The first book I need to look at is Taming Manhattan: Environmental Battles in the Antebellum City, by Catherine McNeur, professor at Portland State University in Oregon. In fact, McNeur is the scholar I will be interviewing and working with for this project. Her book examines things like stray dogs and hogs roaming the streets of Manhattan, as well as levels of horse manure, animal carcasses, and refuse in the city during those years prior to the Civil War.
- Karl Jacoby, Crimes Against Nature: Squatters, Poachers, Thieves, and the History of American Conservation (University of California Press, 2001)
- Jeremy Zallen, American Lucifers: The Dark History of Artificial Light (University of California Press, 2019)
- Tiya Miles, Wild Girls: How the Outdoors Shaped the Women Who Challenged a Nation (Norton, 2023)
These are different from traditional books that describe the history of the United States and should be interesting reads.