The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 95, July 1991 - April, 1992 Page: 442
598 p. : ill. (some col.), maps, ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Hzstorzcal Quarterly
claims over the centrality of the World's Columbian Exposition of 1893 to the
larger movement, and demonstrates how politics was utilized "to achieve a con-
geries of socioeconomic reforms related to urban design" (p. 75). With his able
synthesis and admirable documentation of these seemingly disparate subjects,
Wilson provides a context for the eight case histories that follow and, more im-
portant, rescues the City Beautiful from the narrow design context to which it
is so often confined, thereby reintegrating it into the larger conceptual frame-
work of turn-of-the-century urban development.
The eight case studies, which constitute his two central sections, are orga-
nized chronologically. For the movement's initial stage, Wilson surveys Kansas
City, Harrisburg, Seattle, and Denver. For its second stage, he returns to Kan-
sas City, Seattle and Denver, but substitutes Dallas for the Pennsylvania capital
examined earlier.
With this sample, Wilson accomplishes several objectives. To begin with, he
extends the movement beyond the often-cited Washington and Chicago plans
of Daniel H. Burnham to include City Beautiful plans-and, indeed, cities-
that customarily receive only passing attention from urban historians. Next, by
tracing the progression of the movement in Kansas City, Seattle, and Denver,
Wilson demonstrates that successful planning depended ultimately upon effec-
tive coalition politics. Finally, by providing more contained accounts of the City
Beautiful in a small city (Harrisburg) and in a larger one on the verge of the
automobile revolution (Dallas), Wilson suggests the movement's variety. (For
each case history, the narrative is clear, but graphic presentation tends not to
be. Readers are advised to supplement the visual material in the text with more
detailed maps from other sources.)
"The Glory, Destruction, and Meaning of the City Beautiful" is more than
the title of the book's concluding chapter. It is also an expression of the author's
central theme: that the movement was more than neoclassical massing, and that
it was, in fact, the city-building process that gave shape to early metropoli-
tan America.
Emory Unzverszty DANA F. WHITE
Pattzllo Hzggzns and the Search for Texas Ozl. By Robert W. McDaniel with Henry
C. Dethloff. (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 1989. Pp. xii
+ 174. Preface, illustrations, epilogue, appendices, notes, index. $19.95.)
Pattillo Higgins's contributions to the discovery and development of the
Spindletop field, through his insistence that oil was there, and his role in get-
ting Anthony Lucas to come to Beaumont have been recognized for the last
half century. His long and successful career in the discovery and production of
oil in the whole eastern half of the state has not. Robert McDaniel, his great
nephew, attempts to fill that gap with this book.
The story is a fascinating one of a rowdy, womanizing young man who finds
religion and becomes a successful businessman in logging, real estate, and
brickmaking. On a business trip to Pennsylvaia he catches "oil fever," and the
search for oil becomes the focus of his life for the next sixty-five years. Cer-442
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 95, July 1991 - April, 1992, periodical, 1992; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth117153/m1/502/: accessed April 26, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.