Racism wasn’t
uncommon during the era of Great Camps in the Adirondacks, but it always
surprises me how many of my historical heroes, like Teddy Roosevelt, held
beliefs that I strongly disagree with. The scary thing is these wealthy leaders
weren’t the types of uneducated racists we see today; they had so much power and
resources that they developed an entire science behind their bigotry. It was
called eugenics, “the science of improving stock”. It was developed for
breeding farm animals, but some influential men decided it should be used on
humans to beef up the American population by encouraging people with good
traits to reproduce and discouraging other people, or races, from reproducing.
These wealthy
Great Camp owners and national leaders promoted conservationism and helped
preserve much of the forest by forming clubs in the Adirondacks to buy giant
plots of land before logging companies could. I feel the need to note that these
clubs prevented new members from joining based on race or religion. The entire
ethic of conservationism in the turn of the 20th century was tainted
for me when I found out that there were conservationists who supported eugenics
and that they believed those two ideas were based on the same goal: to preserve
the old America, the wildlife and the races.
One eugenicist,
Madison Grant, was a Progressive like Teddy Roosevelt and worked on getting
conservation laws passed all over the US. He also wrote a book, about eugenics called
The Passing of the Great Race that inspired
Hitler’s racial cleansing plan. Grant and his supporters were worried that the
superior American race was getting outcompeted by lesser, immigrant races. With
his education and his political power, Grant spread the idea that some races
are better than others and that the lesser races should be sterilized so they
die out, like farm animals.
Much
of the land that is in the Forest Preserve was attained by these wealthy clubs
or Great Camp owners, so we have them to thank for the preservation of the
Adirondacks. However in the process of preserving the land, they excluded many
people because of race or religion and they influenced the stance on immigrants
and the racist culture of America. I like to think about things in black and
white and find it shocking when the lists in my head of good versus bad have to
be rewritten to include a middle ground. I guess for now I will just think of
the conservationists as people who preserved so much for future Americans and I
will think of eugenicists as racists who wanted to make decisions for other
individuals without their consent, and I just won’t try to take a stance on the
men who were both.
Godine, Amy. "Conservation's Dark Side." Adirondack Life Jan. 2015: 52-63. Web.
Schneider, Paul. The Adirondacks: A History of America's First Wilderness. New York: H. Holt, 1997. Print.
I feel similarly about these individuals who have helped promote and protect the Adirondack Park and you are absolutely right about it being scary that these people were educated and prominent leaders of our country. Unfortunately, racism and associated ideas have in many ways characterized our country's history. As a result, I disagree with the views of many prominent historical figures; yet I still respect individuals for the positive contributions they have made on society. Specifically, while Teddy Roosevelt may have supported eugenics, he was very progressive in his views of government regulation of corporations and in his environmental conservation efforts. He also invited Booker T. Washington to the White House which was very progressive for the time. Similarly, W.E.B DuBois's idea of a "talented tenth" was quite controversial as many people interpreted it as a eugenics-like effort to advance only the black elite. Yet, DuBois, played a huge role in helping blacks overcome racism in society and made many positive contributions to the movement for racial equality.
ReplyDeleteOverall, I agree that it is difficult to reconcile the fact the many conservationists were also racist, but I also consider the context in which many of these people lived. Many wealthy, educated individuals, who were also the people working to protect the Adirondack Park, were accustom to racism following the Civil War and even in the early 20th century. For example, Woodrow Wilson, a Princeton graduate and a former president, was extremely racist. Of course the time period is not an excuse for being racist or a supporter of eugenics but it does help me understand why many early conservationists held controversial views.
I felt the same way during our discussion of "forever wild" in class. Given the crucial role of wilderness in the american culture and psyche of the day, it becomes difficult for me to not connect keeping a place "forever wild" with keeping it "forever american" against a tide of immigration that had already flooded their glorious cities. All the qualms of the city; the pollution, crime, disease, were all blamed on the immigrant arrivals. In a simplified view, early environmentalism itself was defined by rich white men wanting to preserve places for rich white men to do their thing. It then becomes our job to negotiate these early motivations with the second wave of environmentalism and the environmental justice which exists today.
ReplyDelete