building the american landscape - Univerza v Novi Gorici
building the american landscape - Univerza v Novi Gorici
building the american landscape - Univerza v Novi Gorici
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which displayed hundreds of pieces of equipment, machinery, mills, tools, spare<br />
parts, carriages, and naturally multiple types of ploughs, some of <strong>the</strong>m<br />
programmatically named “New Deal”, <strong>the</strong> ultimate objective of <strong>the</strong> well‐known<br />
policy of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, implemented between 1933 and 1937.<br />
In Virginia in 1831, Cyrus H. McCormick invented <strong>the</strong> mechanical harvester, a light,<br />
horse‐drawn, wooden structure, but <strong>the</strong> model was to be perfected in Chicago in<br />
<strong>the</strong> 1840’s. The historian, Maldwyn Jones, confirms <strong>the</strong> importance of this event<br />
“[…] in <strong>the</strong> middle of <strong>the</strong> wheat belt, and, thanks also to his business skills, he was<br />
able to defeat a rival who had independently perfected a similar machine. In 1860<br />
McCormick was able to manufacture 20,000 harvesters per year. Almost at <strong>the</strong><br />
same time, similar innovations improved threshing […]”. 73<br />
In <strong>the</strong> years immediately after <strong>the</strong> Civil War, all <strong>the</strong>se technological transformations<br />
and innovations had created <strong>the</strong> extraordinary agricultural <strong>landscape</strong> of <strong>the</strong><br />
bonanza farms 74 , cereal cultivations which extended for hundreds of kilometres<br />
along <strong>the</strong> shores of <strong>the</strong> Nor<strong>the</strong>rn Red River, in an extremely fertile geographical<br />
area. From an architectural point of view, <strong>the</strong> <strong>landscape</strong> of <strong>the</strong> prairies was<br />
dominated by typical wooden <strong>building</strong>s. The invention of <strong>the</strong> balloon frame in <strong>the</strong><br />
1830’s completely changed <strong>the</strong> <strong>building</strong> techniques and <strong>the</strong> American <strong>landscape</strong><br />
during <strong>the</strong> settlement of <strong>the</strong> West 75 . The construction of homes became an<br />
industry which replaced <strong>the</strong> small log cabins built by <strong>the</strong> pioneers, as well as <strong>the</strong><br />
more imposing, costly masonry <strong>building</strong>s.<br />
Sigfried Giedion identifies <strong>the</strong> inventor of <strong>the</strong> balloon frame in George Washington<br />
Snow 76 (1797‐1870), even though <strong>the</strong> phenomenon has to be set in a wider context,<br />
73 Numeric data and quotation from JONES, A., Maldwyn, The Limits of Liberty American History<br />
1607‐1992, London, Oxford University Press, 1995 [first ed. 1983] cit. p. 1 (Italian translation Storia<br />
degli Stati Uniti d’ America. Dalle prime colonie inglesi ai giorni nostri, Milano, Bompiani 2011, p.<br />
111)<br />
74 JACKSON, John Brinckeroff, American Space: <strong>the</strong> Centennial Years, 1865‐1876, New York, W.W.<br />
Norton, 1972, pp. 49‐55<br />
75 On <strong>the</strong> diffusion and knowledge of <strong>the</strong> construction system in <strong>the</strong> middle of <strong>the</strong> nineteenth century<br />
see: WOODWARD, George Eveston and F.W., Country Homes, New York, 1865<br />
76 See GIEDION, Sigfried, Space, TIme and Architecture, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard<br />
University Press, 1954 (first ed. 1941)(Italian translation edited by Enrica e Mario Labò, Spazio,<br />
Tempo ed Architettura. Lo Sviluppo di una nuova tradizione, Milano, Hoepli, 2004, p. 340)<br />
43