Power-Lined

Electricity, Landscape, and the American Mind

Daniel L. Wuebben

• Publisher: University of Nebraska Press
• Year: 2019
• Print ISBN:
  9781496203663
• eBook ISBN:
  9781496215963
• Topic: Technology & Engineering
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: Technology & Engineering

The proliferation of electric communication and power networks have drawn wires through American landscapes like vines through untended gardens since 1844. But these wire networks are more than merely the tools and infrastructure required to send electric messages and power between distinct places; the iconic lines themselves send powerful messages. The wiry webs above our heads and the towers rhythmically striding along the horizon symbolize the ambiguous effects of widespread industrialization and the shifting values of electricity and landscape in the American mind. In Power-Lined Daniel L. Wuebben weaves together personal narrative, historical research, cultural analysis, and social science toprovide a sweeping investigation of the varied influenceof overhead wires on the American landscape and the American mind. Wuebben shows that overhead wires—from Morse's telegraph to our high-voltage grid—not only carry electricity between American places but also create electrified spaces that signify and complicate notions of technology, nature, progress, and, most recently, renewable energy infrastructure. Power-Lined exposes the subtle influences wrought by the wiring of the nation and shows that, even in this age of wireless devices, perceptions of overhead lines may bekey in progressing toward amore sustainable energy future.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Preface
• Introduction
• 1. Wires in the Garden, 1844–1882
• 2. New York’s Frontier Lines and Telegraph Forests, 1882–1916
• 3. California’s Wood Poles, Steel Towers, and Modernist Pylons, 1907–1972
• 4. Public Perceptions and Power Line Battles, 1935–2013
• Conclusion
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index
• About Daniel L. Wuebben