Throughout history, rivers have run a wide course through human temporal and spiritual experience. They have demarcated mythological worlds, framed the cradle of Western civilization, and served as physical and psychological boundaries among nations. Rivers have become a crux of transportation, industry, and commerce. They have been loved as nurturing providers, nationalist symbols, and the source of romantic lore but also loathed as sites of conflict and natural disaster.Rivers in History presents one of the first comparative histories of rivers on the continents of Europe and North America in the modern age. The contributors examine the impact of rivers on humans and, conversely, the impact of humans on rivers. They view this dynamic relationship through political, cultural, industrial, social, and ecological perspectives in national and transnational settings. As integral sources of food and water, local and international transportation, recreation, and aesthetic beauty, rivers have dictated where cities have risen, and in times of flooding, drought, and war, where they've fallen. Modern Western civilizations have sought to control rivers by channeling them for irrigation, raising and lowering them in canal systems, and damming them for power generation. Contributors analyze the regional, national, and international politicization of rivers, the use and treatment of waterways in urban versus rural environments, and the increasing role of international commissions in ecological and commercial legislation for the protection of river resources. Case studies include the Seine in Paris, the Mississippi, the Volga, the Rhine, and the rivers of Pittsburgh. Rivers in History is a broad environmental history of waterways that makes a major contribution to the study, preservation, and continued sustainability of rivers as vital lifelines of Western culture.

Reproduction of the original.

From the 1790s to the 1830s, the Palmetto State was a preeminent leader in infrastructure improvements and developed an extensive system of more than two thousand miles of canals and waterways connecting virtually every part of the state with the coast and the port of Charleston. Robert J. Kapsch expertly recounts the complex history of innovation, determination, and improvement that fueled the canal boom in early-nineteenth-century South Carolina. --from publisher description.

Provides a guidebook to the river and its waterways. Explores the physical character as well as the natural history of the river.

Reproduction of the original.

A guide to the forgotten waterways hidden throughout the five boroughs Beneath the asphalt streets of Manhattan, creeks and streams once flowed freely. The remnants of these once-pristine waterways are all over the Big Apple, hidden in plain sight. Hidden Waters of New York City offers a glimpse at the big city’s forgotten past and ever-changing present, including: Minetta Brook, which ran through today's Greenwich Village Collect Pond in the Financial District, the city's first water source Newtown Creek, separating Brooklyn and Queens Bronx River, still a hotspot for urban canoeing and hiking Filled with eye-opening historical anecdotes and walking tours of all five boroughs, this is a side of New York City you’ve never seen.

In Turbulent Streams: An Environmental History of Japan’s Rivers, 1600–1930, Roderick I. Wilson shows how rivers have played an important role in Japanese history and moves beyond conventional stories of technological progress and environmental decline to provide a dynamic history of environmental relations.

Figuring in myth, religion, law, the military, commerce, and transportation, rivers were at the heart of Rome's increasing exploitation of the environment of the Mediterranean world. In Rivers and the Power of Ancient Rome, Brian Campbell explores the role and influence of rivers and their surrounding landscape on the society and culture of the Roman Empire. Examining artistic representations of rivers, related architecture, and the work of ancient geographers and topographers, as well as writers who describe rivers, Campbell reveals how Romans defined the geographical areas they conquered and how geography and natural surroundings related to their society and activities. In addition, he illuminates the prominence and value of rivers in the control and expansion of the Roman Empire--through the legal regulation of riverine activities, the exploitation of rivers in military tactics, and the use of rivers as routes of communication and movement. Campbell shows how a technological understanding of--and even mastery over--the forces of the river helped Rome rise to its central place in the ancient world.

"Jackson weaves a seamless tale stretching from the Native-American river settlements ... to the paper mills and hydroelectric plants of the late twentieth century". -- Southern Historian