Rare Book Monthly
Articles - December - 2003 Issue
Americana, Water and the American West:<br>This Month’s New Americana Catalogues
Water and the American West from Schoyer's Books
The real battles in the American West are not being fought between cowboys and Indians, cattle ranchers and sheepherders, or good guys and bad guys. They’re being fought state vs. state, city vs. country, and community vs. community. And the prize isn’t plunder or gold. It’s water. Out west, the skies are not cloudy all day, which makes for beautiful weather but insufficient rainfall. For the past century, this has been the major issue for the west. And, as ever increasing populations vie for limited resources of water, this will remain the major western battleground for years to come.
Schoyer’s Books of Berkeley, California, has put together a catalogue of over 700 items dealing with the real source of warfare in the west. Collectors of the west, water resources, or specific states or communities in the west will want to see this catalogue. Also, anyone researching water issues in the west needs to have this catalogue. There is wealth of information dealing with the problems, plans and actions taken to deal with the water problem over the past century and more.
Some of this material is admittedly “dry.” Government and scholarly reports don’t always read like action novels, but what they contain is usually far more important. Investigations of the Economical Duty of Water for Alfalfa in Sacramento, California, 1910-1915 is not exactly a scintillating title (item 124). But, its place in the puzzle is better understood when you realize that alfalfa soaks up water like a watermelon (maybe that’s an exaggeration). Perhaps better crop selection could reduce the problem. And, like most titles in this catalogue, “Alfalfa” is inexpensive ($25).
Item 162 is the California desert classic The Land of Little Rain by Mary Austin. Ms. Austin moved from Illinois to California when she was twenty and spent the next fifteen years living in various desert communities. She became a defender of the land and its people, particularly the native Indians, and writes eloquently of them. The book was first published in 1903 and is a member of the most important California book list, the Zamorano Eighty. The copy offered by Schoyer’s Books is a 1950 edition, but it is the first to come with the inclusion of a series of photographs by famed photographer Ansel Adams. $200.
Apportionment of water from the lower Colorado River basin has been in the news lately as California has agreed to try to live within its allotment. This is not a new issue. California and Arizona went to the Supreme Court half a century ago fighting for water rights. California’s position can be found in the 1948 Memorandum…Authorizing Suit to Water in Lower Basin, Colorado. Written by Alan Bible and Fred Howser, who were then Attorneys General of Nevada and California respectively, the authors, with no exaggeration, note “the controversy is of character which, were the states independent sovereigns, would likely lead to war.” Item 405. $65.
