Book Review

This is a dirty book. In it, forestry professors Daniel D. Richter, Jr. and Daniel Markewitz examine in detail how dirt, which they call soil, was formed over millennia, was altered by centuries of agriculture, and finally during the last few decades was transformed yet again by modern forestry practices. Fortunately, these authors do not rely solely on science to tell this story. "History," states the book's forward, "is an essential element for understanding the ecological status of a place" (p. xii). It is this cross-fertilization of history and ecology that will make Understanding Soil Change appealing to environmental historians.	1
Although Richter and Markewitz claim their study has "implications for soil and ecosystem dynamics across a vast and important area of the earth's surface," (p. 65) the book examines as its case study the soil of a single Piedmont farm, the Old Ray Place, in South Carolina's Calhoun Experimental Forest, during three distinct time periods. Understanding Soil Change begins by explaining the pre-human history of the farm's acidic soil, which took thousands of years to form from weather-eroded rock. The authors next examine the soil's agricultural past, which during the last three centuries involved a shift from Native American corn cultivation to plantation agriculture dominated by cotton production. Finally, the book concludes by looking at the last several decades of the farm's history, when the federal government purchased the land and began reforesting it with loblolly pines.	2
The authors show, through a complex analysis of archived soil samples taken from the Old Ray Place during the past four decades, that centuries of agriculture dramatically altered the chemical composition of the farm's soil. Whereas cotton production reduced the amount of carbon in the soil by as much as forty percent, the fertilizer used during this period increased quantities of nitrogen, phosphorus, and calcium while simultaneously lowering the soil's natural acidity levels. More importantly, these changes have not subsided; instead they continued on in the soil for decades after agricultural abandonment, will possibly persist for centuries to come, and have already begun affecting the federal government's efforts to reforest the farm with trees. Richter and Markewitz conclude, "These new forest ecosystems share a legacy both with the land's original primary forest ecosystem, and with the land's agricultural past which has so extensively transformed the region's ecosystems biologically, chemically, and physically" (p. 153).	3
It is this lingering legacy found in Richter and Markewitz's dirt that is most important to the field of environmental history. By illustrating how a particular landscape's deep agricultural past continues to affect the present and future of its soil, and in turn the culture living and working atop that soil, Understanding Soil Change will force environmental historians to re-examine places that long ago evolved beyond farming. And in a nation where agriculture dominated early on, and continues to do so across much of the country, such an approach could help initiate a reassessment of farming's impact on American history, an impact that according to Richter and Markewitz continues to influence in unintended ways long after crop rows are plowed under for suburban developments.	4
While instructive, Understanding Soil Change is not an easy read. Environmental historians may at times feel buried under piles of scientific data, and may likewise question the analytical thrust of the book, which assesses the chemical composition of soil in an effort to increase forest productivity rather than to determine ways to return this landscape to ecological health. Yet just as history has helped these two scientists better understand the ecology of the Old Ray Place, so too can the science in Understanding Soil Change aid environmental historians to better understand the history of the places they study.	5
Neil M. Maher, assistant professor of history, Federated Department of History, New Jersey Institute of Technology—Rutgers University, Newark, is currently revising his dissertation on the environmental history of the New Deal's Civilian Conservation Corps.

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