The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 88, July 1984 - April, 1985 Page: 37
476 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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The Ecology of the Red River in 18o6
of fire.6s Finally, Custis's observations on the Great Raft, which was
extending the swamplands (and such species as Spanish moss, Til-
landsia usneoides [L.] L.) far to the north, and his notes on the ad-
vance of certain tropical species (notably the coffee senna, Cassia occi-
dentalis L. and the sicklepod, C. obtusifolia L.), which were "found
to overspread" and "infest" the entire country, serve to check current
fancies of a smoothly functioning climax paradise in nature.69
Why, then, is the Red River tour a "forgotten expedition," as
Joseph Ewan has styled it? How is it possible that we are only
now discovering that Custis was the first American academic to be
attached to a western exploring expedition or that more than a decade
before examinations of the near Southwest by Thomas Nuttall, Ber-
landier, and James and Say of the Long expedition, a Jeffersonian
explorer had already examined in some detail half of the Red River?70
Part of the somewhat complicated answer may be found in the
overshadowing effect of the Lewis and Clark expedition, both at the
time and, later, among historians. More important is the total lack of
promotion received by the exploration. Apparently concerned that his
political enemies might attempt to use the exploration to embarrass
him (perhaps even to link the administration with the Burr-Wilkinson
conspiracy), Jefferson avoided drawing attention to the tour. Despite
the tense confrontation with a large Spanish force, neither the expedi-
tion nor the confrontation was even mentioned in a front-page story
The species Custis saw that have now become extinct include the Carolina parakeet
and ivory-billed woodpecker; those no longer found along the Red River are the cougar,
bison, elk, plains gray wolf, peregrine falcon, whooping crane, and white cedar.
68Correll and Johnston, Vascular Plants of Texas, 1,405 (Datura stramonium L.) and
1,522 (Lobelia siphilitica L.). In the first published (but heretofore overlooked) explana-
tion by a United States observer regarding the origin of the western prairies, Freeman
wrote that "neither the nature of the soil, nor any other natural cause, gives rise to
these extensive and rich pastures, with which Western America abounds." Instead, he
wrote that they owed their existence "to the custom which these nations of hunters
have, of burning the grass at certain seasons." See Freeman in Flores (ed.), Jefferson and
Southwestern Exploration, 209-21o. Freeman ignored, of course, the equally important
role of increasing aridity farther west, but he was far more accurate than the next
United States citizen to venture an explanation: Caleb Atwater, "On the Prairies and
Barrens of the West," American Journal of Science . . . [and] Arts, I (1818), 116-125,
postulated that the plains were the remains of former lakes. The controversy over the
role that Indian fires played in creating and extending the plains continues to attract
scholarly attention. For particularly good discussions, see Carl O. Sauer, "Grassland
Climax, Fire, and Man," Journal of Range Management, III (Fall, 195o), 16-21, and
Pyne, Fire in America, 71-122.
69Custis in Flores (ed.), Jefferson and Southwestern Exploration, 264; Correll and
Johnston, Vascular Plants of Texas, 356 (Tillandsia usneoides [L.] L.), 791-792 (Cassia
occidentalis L. and C. obtusifolia L.).
70Joseph Ewan to D. L. F., Mar. 12, 1982. See footnote 3, above, for other south-
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 88, July 1984 - April, 1985, periodical, 1984/1985; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101210/m1/59/: accessed April 27, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.