San Antonio College Library

"The evolutionary road is littered with failed experiments, and Richard Manning suggests that agriculture as we have practiced it runs against both our grain and nature's. Drawing on the work of anthropologists, biologists, archaeologists, and philosophers, along with his own travels, he argues that not only our ecological ills - overpopulation, erosion, pollution - but our social and emotional malaise are rooted in the devil's bargain we made in...

Includes Jefferson's correspondence, drawings, and plans for Monticello's gardens. Jefferson's journals on horticulture at Monticello, his achievements, failures, and plans with some of his letters on the subject to Washington, Madison, Adams. The size and quality of the book is explained by the editor's situation: founder and first president, prime computer, and founder an president of fulcrum (and a serious historian and naturalist). Limited edition,...

Plants and animals originally domesticated in the Near East arrived in Europe between 7,000 and 4,000 BC. Was the new technology introduced by migrants, or was it an 'inside job'? How were the new species adapted to European conditions? What were the immediate and long-term consequences of the transition from hunting and gathering to farming? These central questions in the prehistory of Europe are discussed here by leading specialists, drawing on...

This new, annotated translation of Hesiod's Works and Days is a collaboration between David W. Tandy, a classicist, and Walter Neale, an economist and economic historian. Hesiod was an ancient Greek poet whose Works and Days discusses agricultural practices and society in general. Classicists and ancient historians have turned to Works and Days for its insights on Greek mythology and religion. The poem also sheds light on economic history and ancient...

"Great scientific and technological breakthroughs in the twentieth century enabled American farmers to produce bountiful harvests that ensured an abundant and relatively cheap food supply. But this agricultural wealth had its problems. As farmers became more productive, their surplus commodities - such as grain, milk, and cotton - glutted the market and drove prices down. With few exceptions, and despite their increased productivity, farmers found...

"Focusing on the Great Plains States of Kansas, Nebraska, North Dakota, and South Dakota between 1929 and 1945, Down and Out on the Family Farm examines the small family farmers and the rural rehabilitation program designed to help them. Historian Michael Johnston Grant reveals the tension between economic forces that favored large-scale agriculture and political pressure that championed family farms, and the end results." "Grant provides extensive,...

The impact on climate from 200 years of industrial development is an everyday fact of life, but did humankind's active involvement in climate change really begin with the industrial revolution, as commonly believed? William Ruddiman's provocative new book argues that humans have actually been changing the climate for some 8,000 years--as a result of the earlier discovery of agriculture. The "Ruddiman Hypothesis" will spark intense debate. We learn...