Grab the Car Keys
Car Country by Christopher W. Wells
My coffee cup rating: [out of a possible 5 cups]
☕️☕️☕️☕️
As Americans, grabbing our car keys is the first thing we usually do when going somewhere. Not only is this commonplace, it’s likely our only option. Why is this? What made America so car-dependent? Enter Chris’ book, Car Country: An Environmental History. This book is an all-access pass into our motoring past weaving a detailed story of how the car and our roads came to be. Chris has divided the book into four overarching themes: The pre-automobile era, the motor age, building roads/infrastructure and creating fully car-centric landscapes.
In the pre-automobile age, America had one of the most extensive railway transportation systems in the world. This included trains, horse-drawn or electric streetcars and trolly networks. This network was working well until the rise of the automobile started to choke them out. This was one area where I thought the book was light on covering. I understand it’s not the main focus of this book so I won’t doc many points for it.
The motor age was highly dominated by one man…Henry Ford. His model T was a smash hit and help create one of the most fascinating metrics of the book-the automobile adoption rate. In the early 1900s car ownership skyrocketed from 618,727 in 1911 to 8.1 million in 1920. That’s stupid fast growth for such a short period of time. This created a domino effect that helped propel the nation into its next two phases, building roads and creating infrastructure. These two topics Chris dives deep into the policies, politics, economics, and power that created our modern car-centric lifestyle.
With about a decade of study, Chris brilliantly lays out the progression of our car & road history beautifully. While it can be very dense, detailed and academic at times, Chris does a great job of keeping the information light and accessible. Anyone with an interest in this topic will would be hard pressed to find a more detailed, engaging book.
More Resources:
Author’s Website: Chris Wells
To hear more from Chris about his book , check out this interview on Streetsmn Podcast