I am now posting a series of essays on Substack. Each will be described and liked below. Some will contain information I want to supplement or correct based on further study, others will simply be summaries of chapters to introduce the history to other readers.
Thomas Cole and the Oxbow
This essay explores Cole's motivations in painting the Oxbow. It corrects some statements I made regarding the influence of Basil Hall, who had written a disparaging book about America. I confess that I had been influenced by a paper by Oswaldo Rodrigues Roque which made a convincing, but largely circumstantial case for Cole being strongly motivated by wanting to respond to Hall's book. On further study, I think that Hall had little to no influence on Cole and write in this essay about what I think was his true motivation.
The Oxbow Crosses the River
This essay is largely a summary of the story of the flood of 1840 which cut the neck of the Oxbow Island, separating it from the town of Hadley and joining it to Northampton.
Deforestation in Thomas Cole's Oxbow
This essay explains the causes of the deforestation shown on the right side of Cole's painting. The beginning with colonial era farming, compounded by England's quest for potash, progressing to the needed for more lumber to support Jackson's westward expansion.
Lumber on the Oxbow: The Logs Stop Here
The story of how the Oxbow of Thomas Cole's painting became the terminus of the longest log drives in the United States