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EID: 33745941631     PISSN: 00433810     EISSN: 19398603     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/25443100     Document Type: Article

References (135)

1. Hugo Zehrfeld to Ralph Mercer, 17 December 1937, Weeds 1937 file, box 35, acc. no. 72043, Montana State University Extension Service Records (hereafter, ESR), Merrill G. Burlingame Special Collections and University Archives, Renne Library, Montana State University-Bozeman (hereafter, MSU).
2. Theodore Steinberg's Slide Mountain, or, The Folly of Owning Nature (Berkeley, 1995), is one of the few historical works on the incompatibility of nature and property.
3. I am especially indebted to Hildegard Binder Johnson, "Rational and Ecological Aspects of the Quarter Section: An Example from Minnesota," Geographical Review 47 (July 1957): 330-48.
4. By boundaries, I mean those landscape divisions that people impose. On human and natural boundaries, see Richard T. T. Forman, Land Mosaics: The Ecology of Landscapes and Regions (Cambridge, GB, 1995), 81-112, 364-402.
5. John C. Weaver, The Great Land Rush and the Making of the Modern World 1650-1900 (Montreal, 2003).
6. Derek Gregory, "Modernity," in The Dictionary of Human Geography, ed. R. J. Johnston et al. , 4th ed. (Oxford, GB, 2000), 512-6 (quote on 514);
7. Kate Brown, "Gridded Lives: Why Kazakhstan and Montana Are Nearly the Same Place," American Historical Review 106 (February 2001): 17-48;
8. John Opie, The Law of the Land: Two Hundred Years of American Farmland Policy (Lincoln, 1987), xi-xxi, 1-42;
9. James C. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Schemes to Improve the Human Condition Have Failed (New Haven, 1998), 1-52, 262-305.
10. By space, I mean the shifting, culturally-defined distribution of things in relation to one another across the earth's surface. Derek Gregory, "Human Geography and Space," in Dictionary of Human Geography, ed. Johnston et al. , 767-73, discusses the concept.
11. On western weed history, see Frieda Knobloch, The Culture of Wilderness: Agriculture as Colonization in the American West (Chapel Hill, 1996), 113-45
12. and Clinton L. Evans, The War on Weeds in the Prairie West: An Environmental History (Calgary, 2002).
13. On weed characteristics, see Robert L. Zimdahl, Fundamentals of Weed Science, 2nd ed. (San Diego, 1999).
14. Thomas Dunlap to Mark Fiege, 12 April 2000 (letter in author's possession).
15. Gillian Rose, "Hybridity," in Dictionary of Human Geography, ed. Johnston et al. , 364
16. and Edward W. Soja, Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places (Cambridge, MA, 1996), 1-23.
17. Bonnie J. McCay and James M. Acheson, "Human Ecology of the Commons," in The Question of the Commons: The Culture and Ecology of Communal Resources, ed. Bonnie J. McCay and James M. Acheson (Tucson, 1987), 1-34
18. and Louis S. Warren, The Hunter's Game: Poachers and Conservationists in Twentieth-Century America (New Haven, 1997), 1-20, 183 (notes 8, 9).
19. William G. Robbins and James C. Foster, eds. , Land in the American West: Private Claims and the Common Good (Seattle, 2000), summarizes the debate.
20. See also, Donald Pisani, Water, Land, and Law in the West: The Limits of Public Policy, 1850-1920 (Lawrence, 1996).
21. Scott, Seeing Like a State, 11-52. Term quoted above can be found throughout Scott's book.
22. J. W. Blankinship, Weeds of Montana, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 30 (Bozeman, 1901).
23. Alfred Crosby, Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900-1900 (New York, 1986), 145-70.
24. As told to Gilbert L. Wilson, Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden: Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians, with a new introduction by Jeffery R. Hanson (St. Paul, 1987), 116.
25. Originally published as Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians: An Indian Interpretation (St. Paul, 1917).
26. Wilson, Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden, 117.
27. Michael P. Malone and Richard B. Roeder, Montana: A History of Two Centuries (Seattle, 1976), 129-40.
28. Blankinship, Weeds of Montana, 8
29. and D. B. Swingle, H. E. Morris, and E. W. Jahnke, Fifty Important Weeds of Montana, Montana Extension Service Bulletin 45 (Bozeman, 1920), 7, 67-9.
30. L. P. Reitz, Crop Regions in Montana as Related to Environmental Factors, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 340 (Bozeman, 1937), 15-9;
31. Neil W. Johnson and M. H. Saunderson, Physical Factors Affecting Montana Agriculture, pt. 1 of Types of Farming in Montana, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 328 (Bozeman, 1936), 30-2;
32. Paul W. Gates, "Homesteading in the High Plains," Agricultural History 51 (January 1977): 119-27;
33. K. Ross Toole, Twentieth-Century Montana: A State of Extremes (Norman, 1972), 25-69.
34. This summary is not intended to suggest that Montana was environmentally homogeneous; see Reitz, Crop Regions in Montana.
35. and Swingle, Morris, and Jahnke, Fifty Important Weeds of Montana, 3-9, 18-22, 39-40.
36. Lyster Hoxie Dewey, The Russian Thistle: Its History as a Weed in the United States, with an Account of the Means Available for Its Eradication, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Division of Botany, Bulletin 15 (Washington, DC, 1894), 7-18, appended maps;
37. Blankinship, Weeds of Montana, 8, 20, 22-3, 53-6;
38. Johnson and Saunderson, Types of Farming in Montana, 30-9;
39. Gates, "Homesteading in the High Plains," 127;
40. Toole, Twentieth-Century Montana, 70-98.
41. M. L. Wilson, Dry Farming in the North Central Montana "Triangle," Montana Extension Service Bulletin 66 (Bozeman, 1923), 5-25 (quote on 17), 82-5.
42. Gates, "Homesteading in the High Plains," 127
43. Isaiah Bowman, "Jordan Country," Geographical Review 21 (January 1931): 48;
44. Thomas D. Isern, Custom Combining on the Great Plains: A History (Norman, 1981), 37, 182-3;
45. Leland P. Cade to Albert H. Kruse, 10 November 1959 and Kruse to Cade, 18 November 1959, file 32, box 3, Record Series (hereafter, RS) 26, Montana Department of Agriculture Records (hereafter, MDAR), Montana Historical Society, Helena (hereafter, MHS).
46. John R. Lacey and Peter K. Fay, eds. , Proceedings of the Knapweed Symposium, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 1315 (Bozeman, 1984);
47. Peter K. Fay and John R. Lacey, eds. , Proceedings of the 1989 Knapweed Symposium (Bozeman, 1989);
48. for quote see Montana Department of Agriculture (hereafter, MDA), Noxious Weed Trust Fund Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (Helena, 1992), p. 2. 16, Montana Historical Society Library (hereafter, MHSL), MHS.
49. Frank Forcella and Stephen J. Harvey, New and Exotic Weeds of Montana, vol. 2, Migration and Distribution of 100 Alien Weeds in Northwestern USA, 1881-1990 (Bozeman, 1980), Montana Plant Management Plan/Weeds file, box 8, acc. no. 87-027, ESR, MSU
50. and Roger L. Sheley, Bret E. Olson, and Carla Hoopes, What is So Dangerous about the Impacts of Noxious Weeds on the Ecology and Economy of Montana? Montana Experiment Station Extension Bulletin 152 (Bozeman, 1998).
51. For example, H. E. Morris and Ralph D. Mercer, Perennial Weeds and their Control, Montana Agricultural Extension Service Bulletin 225 (Bozeman, 1944)
52. and Robert L. Warden, James L. Krall, and V. C. Hubbard, Recommendations for Chemical Weed Control in Montana for 1949, Montana Extension Service Bulletin 256 (Bozeman, 1949).
53. Richard H. Schein, "The Place of Landscape: A Conceptual Framework for Interpreting an American Scene," Annals of the Association of American Geographers 87 (December 1997): 660-80, analyzes the multiple discourses that people use to interpret and order the same landscapes.
54. and for second quote, see Robert L. Woodahl to George Lackman, 9 June 1976, in MDA, Noxious Weed Management Advisory Council (hereafter, NWMAC), "Final Report," 6 December 1976, appendix VII, MHSL, MHS.
55. See also, H. G. Wood, A Practical Treatise on the Law of Nuisances in their Various Forms; Including Remedies Therefor at Law and in Equity, 2nd ed. (1875; reprint, Albany, 1883), 1-82.
56. Wood, A Practical Treatise
57. and William J. Novak, The People's Welfare: Law and Regulation in Nineteenth Century America (Chapel Hill, 1996), 44-5, 60-71, 191-227.
58. and William deBuys, ed. , Seeing Things Whole: The Essential John Wesley Powell (Washington, DC, 2001), 15, 139-208, 235-42, 299-313.
59. and Laws of Montana, Seventeenth Session (Helena, 1921), Chapter 168, p. 319.
60. Laws of Montana, Eighteenth Session (Helena, 1923), Chapter 60, p. 133.
61. Charles E. Carney, "Ravalli County, Cooperative Extension Service, Report from December 1, 1922 to March 23, 1923," pp. 14, 19, Ravalli files, box 60, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU.
62. Report of the Great Plains Committee, The Future of the Great Plains (Washington, DC, 1936), 64, 65, 65, 63. (The first three of these quotes were column headings and were capped in the original. )
63. See also, Robert S. McElvaine, The Great Depression: America, 1929-1941 (New York, 1993), xxiv
64. and Charles Vindex, "Survival on the High Plains, 1929-1934," Montana The Magazine of Western History 28 (October 1978): 2-10 (quote on 10).
65. Paul W. Gates, History of Public Land Law Development (Washington, DC, 1968), 608-10
66. and for quote, see M. H. Saunderson and N. W. Monte, Gracing Districts in Montana: Their Purpose and Organization Procedure, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 326 (Bozeman, 1936), 3.
67. G. H. Craig and Charles W. Loomer, Collective Tenure on Grazing Land in Montana, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 406 (Bozeman, 1943), 3-28 (all quotes on 8)
68. and Layton S. Thompson, Montana Cooperative State Grazing Districts in Action, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 481 (Bozeman, 1951).
69. Mary W. M. Hargreaves, "Land-Use Planning in Response to Drought: The Experience of the Thirties," Agricultural History 50 (October 1976): 565-76 (quote on 567).
70. Laws of Montana, Twenty-Sixth Session (Helena, 1939), Chapter 195, pp. 490-7.
71. See the extension agent annual reports for Yellowstone County for the years 1938 (pp. 28, 31-2, 99-103)
72. and 1939 (pp. 28-31, 106-10), authored respectively by Keith Sime and Keith Sime and Jack Maguire, both of which are in Yellowstone files, box 81, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU.
73. Laws of Montana, Twenty-Seventh Session (Helena, 1941), Chapter 90, p. 150.
74. See the extension agent annual reports for Yellowstone County for the years 1936 (pp. 17-8)
75. 1937 (pp. 21-5)
76. 1938 (pp. 31-2)
77. 1939 (pp. 28-31)
78. 1940 (pp. 33-9)
79. and 1942 (pp. 72-4, 78), authored respectively by R. B. McKee, Keith Sime, Keith Sime, Keith Sime and Jack Maguire, Keith Sime, and W. H. Jones, all of which are in Yellowstone files, box 81, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU.
80. The following can be found at acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU: Ben B. Hill, "Narrative Report of County Extension Agent, Rosebud County, 1947," p. 74, Rosebud files, box 65;
81. W. W. Mauritson, "Annual Report of Flathead County Agticultural Agents, 1948," 80, Flathead files, box 38;
82. no author, "Annual Report of County Extension Agent, Counties of Powell and Deer Lodge, 1953," p. 32, Powell and Deer Lodge files, box 33;
83. Robert L. Warden, "Annual Report of Weed Control Project, 1950," p. 2, 1950 file, box 14.
84. See also Jones, "Annual Report of County Extension Agent, County of Yellowstone, 1942," 71
85. and Laws of Montana, Forty-First Session (Helena, 1969), Chapter 185, p. 462.
86. For quote, see Gail Schontzler, "Volunteer Brigade Fights Noxious Weeds," Bozeman (MT) Chronicle, 5 August 1984, Weeds vertical file (hereafter, WVF), MSU. For other examples, see county agent annual reports in box 54, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU, and newspaper clippings in WVF, MSU.
87. The following are in ESR, MSU: V. D. Gilman to C. B. Ahlson, 24 October 1922, Weed Laws file, box 4, acc. no. 72043 (see for quote);
88. Harold L. Dusenberry and Robert L. Warden, "Annual Report, Weed Control - Montana, 1948," p. 7, 1948 file, box 14, acc. no. 00021;
89. Eugene Heikes, "Annual Report, Weed Control Project, 1957," p. 75, 1957 file, box 5, acc. no. 71031.
90. Dusenberry and Warden, "Annual Report, Weed Control - Montana, 1948," 6-7
91. and Eugene Heikes, "Annual Report, Weed Control Project, 1956," pp. 2, 25, 1956 file, box 5, acc. no. 71031, ESR, MSU.
92. See the extension agent reports for Rosebud County for the years, 1940 (p. 14)
93. 1941 (p. 17)
94. and 1945 (pp. 79-80), authored respectively by Frank Barnum, H. L. Dusenberry, and H. L. Dusenberry, all of which are in Rosebud files, box 65, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU.
95. For first quote, see Eugene Heikes, "County Weed Programs in Montana," 21 January 1960
96. Heikes, "Annual Report, Weed Control Project, 1960," pp. 59-62, 1960 file, box 5, acc. no. 71031, ESR, MSU
97. and for second quote, see Robert L. Warden, "Annual Report of Weed Control Project, 1951," p. 10, 1951 file, box 14, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU.
98. The following are in acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU: extension agent annual reports for Big Horn County for the years 1948 (p. 15)
99. and 1949 (p. 24), both authored by N. A. Jacobsen and located in 1948 and 1949 files, box 21
100. See also R. V. Bottomly, Report of the Attorney General of the State of Montana, January 1, 1947 to December 30, 1948 (Helena, 1948), 79-82.
101. Davis W. Armstrong III, "1976 Consolidated Report of County Noxious Weed Programs," 3, MHSL, MHS
102. and T. J. Gilles, "Spreading Weeds Likened to a Biological Forest Fire," Great Falls (MT) Tribune, 21 August 1984.
103. The following are in file 14, box 25, B10:1-1, Director's Office Records, Montana Department of Agriculture Records (hereafter, DOR, MDAR), MHS: Roger Engle et al. , "To Whom it May Concern," ca. 1986 (see for quote);
104. Ted Schwinden to Tom Brownlee, n. d. ; Celestine Lacey to Keith Kelly, 1 July 1986;
105. Jim Story to Keith Kelly, 22 August 1986. The same kind of tensions afflicted citizen relations with other public land agencies and, in addition, railroads.
106. For first quote, see Tribune Capitol Bureau, "'Wrong Targets' Hit in Counties' Weed War," Great Falls Tribune, 11 May 1977
107. and for second quote, see Mea Andrews, "Fighting a Noxious Weed Problem," Missoula (MT) Missoulian, 12 September 1982, both WVF, MSU.
108. Armstrong, "1976 Consolidated Report of County Noxious Weed Programs," 4 and Carol Flaherty, "Mapping out the Problem is an Ongoing Project," in The War on Weeds, ed. Montana Extension Service (Bozeman, 2000), 8.
109. The following are in WVF, MSU: Kay Hardin, "Weed, Wildlife Groups Disagree on Proposed Law," Billings (MT) Gazette, 12 November 1968 (see for quote);
110. Tribune Capitol Bureau, "Statewide Weed Control Given Early Approval," Great Falls Tribune, 31 January 1969;
111. Tribune Capitol Bureau, "State Criticized for Expanding Use of Weed Killers," Great Falls Tribune, 16 November 1972.
112. For drifting 2,4-D and consequences, see Warden, "Annual Report of Weed Control Project, 1950," 22;
113. N. A. Jacobsen, "Annual Report, Cooperative Extension Work, Big Horn County, Montana, 1950," p. 15, Big Horn files, box 21, acc. no. 00021, ESR, MSU;
114. W. F. Woolston to All Section Men, 6 April 1968, file 6, box 16, B7:2-1, Montana Department of Highways Records, MHS.
115. "Game Management Division, Weed Control Policy," June 1972 (see for quote), file 64, box 1, RS 198, Wildlife Division Records, Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks Records, MHS;
116. MDA, NWMAC, "Final Report," 7-9;
117. Noxious Weed Advisory Council Minutes, 10 September 1975, appendix V(a), p. 5, in MDA, NWMAC, "Final Report. "
118. Both of these articles can be found in WVF, MSU: Greg Northcutt, "Insects Counter Pesky Weeds," Bozeman Chronicle, 22 June 1980
119. and "Weed Program Plan Given Mixed Reviews," Great Falls Tribune, 13 January 1981.
120. See also Gerald W Marks, "Biological Weed Control," ca. 1980 and Jo Brunner to Pete Fay, 14 May 1981, both in Weed Control files, box 8, acc. no. 87-027, ESR, MSU
121. and MDA, Noxious Weed Trust Fund, pp. 2. 7, 2. 9-2. 11.
122. On herbicide problems, see Lorney Faber, "Judith Basin Goes to War With Range Invader," Lewistown (MT) News-Argus, 2 December 1979, WFV, MSU and the following, all of which are in box 25, B10:1-1, DOR, MDAR, MHS: Cecil Weeding to Keith Kelly, 21 January 1986, file 13;
123. Kelly to Weeding, 14 February 1986, file 13;
124. Celestine Lacey to Kelly, 18 July 1986, file 14.
125. Noah Poritz, Leona Poritz, Tony Aiello, "Biological Control of Weeds, 1993," p. 5, file 4, box 31, B10:1-1, DOR, MDAR, MHS.
126. Bill Thomas to Celestine Lacey, 3 July 1986 and Celestine Lacey to Keith Kelly, 18 July 1986, file 14, box 25, B10:1-1, DOR, MDAR, MHS;
127. Richard Manning, Grassland: The History, Biology, Politics, and Promise of the American Prairie (New York, 1995), 188-90;
128. Dan Flores, The Natural West: Environmental History in the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains (Norman, 2001), 193-9.
129. Report of the Great Plains Committee, The Future of the Great Plains, 71-89, 105-20, 133-91;
130. Carl Frederick Kraenzel, The Great Plains in Transition (Norman, 1955), 278-82, 384-7;
131. John C. Bollens, Special District Governments in the United States (Berkeley, 1957), 139-78.
132. McCay and Acheson, "Human Ecology of the Commons," in The Question of the Commons, 15.
133. See, for example, Roland R. Renne, Montana Land Ownership: An Analysis of the Ownership Pattern and Its Significance in Land Use Planning, Montana Agricultural Experiment Station Bulletin 322 (Bozeman, 1936).
134. On the complex, contested connections between public land and private property, see Karen R. Merrill, Public Lands and Political Meaning: Ranchers, the Government, and the Property Between Them (Berkeley, 2002).
135. Daniel Kemmis, Community and the Politics of Place (Norman, 1990), argues that a shated landscape and the common experience of place can serve as the basis of an effective political order.