Paving Prairie with Green Rectangles
A Distorted Sense of Beauty
By Laurine Brown, PhD, MPH
Illinois is "the Prairie State." Early pioneers described the "endless flat land covered with tall grass blowing in the wind… and enormous sky" which at pre-settlement time covered 60% of the state. Where rippling seas of lavender stretched further than the eye could see, appeasing all senses, and fading into another marvelous sea of nature’s planting - phlox, purple cone flower, silphiums. Where song birds circled in chorus, coyotes bedded in tall grass and herons fished above their reflections in dark shallow water. Where dragonflies navigated the air currents, elegant monarch butterflies sampled nectar from fragrant wildflowers, toads voiced their opinion in tenor, and prairie dogs burrowed breathing holes in the earth. And where the buffalo roamed.
Where can we today experience this glorious Illinois prairie?
It’s gone. Sadly, an official 99.99% of the state’s tall grasslands vanished after John Deere invented the plow in 1836. Now our "virtual" prairie state is paved in croplands and suburban greens. "What a thousand acres of Silphiums looked like when they tickled the bellies of the buffalo is a question never again to be answered, and perhaps not even asked," laments Aldo Leopold in "A Sand County Almanac".
Perhaps drastically transforming the native landscape to grow food crops seems somewhat rational. But rolling it over with the homeowner’s treasured turf grass defies logic. Nature’s logic, that is. Amazingly, we Americans even pass "weed-ordinances" that forbid the very plants native to this place. Plants whose living and dying over thousands of years built the richest soil on earth, and sustained a harmonious culture of wildlife.
A humorous dialogue "Lawns and God" circulating anonymously on the internet portrays the silliness of what many of us simply accept as "normal". The Creator asks St. Frances "What in the world is going on down there in the USA? What happened to my no-maintenance garden plan? All I see are these green rectangles." St Frances struggles to explain, "It’s the tribes that settled there, Lord. The Suburbanites. They started calling your flowers "weeds" and went to great lengths to kill them and replace them with grass." While the Creator gets increasingly agitated, St. Frances describes how the Suburbanites kill all the "weeds" and fertilize the grass so it will grow. When it does, they cut it off and pay to have it thrown away. Instead of being relieved when grass growth slows during summer heat and drought, they drag out hoses and pay more money to water it so they can continue to mow it and pay to get rid of it. And when the leaves fall they… Enough! The Creator halts the conversation in disgust.
We are the "intelligent" species?
Those of us that grew up with green lawns are surprised to learn they have been popular for a mere 50 years. A fascinating book "The Lawn: A History of An American Obsession" by VS Jenkins meticulously documents the history of this uniquely American obsession, demonstrating that lawns are a cultural creation. By the 1950s, Jenkins asserts, Americans had been "seduced" to invest in a landscape aesthetic that was attainable only at great costs to themselves and to the environment. Turf-grass lawns were the product of successful marketing to the American middle class by several influential groups, coupled with the universal human compulsion to demonstrate social status and control nature.
Until the late 19th century few Americans had any desire for a front lawn, much less access to seeds for growing one. Short-cropped grasses that could tolerate the shock of frequent cutting were not native to America. The first "lawns" were imported from English Gardens by the rich (like George Washington’s Mt Vernon), and were maintained by grazing animals. But the average household had a functional yard prior to the 1950s, with the house right up on the street. In the mid 1830s the lawnmower was invented making mowing possible. Lawn mower ads of the 1800s and early 1900s featured pretty girls in entirely impractical clothes (short skirts, high heels), clearly aimed at men, using sexuality to lure them into investing in lawns with all the amenities. Still maintaining a lawn was impractical for most.
By the end of World War II however, lawn fashion caught on. Powerful persuasion by the US Golf Association, Garden Clubs of America and US Department of Agriculture convinced people that "good moral citizens" had well-trimmed front lawns (for aesthetics, not usefulness). Having convinced us to establish lawns, promoters of lawns then had to convince us that lawns weren’t a lot of work if we just used their products (machinery, chemicals, seeds, etc.). Ads of the mid-1900s featured women, children and even pets with products, implying their "ease of use" (and safety, albeit untested).
USDA funded development of turf grasses, an odd activity for an agriculture department. Apparently, the Golf Association had a few friends in high places at USDA, enough to influence taxpayers’ money being funneled to golf course turf, which in turn was promoted as homeowner turf. War mentality marched right into our yard care. "Give em Hell!" the suburban wife says to her husband in one 1950s magazine ad as he blasts "weeds" with diluted war chemicals. While conquering nature was not a new quest, the ability to obliterate natural life was made possible with tools of war: machinery and chemicals. The late 20th century lawn became such an artificial environment it could not live up to suburban standards without an arsenal chemical fertilizers & pesticides.
All this to keep up with the Joneses?
We are only beginning to discover the true costs of paving our prairies in turf. Aside from wiping out native habitat and smothering the soul of this land, the toxic chemicals required to achieve such "beauty" are polluting the earth, it’s waters, and ultimately us. How ironic that while we are eager to line our medicine cabinets with extracts of native purple cone flower (Echinacea), we have destroyed the immune-boosting flower’s habitat. Our health may be connected to the return of the prairies in more ways than we can imagine.
It’s time to re-define yard beauty. The hopeful message is that if the green velvet lawn we so unwisely value is a cultural creation, we are free to replace it with safer, more harmonious and life-giving alternatives. How about native Illinois dress?
Next month: information about a local Yard Smart campaign that encourages homeowners to invite native diversity back into their yards.
Prairie descriptions: Wilder LI, "Little House in the Prairie" 1935, p13; Anderson R, "The Prairies" Outdoor Illinois, Feb 1972; M Berenbaum and MR Jeffords, "As It Was: The Story of the Illinois Prairie" for Prairie Watch, undated.
Prairie loss figures: Robertson KR, RC Anderson and MW Schwartz. "The tallgrass prairie mosaic" Table 3.2, 1997; Schwartz, MW "Conservation in Highly Fragmented Landscapes" NY: Chapman & Hall, Chapter 3; Illinois Department of Natural Resources, "Illinois Natural Areas Inventory" 2003.
"Lawns and God" dialogue: anonymous author circulating on internet, viewed May 24, 2001.
History of Lawns: Jenkins VS, "The Lawn: A History of An American Obsession" 1994.
March 2003
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