ENGINEERING THE HUDSON:
THE CREATION OF A HISTORIC LANDSCAPE

-By Wendy Harris and Arnold Pickman

Corps of Engineers New York District
For Session on The Built Environment: Houses and Landscapes
Society for Historical Archaeology Conference [January 1996] Cincinnati, Ohio


New York States's Hudson River extends 315 miles from the Adirondack Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean. Today, the traveller on the Hudson views verdant banks and abundant wildlife. However, the landscape viewed by the traveller is far from a natural landscape. It is, rather, an engineered cultural landscape, one which was created, in part, as a response to the need for improved transportation into the interior of the developing nation.

On the one hand, we have a place of great natural beauty, depicted by painters of the Hudson River school in the nineteenth century as a manifestation of the sublime. Alternatively, we have the river as an actual physical space whose natural terrain has been modified, beginning in the early nineteenth century, to create a transportion corridor for shipping and rail traffic and sites for industry.

This seeming paradox is very much in keeping with what we know of landscapes and culture. Landscapes are, after all, particular sorts of spaces - that is they are spaces which are socially produced. And as Simon Schama (1995:6) reminds us, a landscape is not nature, but rather the intersection of nature and human perception. He explains that "...landscape is the work of the mind. Its scenery is built up as much from strata of memory as from layers of rock."

Like any artifact, a landscape is dependent upon its context for its meaning (Hodding 1991:123). This paper describes an effort in landscape interpretation undertaken by the authors as part of a cultural resources investigation for the New York District Corps of Engineers. Our assigned task was to evaluate the signficance of a forty mile long series of timber, stone and concrete diking structures and altered shoreline located between Hudson and Waterford, near Albany, New York. These structures are the remains of a state and federal navigation project originating in the eighteenth century and continuing into the twentieth century. This research has led to a somewhat broader consideration of the relationship between the Hudson River landscape as a representation and as an artifact. That is, we are attempting to study the river both as it has been imagined, and as a material product shaped by human activity (Watts 1992).

SunsetHudsonRiver
From the beginning of the settlement of the eastern United States, the natural splendors of the Hudson River and the surrounding scenery were commented upon. One visitor in 1638 noted that "if you would know the garden of New England, then must you glance your eye upon Hudson's river, a place exceeding all yet named" (Wilmerding 1984:4). In 1654, Adrian Van der Donk noted that "his attention was arrested by the Hudson, in which a painter could find rare and beautiful subjects for his brush" (LaBudde 1955:17).

From the 1820s through the 1870s and 80s, painters of the Hudson River School created views of the river which displayed the natural beauties of the landscape. Foremost among them was Thomas Cole who noted that "the Hudson for natural magnificence is unsurpassed. [It] has a natural majesty, and an unbounded capacity for improvement byart" (Wilmerding 1984:5). He painted the river and described it in poetry and in narrative.
Thos. Cole
Cole observed that "To walk with Nature as a poet, is the necessary condition of the perfect artist" (Howat 1978:35). The poet William Cullen Bryant referred to Cole's paintings as "acts of religion" (Howat 1978:37). This spirit of mystical transcendence was to become the hallmark of the Hudson River School painters. Searching for God in nature, they left their homes and studios, and travelled the length of the river, leaving us a record of their encounters.

However, Cole and the other Hudson River School painters did not feel constrained to portray the landscape exactly as it was. Rather they selected out elements which would evoke the emotional impacts they wished to convey.While signs of human activity are shown in these paintings, nature is given the most important role (Schama 1995:367). One scholar notes that "People and other signs of farmlife had to remain picturesque accents in the panorama of nature" (LaBudde 1955:29)
While there are exceptions, overall, the aesthetic of the Hudson River School accords well with Raymond Williams (1973:125) observation regarding neo-Pastoral art: that what we see are landscapes "from which the facts of production [are] banished."
WestPoint_Gignoux
This is reflected in the context within which the paintings of the Hudson River School were produced and consumed.

Although Thomas Cole abhored the economic expediency which led to the destruction of natural elements of the landscape, such as the cutting down of trees to make room for the railroad, he was supported by the very same interests that sought and finally effectuated the river's transformation (Roque 1987:39). The fortunes of the patrician elites who commissioned the art produced by the Hudson River School also subsidized and profited from the Erie Canal, packet steamboat service on the Hudson, and ultimately the Hudson River Railroad. Among the early patrons of the Hudson River School were New York City's mayor Philip Hone and the merchants Luman Reed, Jonathan Sturges, and Daniel Wadsworth, whose money came from commerce and banking. They not only bought the paintings, and arranged for their exhibition, but also financed the wilderness expeditions necessary for creating representations of the natural world (Albion 1970; Bender 1987:123; Dunwell 1991:54-55; Howat 1978:28-29, 38-39;1987:49-70; Roque 1987:21-48) (Schama 1995:364).

Many historians including Raymond Williams (1973), Leo Marx (1978), and Jackson Lears (1981), have noted that at the heart of early industrial capitalism lurked a profound ambivalence towards modernity. Whether expressed as a yearning for a simpler life, or for a green and unspoiled countryside, the sources of these feelings were complex and certainly beyond the scope of this paper. However, it is a fact that many of nineteenth century New York's most powerful merchants and bankers participated in a system which produced representations of the river as generally pristine, minimalizing such features of nascent capitalism as factories, steamships, and bustling waterfronts - at a point in history when we know that these features not only existed but were also being created by these men.

ViewofHusonRiverValley
Jackson Lears (1981:219) speaks of "the pastoral haze which obscured the rise of industrial capitalism." While this may characterize the Hudson River School painters and many of their wealthy patrons, it does not hold true for all segments of society. From earliest times, the economic importance of the Hudson transcended its value as an aesthetic resource. And like all other major rivers, its major economic benefit was as a transportion corridor. In the case of the Hudson, much of which flows through mountainous terrain, the river was of particular importance in permitting the settlement of the interior and the exploitation of its resources.


Alternative visions of the Hudson's landscape appear in texts and graphics oriented to the needs and interests of an emerging middle class. In 1846, Ward and Crooms produced "A Panorama of the Hudson River from New York to Albany." Drawn in pen and ink, it is a remarkable effort to record every topographic and structural detail along both shorelines. There were also guidebooks - produced, we assume, to accompany travellers as they voyaged upriver via steamship. While there are some references to "the picturesque beauty" of the river, most of these texts give primacy to the economic development of the region. Where scenic aspects of the landscape are mentioned,these often reflect a view in which these scenic values have been improved by the works of humans. Among the improvements noted were those made to the body of the river in order to make it navigable as far north as the Erie Canal (Freeman 1837; Munsell and Roland 1859; Phelps 1857).

The Erie Canal had opened in 1825, creating the need to upgrade the Hudson for purposes of transportion. This year,1825, also saw the first exhibition of Thomas Cole's paintings in New York City, and is the date traditionally given for the inception of the Hudson River School (Howat 1978:33-34). Thus from the moment the Hudson River School painters began portraying the natural beauties of the river, economic forces were at work which would transform it. The engineering of the Upper Hudson is a little known chapter in the river's history. At about the same time the Hudson River School painters first entered the valley in search of scenic vistas, engineers and surveyors were collecting bathymetric and hydrological data, and producing the earliest detailed hydrographic maps of the river (Hughes 1844:5).These surveys became the basis for a federal navigation project directed towards staightening and deepening the river from Hudson, New York, to the entry point of the Erie Canal, forty miles upstream.

AlongtheRiverCropsey
While the river was easily navigable from New York City to Hudson, New York, the forty miles between Hudson and Waterford, where the canal made its entry, was a navigational nightmare of shifting shoals, mudflats, sandbars and islets. These features are shown on maps dating from the seventeenth and eighteenth century. The worst of these obstructions were to be found in the vicinity of Castleton and Coeymans. They continue to be shown in greater detail on the 1820 hydrographic maps (Randel 1820). As early as 1769, a traveller up the Hudson noted the recent formation of an island opposite Coeymans in the vicinity of what later became known as Ogden Island (Bacon 1902:352). An early 19th century survey likened these reaches of the channel to "the sinuous curves of a serpent." The same survey observed that portions of the channel "present[ed] to the ablest pilot difficulties almost insurmountable" (Hughes 1844:4). Without improvements to this channel, the Erie Canal would remain inaccessible to steam traffic.

As early as 1797 and continuing through the 1820s various local efforts, and efforts by the State of New York, were made to remove obstacles to navigation. The first works constructed were wing dams which sought to focus the forceof the river currents upon the bars and other obstructions. The results of these efforts were in general merely to shift the obstructions from one location to another (Munsell 1870:302; Newton 1866:10). However, by the 1830s, the first steam powered dredging machines had become available. These machines were incorporated into a federal navigation improvement plan which was proposed in 1832 by DeWitt Clinton, son of New York State's former governor, and subsequently implemented by the Corps of Engineers. In the 1830s the first dikes were constructed in the Albany area, one of these, the Overslaugh dike, appears in the 1846 Wade and Crooms panorama. Construction continued into the early twentieth century.

Clinton's plan involved the construction of parallel rows of dykes to narrow and straighten the river channel, and dredging of the channel between these dykes. The river currents would thus be utilized to maintain the dredged channel. The dykes would also serve to prevent the siltation of the channel by soil eroded from islands and shoreline banks. In addition to the construction of parallel dykes, other dykes were constructed to close off side channels in order to strengthen the force of the current in the main channel. Efforts were also made to make the bends in the river more gradual in order to prevent the formation of bars at these locations (Hughes 1866; Newton 1872; Talcott 1867-8; Corps of Engineers 1897).
ViewOfColdSpring_DeGrally
In the 1860s the State of New York increased its efforts, repairing the previously built dykes and erecting additional dykes. An 1865 report by the State Commission responsible for these efforts lauded the success of the State and Federal efforts in removal of Hudson River navigational obstructions (New York Times 1865). However, other 3 descriptions of the river during the second portion of the nineteenth century indicate that these efforts had provided only limited benefits. The dyke system still permitted the re-deposition of silts from upstream to form new bars at downstream locations (Munsell 1875).

Maps made in the later portion of the nineteenth and early portion of the twentieth century show the dykes, and indicate that at some locations, siltation behind the dykes had begun the process of transforming the river's shoreline.Meanwhile, advances in mechanical technology made feasible the removal of larger volumes of material from the river and the increase in channel depths needed to accomodate larger vessels. The large volumes of dredge spoil generated by the creation of these deeper channels were deposited behind the dykes, transforming the morphology of the river islands and the river banks themselves (U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 1897, 1911-1930). Today, many islands, such as Barren Island, shown here are completely enclosed by accumulated sediment and disposed dredge material.
The net result of the engineering efforts was a profound change in the configuation of the Hudson River shoreline. In these two maps the one on the left dating from 1891, and the one on the right from 1947, we see that the channel is narrowing, the islands merging with each other and with the shore, and the shoreline taking on a more linear aspect.

Corps of Enginners archival photographs taken in the early portion of the 20th century document both new dyke construction during this period, as well as repairs to earlier dykes damaged by ice flows.

The photographs illustrate the timber piles and sheeting which formed the exterior of the dykes and the cross pieces and cobble fill which formed the interior. The earlier dykes were capped by stone blocks and later ones by poured concrete. While the capping has been removed at most locations, extensive remains of the lower portion of the diking structures are still visible at low tide (Corps of Engineers 1915 - 1920s).

These partially buried and submerged remains, as well as the altered terrain, embody the history of the navigation project. Like the paintings of the Hudson River School, these elements are evidence of human efforts to transform nature. Whether created through imaginative activity by artists in their studios or through the application of the principles of hydraulic engineering by work crews such as this, the Hudson River landscape, as we now know it, is a product of social, not natural forces. This type of evidence, when augmented by the study of more traditional textual sources, can greatly expand our knowledge of the river's past.

REFERENCES:

Anonymous
1665 De Noord Rivier anders R. Manhattans opp Hudsons Rivier Genaamt in t'Groodt. 1854 Copy of original map. Collection of the New York Public Library, Map Division
Bacon, Edgar Mayhew
1902 The Hudson River from Ocean to Source. G.P. Putnam's Sons. New York. Bender, Thomas 1987 New York Intellect: A History of Intellectual Life in New York City from 1750 to the Beginnings of Our Own Time. Alfred A. Knopf, New York, NY
Clinton, DeWitt
1832 Improvement of the Hudson River. 22nd Congress, 1st Session, Document No. 189, House of Representatives. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
Dunwell, Frances F.
1991 The Hudson River Highlands. Columbia University Press, New York. Freeman, Hunt and Company 1837 Letters about the Hudson River and its Vicinity, 3rd Edition. New York.
Hodder, Ian
1991 Reading the Past: Current Approaches to Interpretation in Archaeology. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York.
Howat, John K.
1978 The Hudson River and Its Painters. Penguin Press, New York, NY. 1987 A Climate for Landscape Painters. In American Paradise:The World of the Hudson River School, pp. 49-70. Published in conjunction with the exhibition:American Paradise, The World of the Hudson River School, held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, from 4 October 1988 to 3 January 1988. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Hughes, G.W
1844 Report of Colonel of Corps of Topographical Engineers, Relative to the Examination and Survey of the Hudson River. In Annual Report of the Chief of Engineers, United States Army, 1844. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
LaBudde, Kenneth James
1955 The Mind of Thomas Cole. Unpublished Ph.D Thesis University of Minnesota. University Microfilm, Ann Arbor.
Lears, Jackson
1981 No Place of Grace: Anti-Modernism and the Transformation of American Culture, 1880- 1920. Pantheon Books, New York.
Marx, Leo
1978 The Machine in the Garden: Technology and the Pastoral Ideal in America. Oxford University Press, New York, NY.
Munsell, Joel
1870 The Annals of Albany, Volume II. Munsell, Albany. 1875 The Hudson River Overslaugh and Coeymans Bouwery. A Talk Given At the Albany Institute, June 16,1875. Pamphlet in the Collection of the New York Public Library. Munsell and Roland
1859 Munsell's Guide to the Hudson River by Railroad and Steamboat. Albany. New York State Hudson River Commission 1820 Plans for Improving the Navigation of Hudson's River. Collection of the New York Public Library and the New York State Archives. New York Times
1865 Improvement of the Hudson, Report of Commissioners Under Act Chapter 105; Laws of 1864, For the Improvement of the Hudson River. Feb.19, page 6, column 4.
Newton, John
1866 Hudson River Improvement, Inspection Report, Appendix to the Annual Report of the Chief of Engineers and Officers of the Corps of Engineers and Officers of the Corps of Engineers, United States Army. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
1872 Hydrographic Chart of the Hudson River at Coeyman's New York. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
Phelps, Humphry
1857 The Traveller's Steamboat and Railroad Guide to the Hudson River. Phelps and Watson.
Pickman, Arnold and Wendy Harris
1994 Annotated Bibliography of Sources Useful for Hudson River Environmental Reconstruction. On file Corps of Engineers, New York District
Randel, John Juhr
1820 A Map of Hudson's River between the Cities of Troy and Hudson, with the Soundings & all the Islands therein shewing the Obstructions to Navigation together with Blocks, Dams & Piers Projected by Mr. Henry Butler for removing them also the Route of a Lateral Canal for avoiding them Projected by Edmond Charles Genet Esqr. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
Roque, Oswaldo Rodriguez
1987 The Exhaltation of American Landscape Painting. In American Paradise:The World of the Hudson River School, pp.21-48. Published in conjunction with the exhibition: American Paradise, The World of the Hudson River School, held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, from 4 October 1988 to 3 January 1988. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
Sauthier, Claude Joseph
1776 A Topographical Map of Hudson's River with the 1776 Channel Depths of Water, Rocks, Shoals & etc. and the Country Adjacent. Collection of the New York Public Library, Map Division. Schama, Simon 1995 Landscape and Memory. Alfred A.Knopf, New York.
Talcott, R.H.
1867/8 Map of the Hudson River, N.Y. Between Troy and New Baltimore, surveyed and drawn in 1867-8 under the direction of Bvt. Major General John Newton. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York. U.S. Corps of Engineers
1897 Improvement of the Hudson River, N.Y., in charge of Lt. Col. William Ludlow, Corps of Engineers, U.S.A. and Major A. N. Miller, Corps of Engineers, U.S.A. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
1911- Hudson River, New York, Waterford to Hudson. 1930 Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York.
1915- Hudson River, General. Volumes 1,5,8,10,13,16,17,19,and 20. 1920 Photographic prints. Collection of the Corps of Engineers, New York District, Albany Field Office, Troy, New York. United States Geological Survey, Department of the Interior 1891 Albany, New York Quadrangle, 1891 survey, 1898 edition, 15 Minute Series (Topographic).
1947 Albany, New York Quadrangle, 1925 survey, revised 1947, 15 Minute Series (Topographic).
1980 Ravena, New York Quadrangle, from 1952 aerial photographs and 1942 hydrography, 1978 revisions, map edited 1980, 7.5 Minute Series (Topographic).
Wade, William
1846 Wade & Crooms' Panorama of the Hudson River from New York to Albany. J. Disturnell, New York.
Watts, Michael J.
1992 Space for Everything (A Commentary). Cultural Anthropology 7(1): 115-129.
Williams, Raymond
1973 The Country and the City. Oxford University Press, New York, NY.
Wilmerding, John
1984 American Waters: The Flow of Imagination. In The Waters of America: Nineteenth Century American Paintings of Rivers, Streams, Lakes and Waterfalls. Published as a catalogue in conjunction with the exhibit: The Waters of America, Nineteenth Century American Paintings of Rivers, Streams, Lakes and Waterfalls, held at The Historic New Orleans Collection, The New Orlean Museum of Art, 6 May to 18 November 1984. The New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans.
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