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From The New Yorker
This meticulous narrative of the rise of the cotton magnate James G. Boswell begins in the nineteen-twenties, when his family was driven from Georgia by boll-weevil infestations and brought its plantation ways to California's San Joaquin Valley. Not to be defeated by nature again, the Boswells leveed and dammed Tulare Lake, the largest body of fresh water west of the Mississippi, to the point of extinction. In its six-hundred-square-mile basin they grew cotton, while in Los Angeles office towers they built one of the country's largest agricultural operations, swallowing small farms and multimillion-dollar subsidies with equal vigor. Arax and Wartzman strive for evenhandedness but acknowledge the costs of Big Ag—such as evaporation ponds with selenium levels so high that ducks are born with corkscrewed beaks and no eyes, and the recurrent "hundred-year floods," stubborn attempts by the old lake to reassert itself. Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker
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"A rollicking tale. . . ." -- Raleigh News & Observer
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Product details
Paperback: 592 pages
Publisher: PublicAffairs; Revised edition (February 15, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1586482815
ISBN-13: 978-1586482817
Product Dimensions:
5.5 x 1.5 x 8.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:
4.3 out of 5 stars
92 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#65,459 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Fascinating book. Not only about the agricultural empire the Boswells built starting in the early 1920s, but the backgrounds and working conditions of those attracted to work in the Central Valley (Oakies both black and white in addition to Mexicans), how towns like Corcoran were established (and later destroyed), all made very real by the endless interviews conducted by the authors. The amount of background research required to produce this book is mind boggling, yet the pieces are seamlessly put together - the book moves right along, I found to be a real page-turner, and has no axe to grind, it isn't a polemic against "big agriculture" as the good and the bad of this family farming operation are both presented. The cast of characters is wide, and at times pretty weird, all making for a good read. The final ingredient is California and federal water policy, a story unto itself with battle lines changing over a century. I found this story of particular interest as I worked at the Boston Ranch - Boswell's 23,000 cotton operation in the Valley - in 1958 when I was 16. All I can remember is it was really, really big, even though it was a fraction of the 150,000 acres the family eventually controlled. Also remember the tarpaper shacks on the edge of the property where the pickers lived - a disturbing sight. How all the part of this empire, including the fate of its employees, came together and grew is a most interesting story - and told with great style and verve by the authors. A real classic about a small spot on the planet.
This particular chapter details the rise of a farming empire in California's Central Valley. Coming from Greene County Georgia, the Boswell family built this empire largely on the backs of migrant labor and water--lots and lots of water. One other point: on the way to becoming one of the largest landowners in California, the Boswell's forever reshaped the landscape and drained Tulare Lake.Prior to settlement, the Central Valley's river floodplain system nourished some 1.4 million acres of tule marshes and wooded wetlands. The draining of vast sweeps of wetlands along with the damming and channeling of four major rivers has altered the landscape in both a manner and at a scale that is, quite literally, unprecedented. If you wanted to focus on a single family/farming empire that played the biggest role in this alternation, then you could do no better than The King of California.Tulare Lake lies near the southern end of California's Central Valley. The proximity of such a huge, seasonal lake to a large farming operation was a mixed blessing. During dry years, as the shoreline contracted, the land could be transformed to grow grain or row crops. In wet years, however, as the Sierra Nevada snow pack melted, the runoff of the Kings, Kaweah, Tule, and Kern Rivers filled this basin. The big runoff produced high flows into July and August, resulting in a vast and expanding lake shore. The flooded farmland resulted in less crops, less money... J.G. Boswell was determined to rein these waters in and convinced the Federal Government to help.In an errant attempt to encourage small family farms, loopholes in the reclamation laws brought most of the land in the Central Valley under the control of a handful of private landowners. The Californian land barons went by the names of Henry Miller, J. G. Boswell, and "Cockeye" Salyer. The land around Tulare Lake eventually got folded into Boswell farming empire. In the final analysis, the Boswell's got the land, the water rights, and handed the tax-payers the bill for the construction of Pine Flat Dam on the Kings River.I feel a bit of guilt when I throw on a mass produced cotton T-shirt (e.g., I can buy a three-pack for under ten dollars). Because this cheap cotton underwear really isn't that cheap. Mass produced cotton uses a lot of water. In fact, to grow a single T-shirt takes 257 gallons of water. If you own a piece of cotton underwear, chances are pretty good it's fibers came from land in California's Central Valley. And by default, you can be sure the Boswell family grew it. The King of California tells the interesting story of how the Boswells became the single largest grower of cotton in the United States.
The King, J.G.Boswell II, died in April 2009 but the empire he and his fore bearers built still allowed his chroniclers to drive the distance from Washington DC to Philadelphia (over 135 miles) without leaving their property. The incredible reporting job done by these authors speaks to the highest traditions of that craft. Their detailed, balanced account of just how Boswell and his family acquired and maintained this vast empire of cotton and other agricultural products ranks with other California water sagas such as the classic "Cadillac Desert: The American West and its Disappearing Water" by Marc Reisner. That the Boswells and their competitors, who often joined in oligarchical goals, were clever, able, and rapacious is only part of a fascinating story. You must admire the effective management they brought to their tasks and almost find yourself applauding their victories until you ponder the immensely adverse consequences.Now that the Pacific King Salmon season has been shut down on the entire California coast for the 2008 and 2009 seasons due to the almost total extinction of their number, citizens of California and the nation may want to ask about how the water allocation which made these barons so rich and politically powerful can be more justly shared with the entire environmental system. Most would agree I think that trading the magnificent salmon harvest for more Pima cotton shirts makes no sense.Surely one could give up some of the products now produced by this mega farmers to save such a precious resource as the King Salomon. This book serves as the ultimate cautionary guide to how we should not go about water allocations in this beautiful state.
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