This would be a reasonable lament were it true. I recently read, in Chernov’s Washington: A Life, that George Washington was anti-vax, before he changed his mind based on evidence made clear to him, and then became pro-vax. That was in relation to smallpox, and the “vaccine” was actually “variolation,” which is to modern vaccines what a camel is to a modern RV. Same idea, different technology.

Polio still exists, it is just very uncommon in the United States. Some of this is because of continuing anti-vax misinformation. For example, in Pakistan, there is a false anti-vax belief that the vaccine contains ingredients that are haram, and could cause male impotence. During the era of the American polio epidemics, and in connection to Franklin Roosevelt’s war on polio, there was a vibrant and damaging anti-vax movement. Historian David Oshinsky notes that the post World War II era was a high point for respect for, and awe of, science in the US. But even in this golden age of fear and love for things science could fix or provide, polio anti-vax did fine. (see: Polio: An American Story.)

This is not the place to talk about vaccines or the enemies of science who prefer infection-caused morbidity and mortality for their fellow citizens, though I am rather fed up with the Trumpsucker Contaminants and their ways. I want to talk about something else: The contrasting role of history vs. now in our perception of things.

I’ve always been a student of, a fan of, history, and all of my professional work has involved the study of history in some way or another. But, I am not a historian, and the streams of history I have studied, and the methods I’ve used, would not get me through the final exam of a college history class. But over the last few years, I’ve been reading the better biographies and histories, focusing mainly on American history (though I’m currently reading a mainly European classic). I am doing this to preserve sanity and be better at certain conversations. There is a danger that a close look at antebellum politics in the US will make the recent rise of Tump Fascism seem less severe or important, but that would be a miscalculation. When we look back at the Congress in the 1830s through the beginning of the Civil War, we see actual literal violence in the Capitol building carried out by the elected representatives themselves, and that may seem worse than a crowd of Trump organized insurrectionists breaking into the same exact building, some of them intent on murdering the Vice President of the United States and/or the Speaker of the House. But both are bad things, and they are utterly different kinds of things, and thus hard to compare.

I think about history not as a way of being less upset about now. It is simply a way of understanding now (as well as then). Historian Jon Meacham had a similar idea, and he put his approach to understanding the present out as a podcast, called “Hope Through History.” I’m not a big fan of the musical scoring, but otherwise, the podcast is a must-listen. Meacham addresses a wide range of historical events or periods, and with the use of a lot of excellent commentary from other historians, and a mix of primary sources, describes and explains major past events in a way that one thinking of present events can relate to. He covers the war on polio, including the anti-vax, Selma, the Gettysburg address, the shift from nationalism to engagement in the middle of World War II, the Great Depression, the Cuban Missile Crisis, and so on. You can, if you want, do exactly as I’ve done over the last five years, but instead of reading book after book after book after book, you can listen to a nice podcast while folding the laundry or driving to work. Either way, your concern for our future will not diminish, but your hair will be less on fire about it.

But that is also not what I’m really talking about here. Since this is a blog post, you know there is at least a 50-50 chance that it exists because I had a random thought and I’m working it out with you. Thanks for that opportunity, by the way. And here is the random thought. Really, a random memory. I remember, some ten years ago or so, needing to look something up in an atlas. I was at work, so I went to the office and asked the office manager if we had an atlas. She pointed to the bookshelf, and sure enough there was an atlas up on the top shelf gathering dust.

I pulled it down, and yes, there was a lot of dust. I don’t remember the exact atlas, but it was something like a Rand McNally or Hammond (as distinct from a Colliers). It dated to World War II. From within the war. So the people who made it, and originally ordered it and put it on an earlier version of the shelf I had just taken it from, were in the middle of the war, and some of their friends, relatives, and co-workers were in North Africa, Europe, or the Pacific (or somewhere else) fighting in this war. The atlas had, as do most, one or a few orientation maps inside the covers and on the first pages, so one could find the more detailed maps within. And, one of these orientation maps indicated which parts of the world were under occupation by one of the three major forces: Nazis, Japan Imperial, or Allies.

It was static. It was not an historical map. It was not a map about the war. It was a map in the war. It is where you would look up and say, “Oh wait, I can’t use that service to send a manuscript to that particular city, because it is in German-occupied Europe. I’ll have to use a different service.” Then you go on with your business as though … well, as though half the world was under the occupation of fascists. Because it was. As a static phenomenon, not a historical process viewed in the halogen light of later time, as history.

In other words, the map did not show the dynamic, and eventually ending, process of a great war, like this map does:

See all those lines and things happening? See that history, that happened, and is now diagrammed out for you? That is how we, now, think of then. But if you were then, how would you see that vintage 1943 now? More like this:

See the difference? In the first map, you see how things happened over time. The Germans spread out across Europe and the Allies pushed them back into Germany, plus or minus. In the second map, you can find out if you are supposed to do the whole “Heil Hitler” thing if you visit a particular city. Ireland is a little confusing. What’s that one circle there in Italy?

This is not the map I saw a decade ago. I actually had the chance to acquire that atlas. I was commenting on it and the office manager said, “you can have that if you want, it’s old.” It didn’t seem right to take it, though.

Here’s another one where the color coding makes more sense:

If I track down the original, I’ll add it here.

I think most people made a mistake, over the last few years, of characterizing Trump as a potential dictator. He was in fact a dictator the entire time he was in office. Many dictators started out being in a position of executive power of one kind or another, but within a system where the person in that role was not explicitly hooked up to the rest of the system as a dictator. The institutions of democracy, or in some cases, royalty, persisted and held power for a period of time. Eventually, the person seen later, by history, as a dictator would abrogate or take over each of those institutions, but the person was a dictator the whole time that was going on. Trump was the dictator of the Unites States and its territories from the moment he was inaugurated, right through his last days in the White House (some would sat to this very day). The institutions that persisted kept him from being an effective dictator, but had he been in the White House longer, or if he is put back there by McConnell and Manchin, there will be a redrawing of the atlas.

Our grandchildren can look at this map with wonder and possibly amusement:

Or this one, a last gasp for democracy on its decline, made just before a coalition of oligarchs and tyrants takes care of the remaining democracies:

In the early 1990s, in an essay and a book called “The End of History,” Francis Fukuyama told us that humanity has reached the end of the historical road, having achieved a normalcy based on Western liberal democracy, and that this has emerged, or was emerging, as the final form of society. Many agreed. It was apparent.

Fukuyama needed a better atlas.

Now, here’s the thing. The above paragraph will enrage many. Others will not be so enraged but they will quietly pull me aside and explain how everything I just said is wrong. Why? I don’t know. Third base!

What about the urban side of the divide? Non city folks use terms like “the inner city” to describe the urban zone, but not one person who lives there ever uses that term. Sometimes, “downtown” which actually only refers to a tiny portion of the urban zone. And of course, all this forgets the suburbs. Which, in Minnesota, are very very urban. Except the very rural suburbs.

All this is to say that we have problems in Minnesota understanding our own geography, and we we tend to get mad about the terms people use. One of those terms, that was used for years to refer to the parts of Minnesota that were not the “Twin Cities” urban and suburban zone, is “Out State.” I myself come from “Upstate” (New York) and we were proud of our Upness. But in Minnesota, rural folks decided that “Out State” is insulting. Why? One reason: It was a term adopted by urban people.

Anyway, the way to fix this has been to use the term “Greater Minnesota.” I suppose this is supposed to be ironic. Instead of the deeply insulting term “out” we shall use the equally insulting term “greater” but where the insult is punching up. Which of course is an admission by the purveyors of this term that the urban zone is superior to the rural zone, otherwise it would be punching down.

A stupid irony wrapped in ironic stupidity.

But even worse is the actual meaning of the word “greater” in the term “Greater wherever.” Here in Minnesota, “greater” is meant to mean the parts of Minnesota that are, well, within Minnesota but not part of the downtown-inner city aka where non white people are numerous. But that is an entirely new use of the word. Normally, and in many other cases, “greater” means something entirely different. And, I can’t find any exceptions.

Greater X, where X is a place, means X proper PLUS a larger region outside of X.

In ancient world studies and archaeology, “greater” usually means the maximally delineated zone some major power has occupied or colonized at various times in the past, the sort of high water mark of some huge power. Greater Egypt, or Greater Syria. Here for example is a map I found on the Internet of Greater Syria:

When people ask, I sometimes say that I lived in Boston. But everyone who has ever “lived in Boston” knows that almost nobody actually lives in Boston. They live in the “GBA” aka the Greater Boston Area. About a half a million people live in Boston Proper (where proper means more than one thing) while about 5 million people live in Greater Boston. Like this, which is only
a slight exaggeration:

And, of course, Greater New York (city) aka the Greater Metro:

You know what I’m talking about. Roughly half of Americans live in a Greater This or That and many use that term.

So, what gives, Minnesota? Did you not know that? Probably not. I don’t hear “Greater Twin Cities” or similar terms here. I think Minnesotans think they thought this up from scratch, and don’t know that they have bumped into a terminological realty that already exists, and stepped on its toes.

Or, maybe, they have big plans. Maybe I’m misunderstanding. Maybe, someday, historians will be using the term “Greater Minnesota” to mean something like this:

That would be great!

The Revenge of Geography: What the Map Tells Us About Coming Conflicts and the Battle Against Fate by Robert Kaplan.

Leonardo da Vinci by Jay Williams.

Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race by Margot Lee Shetterly.

But despite the importance of lakes in our recreational regime, lakes were actually fairly uncommon in Upstate New York and New England. A surprising number of lakes in the US Northeast are actually rivers or streams that have been dammed. Much of the landscape was glaciated and much of that was blanketed with glacial drift, in which ponds and lakes often form, but since the landscape is hilly (often mountainous), rivers and streams have joined low spots together into a dendritic network of flowing water. Many of the lakes that may have been there right after the glaciers retreated had been swallowed up by this network.

For example, this is the region of upstate New York where I spent much of my childhood and teenage years:

There are lakes, but most of the terrain is uplifted and drained by streams and rivers. Indeed, many of the lakes you see on this map are formed by dams and are not natural. One of the main walleye fishing lakes in New York State is the Great Sacandaga, a reservoir.

Where I now live,in Minnesota, there is not that much change in elevation, so there are lots and lots of lakes, to the extend that this is called “The Land of Lakes.” If you’ve ever seen “Land o’ Lakes” butter or other dairy products … well, that’s from here. Land o’ Lakes is one of our local businesses.

For example, this is where I spend much of my time during the summer here in Minnesota:

The same glacier covered this area and upstate New York, but here there are more lakes, owing mainly to the flatter terrain. Also, very few of these lakes are regulated by dams (though more were in the past during logging days, the dams now in disuse) and I’m 99 percent certain that not one of the lakes shown on this map are human-made. (This map and the one above of New York show roughly the same land area.)

It is worth noting that people who live in Upstate New York can typically tell you where various rivers and streams are, and can tell you what river or stream feeds into what other rivers and streams. In contrast, I’ve found that Minnesotans often have no idea what the nearest stream or river is, or where it goes . In the region depicted here, if you ask someone which way the Mississippi River is (all the water you see here drains into it) people will simply not know or will point in a random direction.

A lake is the landscape thumbing its nose at time. All elevated regions … all places on Earth where you can stand in one place all day and NOT have the briny sea lapping at your ankles (or knees) at least a couple of times a day … are subject to being eroded down to sea level, someday. Wind, rain, phytochemical activity, and running water will eventually flatten any and every continent to the level of the ocean’s tides.

Or at least, that is what the forces of erosion would do were it not for forces of uplift and deposition happening at the same time. And as mountains or uplands rise above the theoretical tide line, rivers cut down into the emerging hills, and seas grind away at the edges, every here and there forms a low spot that does not drain gravity-ward, and that can hold water for a time. Sometimes that time is days, after a rain. Other times, it is tens of thousands of years, until the low spot is breached by erosion and let out to the sea. Eventually, every lake may give up its basin to a stream, and thus its water to the ocean directly, by surface flow (it had already been feeding the sea indirectly via groundwater movement and evaporation).

(There is another way to think of lakes that views them as windows into an underground system of rivers and reservoirs. That perspective works better in a different kind of discussion, so we’ll set it aside for now.)

There is no reason to believe, by the way, that the forces of uplift and deposition on continents is in balance with the forces of erosion. There is no reason to expect that there have not been times in the past when most of the continental regions of the Earth was inundated by shallow seas, with few rises and almost no mountains above them. Conversely, there may be times where much of the world’s water is trapped in ice, so the ocean rests much lower than the continental margins, and much of the land is high and dry. I sometimes wonder how one would characterize the present day in this regard, relative to other time periods. There are major “inland seas” (the Caribbean, for instance) but it seems some major seas and low areas have been elevated in recent millions of years (the Tethys Sea, which once ran from Gibraltar to the Black and Caspian seas, cutting off Africa from Eurasia; The Miocene seas and lowlands of South Asia now known as Pakistan and Afghanistan; the sea that was an arm of the Pacific, where the Amazon now stands; etc.)

For many lakes, their death precedes their capture by the growing network of rivers and streams, as they are filled in with sediment, converted to bog and eventually become a flat marshy spot. The cost you pay for being amenable to settling water is muck and other sediments filling you in. Lakes with outlets don’t have this problem to the same degree, but those outlets are essentially topographical hemorrhages, cutting down even if there are ephemeral human dams in the way, stranding the shorelines and making the lake into an ever growing valley or canyon.

So when you see a lake, take a good look. It might not be there tomorrow.

Well, OK, it probably will be there tomorrow, but at the medium to large temporal scale, all lakes are temporary features of the landscape, thumbing their metaphorical noses at the tide line, to which, eventually, they are bound to sink. Unless something else, much more severe, happens to them, like being ground up by a glacier or subducted into the fiery mantle of the earth. Or the sun exploding. Or it turning out that the Universe is only a simulation game being played in some other universe that does exixt.