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Common Lands, Common People : The Origins of Conservation in Northern New England
Common Lands Common People The Origins of Conservation in Northern New England Author:Richard W. Judd In this innovative study of the rise of the conservation ethic in northern New England, Richard Judd shows that the movement that eventually took hold throughout America had its roots among the communitarian ethic of countrypeople rather than among urban intellectuals or politicians. Drawing on agricultural journals and archival sources such as ... more »legislative petitions, Judd demonstrates that debates over access to and use of forests and water, though couched in utilitarian terms, drew their strength and conviction from deeply held popular notions of properly ordered landscapes and common rights to nature. "As Common Lands, Common People describes beautifully, the march of 'progress' [in New England] was slowed by the nascent environmentalists of Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire standing up to big businesses of the day. The beauty of these states today is thanks to the pressure of these early conservationists—who were not, the author suggests, an elitist group drawn from the upper echelons of society as some historians contend, but the 'common people' of the title. The writing is vivid and the history thorough." —New Scientist "This book offers an important new view of the history of environmentalism in the United States … By focusing on the attitudes of the common people who lived and worked the land as well as the adjacent forests and waterways, Judd offers a useful corrective to our prevailing understanding, which sees the conservation movement primarily as an expression of elite concerns. This is a most interesting and informative study of the political economy of nature, the origins of conservation, and the multiple uses of natural resources." —Hal S. Barron, American Historical Review« less