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Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water, Revised Edition Paperback – January 1, 1993
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"The definitive work on the West's water crisis." --Newsweek
The story of the American West is the story of a relentless quest for a precious resource: water. It is a tale of rivers diverted and dammed, of political corruption and intrigue, of billion-dollar battles over water rights, of ecological and economic disaster. In his landmark book, Cadillac Desert, Marc Reisner writes of the earliest settlers, lured by the promise of paradise, and of the ruthless tactics employed by Los Angeles politicians and business interests to ensure the city's growth. He documents the bitter rivalry between two government giants, the Bureau of Reclamation and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, in the competition to transform the West. Based on more than a decade of research, Cadillac Desert is a stunning expose and a dramatic, intriguing history of the creation of an Eden--an Eden that may only be a mirage.
This edition includes a new postscript by Lawrie Mott, a former staff scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council, that updates Western water issues over the last two decades, including the long-term impact of climate change and how the region can prepare for the future.
- Print length582 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherPenguin Books
- Publication dateJanuary 1, 1993
- Grade level12 and up
- Reading age18 years and up
- Dimensions8.36 x 5.52 x 1.09 inches
- ISBN-100140178244
- ISBN-13978-0140178241
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Editorial Reviews
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--San Francisco Examiner
"Essential background reading for anyone who cares about the drought ravaging the West and the region's prospects for changing course before it is too late."
--Mark Hertsgaard, The Daily Beast
"Timely and of national interest. . . . Resiner captures Western water history in Cinemascope and Technicolor. . . . lawmakers, taxpayers, hurry up and read this book."
--The Washington Post
"The scale of this book is as staggering as that of Hoover Dam. Beautifully written and meticulously researched, it spans our century-long effort to moisten the arid West. . . . Anyone thinking of moving west of the hundredth meridian should read this book before they call their real estate agent."
--St. Louis Post-Dispatch
"A revealing, absorbing, often amusing and alarming report on where billions of [taxpayers'] dollars have gone-- and where a lot more are going . . . [Reisner] has put the story together in trenchant form."
--The New York Times Book Review
About the Author
Lawrie Mott, formerly an environmental heath scientist with the Natural Resources Defense Council, lives in a Bay Area county that receives all its water from local supplies. From Marc Reisner, her late husband, she learned about water in the West at their dinner table and during long drives through western states. Mott received her B.A. from the University of California at Santa Cruz and her M.S. from Yale.
Product details
- Publisher : Penguin Books; Revised edition (January 1, 1993)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 582 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0140178244
- ISBN-13 : 978-0140178241
- Reading age : 18 years and up
- Grade level : 12 and up
- Item Weight : 1.07 pounds
- Dimensions : 8.36 x 5.52 x 1.09 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #22,084 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2 in Water Supply & Land Use (Books)
- #35 in Environmental Science (Books)
- #149 in U.S. State & Local History
- Customer Reviews:
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Underlying the encyclopedic scope of “Cadillac Desert” are two basic themes.
First, the settlers lured to the arid West by the railroads and the US Federal Government in the 19th century needed cheap water to support agriculture on their 160 acre parcels of land, and also for their growing cities such as Los Angeles. Cheap hydroelectric power was often a secondary need, essential to pumping water. This need was met by projects of the Bureau of Reclamation and the Corps of Engineers. The projects were generally promoted by local congressmen, who supported each other’s projects. In the long term this endeavor has been subsidized by US taxpayers since return revenues from the projects have generally fallen fall far short of plan.
Second, the projects and dams have been an escalating source of controversy. For the most part the projects have not been economically justifiable, especially the irrigation projects, and especially the more recent projects. Also, the dams have created lasting problems -- salination of irrigated soil; silt accumulation behind the dams; environmental devastation to streams, salmon fisheries, and migratory birds; an overstretched US Federal budget, etc. Cheap hydroelectric power has also enabled groundwater pumping which is depleting aquifers. The taxpayer subsidized benefits of cheap water have often gone to large corporate agriculture, not the small farmers for whom the water was intended. By the later part of the 20th century the public sentiment had largely turned away from building ever more dams, and indeed toward removing some of the existing ones.
The individual chapters of “Cadillac Desert” are often mesmerizing, instilling a sense of outrage in the civic and history minded reader. The chapter on the 1976 Teton Dam failure is a great example. If the leaders and promoters had thoughtfully considered the economics of the dam, or the geology of the site, the dam would never have been built in the first place. But built it was and fail it did. The spectacularly devastating failure is now used as a case study in engineering courses, providing an example of mistakes at all levels and by all of those involved.
While Reisner does seem long winded at times, it is worthwhile staying with “Cadillac Desert” to the end. On one hand, it provides many interrelated perspectives on water and the West. It also ends on a somewhat positive note as the many constituencies involved seem to be converging on a more rational approach to future water usage in the West.
Although pretty familiar with this region of the US, I still needed a map most of the time. The locations, distances, and relationship of places is both important and punctuates the story. It is shocking the almost diabolic regression of the Bureau of Reclamation and the Corps of Engineers in the three decades following the mid 1950's. To think that we came to believe that "any water which flows into the ocean is waste" and that it made sense to divert the Columbia River to California is almost inconceivable. The actual projects built in the 60's and 70's are equally unbelievable. Yet they are all there.
In the end, I did not finish the final 20% of the book because I pretty much understood the story and couldn't take another story of corrupt western senators, water projects that don't pay off, subsidized farms, and ill-conceived dams. Prior to reading Cadillac Desert I could not understand why we might tear down a dam. Now I can't believe we haven't torn down more.
Cadillac Desert will inform you, shock you, and get you a whole lot closer to a clear liquid we take for granted every day.
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The book was originally written in the 1980s but was reissued in 2017 with a new afterword to catch you up in what happened since the book was originally published.
Easy and fun reading!












