Inventing Niagara: Beauty, Power, and Lies

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Editorial Reviews:

Product Description
Ginger Strand reveals the hidden history of America's most iconic natural wonder, Niagara Falls, illuminating what it says about our history, our relationship with the environment, and ourselves.

Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...

5 out of 5 stars

The Eternal, Ever-Changing Niagara June 20, 2008
7 out of 8 found this review helpful

There may be many reasons for going to Niagara Falls. Sure, you have to be awed by the spectacular falls themselves. You might go to start up a marriage, or to re-start one. You might go gamble. "I went to Niagara Falls because I wanted to laugh at it," says Ginger Strand, author of _Inventing Niagara: Beauty, Power, and Lies_ (Simon and Schuster), and she finds plenty of the historical and regional environs funny. But wanting to laugh was the reason she went there during her college years, just to smirk at the tackiness and kitsch. She has been going back, though, over and over since then, because "I do love hydroinfrastructure - water tunnels, reservoirs, canals, sewers, aqueducts." She finds it inspiring, but she also finds that the natural wonder that everyone loves about the falls is not natural at all. It has been used, changed, prettified, trivialized, exploited, and poisoned. There is thus a great deal of amusement in this wide-ranging account, but a good deal of loss and sadness as well.

"Niagara Falls as a natural wonder does not exist anymore." It is originally hard to believe this. It is not surprising that the water does not fall exactly as it did three hundred, or three thousand, years ago, but it is surprising how much people have made the changes happen in recent years. This is not entirely because of using the water for hydroelectric power, although this is certainly one cause of the change. The waterfall has hours of operation. In the summer, and during the daytime, when people come to see the falls in action, the water gets turned up to maximum flow. At night, it gets dialed back "like a fancy massaging showerhead" so that more electricity is generated. No more than half the water that could go over the falls actually does so, and an engineer assures Strand that yes, if they wanted, the power companies could divert all the water to the generators with none for the tourists. The effect on the scenery of the reduced flow has been minimized by huge engineering projects, tinkering with the flow and diverting it so that it goes evenly over Horseshoe Falls, for instance. The fall of the water is not all that has changed, of course. The "Free Niagara" movement, guided by the famous landscape architect Frederic Law Olmsted, proposed to make the surroundings of the falls to be picturesque and spiritually elevating. Strand writes that this was questionable social engineering. Worse than that, it hid the hydrodynamic and chemical exploitation of the area as industry sprang up to take advantage of the water's power. Only later did atrocities like the toxic dumps of the Love Canal come to light. There is a long history of utopian dreams for the region, but few of them have come true.

Much of Strand's book is therefore distressing. Humans have tried to do what they always try to do, take control of nature for reasons esthetic, and especially commercial, and whatever successes have come are inextricably linked to failures. The pessimism does not mean that Strand's book is preachy. There are stories of shrunken heads here, and Jo-Jo the Dog-Faced Boy, and fake Indian legends, and of course the peculiar thrills of those who go over the falls in barrels. There is a great deal of fun here. Strand writes, "On every level, Niagara Falls is a monument to the ways America falsifies its relationship to nature, reshaping its contours, redirecting its force, claiming to submit to its will while imposing our own upon it." There is plenty of documentation here of this theme, but Strand still travels to Niagara every chance she gets. She is continually amazed at the landfills or the other examples of disharmony with nature, but that's not important. The real amazement, and she writes about it heartily and endearingly, comes from the big, green spectacle of water, falling. Anyone reading this entertaining account will understand how well-placed is her obsession.

3 out of 5 stars

Only Half the Book I Hoped For May 30, 2008
5 out of 10 found this review helpful

Ginger Strand's _Inventing Niagara_, in part lives up to its blurbs. It is a decent history of the myths and history of the Falls and its surroundings (mostly on the American side) starting with the early French explorers.

The blurb implies a book about the Falls, particularly of the engineering that resculpted the Falls. By weight, it seems like the bulk of the book is about Strand's experience researching the book, which is less clearly foreshadowed. For some authors and books, the blend of history and autobiography can work. Here it seems forced and it is hard to get a sense of what it is about the Falls that the author finds so captivating to keep bringing her back to do the research that is evident in it.

If you are looking for a history of the Falls, there are a number of interesting nuggets here. But those looking for a book about its history or engineering may wish to consult the author's souces at the back of the book instead.

5 out of 5 stars

I loved this book. June 2, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful

Strand takes history, engineering, and environmentalism and makes it come alive. Her writing style compelled me to keep reading and I learned so much about a region I must have learned, and retained nothing about, in school. Strand's personalization of her research and her travels only made it more interesting to me. I look forward to reading much more of her writing in the future.

5 out of 5 stars

Excellent Book June 4, 2008
3 out of 3 found this review helpful

As a Niagara Falls native, who has traveled all over the world and lived in several other parts of the country before returning to WNY, I found this book to be right on target. It was an engaging and easy read. Although I also thought I knew a lot about the history of the region, this wonderful book filled in a lot of blanks for me. It also made me remember the "good old days" when Niagara Falls was a destination to be enjoyed.

5 out of 5 stars

Niagara is a Wonder but a Manufactured Wonder July 25, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful

If you live in the US or Canada, I would imagine that you would be in the minority if you say that you have never been to Niagara Falls. According some sources, over 2 million people visit the Falls every year. But what you see is just a small portion of the area. Ginger Strand, in her book, Inventing Niagara, shows you Niagara Falls and the surrounding area in a way that no travel guide will; She debunks the myths, shows you the environmental damage, takes you behind the scenes of the massive power plants, and introduces you to the many people that have shaped the area. And when I say "shaped," that is exactly what you see - men who have turned a natural wonder into something fake. At the end of the book, you have to wonder if Disney had something to do with the Falls, as what you see is manufactured realism.

Contents:
Introduction: Down the Memory Hole
Chapter 1: White Man's Fancy, Red Man's Fact
Chapter 2: The Eighth Wonder of the World
Chapter 3: Skipper the Two-Legged Dog
Chapter 4: The Other Side of Jordan
Chapter 5: Free Niagara
Chapter 6: King of Power, Queen of Beauty
Chapter 7: Sentiment in Liquid Form
Chapter 8: The Bomb and Tom Brokaw's Desk
Chapter 9: Boulevard of Broken Dreams
Epilogue: The Voice of the Landscape
Sources and Acknowledgements
Index

Starting the book with a critique of the "Maid of the Mist" mythology, Strand moves along to other historical figures such as the early explorers, the indigenous Indians, and the developers. One of the stories that amazed me was the spectacle of the schooner Michigan, which is curiously omitted from all current guide books. In 1827, two businessmen contracted to have the schooner Michigan towed to currents above the falls with a crew of caged animals. At the appointed hour, the schooner was cut loose and a crowd of up to 20,000 watched as it plunged over the falls and was smashed to bits. Only a bear and a goose survived the ordeal. As time moves on, things don't get better for the area. As men realize the unlimited hydroelectric potential of the falls, water is diverted from the falls, reducing the flow to the minimum for the tourists. The resulting factories dump their toxic chemical and radioactive waste into the Niagara River. Or they create Superfund sites like Love Canal (Love Canal is but one Superfund site in the area, there are many others). Or they create giant landfills. The memories that travel guides omit are brought to the light by Strand, made more compelling by her interviews with people that actually lived on the land or worked in the factories.

From the opening pages, you understand that Strand has an obsession with Niagara Falls. And it is a good thing, too, as she has written a very good book on the dark side of the falls. While 99.9% of those 2 million visitors only look at what is in front of them, enjoy the casinos, or the tourist mecca that is Clifton Hill, there is much more to experience and know. Not all of it equals a happy and relaxing visit, but it is a view of the real falls. The fact that only a small percentage of the Niagara River flows over the falls and is controlled and manipulated very carefully by the power authorities is just as amazing as the history of Goat Island and the American Falls. You finish the book realizing that what you see isn't real, it is man-made. This book hasn't deterred me from visiting again, it has shown me some sites that I would like visit. And it puts into context why you see what you do. Knowing that, I can still have a pleasant visit, but it will not be spent only on the Canadian side of the falls. There is too much to do on the American side and it will be important to share those sites with the family. I can't wait to relate to the family the history of the Robert Moses Parkway or how a small band of Indians lost their land because they didn't do anything with it (this is a point that probably has some merit in today's society). The only issues I had with the book are probably trivial: Strand's overuse of the word "sublime" and the casual tone. But it is a very enjoyable, interesting book.

Be sure to read the Sources and Acknowledgements. Strand adds more personal tidbits amongst her sources, especially an anecdote concerning Norm Stressing, supervisor of operations at the Robert Moses Niagara Power Plant.

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