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So far in class we have covered a variety of things from the Gilded Age to natural disasters like the Chicago Fire, Johnstown Flood, and Galveston Storm. While covering some of these topics and natural disasters we have come to see them through different lenses, digging deeper into these disasters, than just looking at the devastation caused, but also the hidden ramifications.  After looking through the past blog posts I’ve noticed how some themes have come up repeatedly.  A theme I was able to pick out after reading the posts was the notion of man’s ability to change nature or in other words “man vs. nature.  I’ve seen this theme since the beginning when we talked about the Gilded Age where JOHNKANE talks about how “as Calhoun describes, many cities were being created with a more modernized organization and innovation.”  We are able to see how as societies grew men molded the land to meet their needs.  JohnKane goes on to say that this was done by the addition of “sewage systems, lighted streets, parks, and other amenities being constructed to enhance urban life.”  Men didn’t just mold the land to meet their needs in terms of sanitation or leisure time (hence sewage systems and parks), but they also did it to make money. In the post by GRAVITY21 we see how the “boosters” who were people who wanted to make money off of the land, ran into the problem that “citizens wanted to build a harbor in the mouth of the Chicago River” but “there was a hindrance preventing them from achieving their vision.” Gravity21 goes on to talk about how that issue led to “the Chicagoans to “take fate into their own hands” by constructing plans for a canal, which led to the creation of the first part of second nature.”   ZHEDRICK in his post describes “second nature” as “pertaining to the man-made creations that allowed for the city to expand its commercial opportunities.” This shows us how man didn’t let nature get in the way of making money and how man has changed nature.

Another theme brought about in the blog posts was the issue of manmade disasters. In terms of the Johnstown Flood MCKENNDY21 stated that “Godbey first retells the story of how the flood happened and how it could have been prevented if people would have built the dam correctly the first time and then checked on it during the storm to make sure it hold it up it could have prevented a natural disaster.” MCKENNDY21 then states that Godbey “goes as far as saying ” the Johnstown Flood was clearly manmade”.  PETERROSSI1 talks about how during the Galveston hurricane the argument for the loss of life being a manmade disaster can be made because he thought that “ignoring the warnings of a storm, is a form a negligence that can be blamed for the loss of life in the storm.”  These two points help us see that the argument for a disaster being manmade can be made on some disasters that occurred throughout or nation’s history.  These were just some reoccurring themes that I was able to pick out from the first part of the semester.  I think it’s fascinating how even though these events are different, similarities can be made between them.