11 records matched your query       

Author:

Dugatkin, Lee Alan, 1962-

Title:

Mr. Jefferson and the giant moose : natural history in early America / Lee Alan Dugatkin.

Publisher:

The University of Chicago Press,

Copyright Date:

2009

Description:

xii, 166 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.

Subject:

Degeneration--Historiography--America--Historiography--18th century.
Human beings--Effect of environment on--America.
Life sciences--History--18th century.
Jefferson, Thomas,--1743-1826--Knowledge and learning.
Buffon, Georges Louis Leclerc,--comte de,--1707-1788--Attitudes.
Jefferson, Thomas,--1743-1826.
Buffon, Georges Louis Leclerc,--comte de,--1707-1788.
Natural History--history--United States.
Ecology--history--United States.
Evolution--United States.
History, 18th Century--United States.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (p. 153-158) and index.

Contents:

"Dictatorial powers of the botanical gentlemen of Europe" -- The count's degenerate America -- "Noxious vapors and corrupt juices" -- "Not a sprig of grass that shoots uninteresting" -- "Geniuses which adorn the present age" -- Enter the moose -- Thirty-seven-pound frogs and Patagonian giants -- Extracting the "tapeworm of Europe" from our brain.

Summary:

Capturing the essence of the origin and evolution of the so-called "degeneracy debates," over whether the flora and fauna of America (including Native Americans) were naturally weaker and feebler than species elsewhere in the world, this book chronicles Thomas Jefferson's efforts to counter French conceptions of American degeneracy, culminating in his sending of a stuffed moose to Buffon.

ISBN:

0226169146 (cloth : alk. paper)
9780226169149 (cloth : alk. paper)

OCLC:

(OCoLC)317923081

LCCN:

2009013816

Locations:

USUX851 -- Iowa State University - Parks Library (Ames)

UNUX074 -- University of Northern Iowa - Rod Library (Cedar Falls)

OIAX792 -- Grinnell College (Grinnell)

SOAX911 -- Simpson College - Dunn Library (Indianola)