Glossary

driving cities

Cities like Los Angeles, Phoenix, Denver, Dallas, and Houston became known as "driving cities" because of their dependence on automobiles. This mobility, together with the availability of inexpensive land, led to the creation of metropolitan areas consisting of many suburbs linked together through networks of highways.

hydraulic society

According to historian Donald Worster, the West became "a modern hydraulic society," a society in which social order is based on the intensive manipulation of water and its products in an arid setting. Federally financed dams for irrigation, flood control, navigation, and electric power transformed the West during the twentieth century.

politics of liberation

The political thinking of the post-1945 West has been dominated by the idea of individual freedom, measured by less government and fewer restrictions.

Sagebrush Rebellion

This rebellion was the effort of conservative western politicians to have the federal government cede its control of western lands to individual states. Their expectation was that the states would develop some of the land, and sell off most of it to promote economic development. It failed because of distrust of developers.

southern rim

After 1945 power shifted to the southern rim of the United States. This rim circled half the country - from the Chesapeake region southward through southern cities, westward along the Gulf of Mexico and across the Southwest to the Pacific, and then north to Seattle. This was the area of greatest economic growth and immigration after World War II.

Sunbelt

During the late 1960s and 1970s, the South witnessed a period a spectacular economic growth while industry in the Midwest declined. Cheap labor, weak labor unions, cheaper land, low taxes, and fewer regulations all attracted industries to the South by lowering general operating costs. The South became known as the Sunbelt.

western economic diversification

After 1945 the West experienced a dramatic economic transition. Previously, it had been a land dominated by extractive industries such as mining, agriculture, ranching, oil, and logging. Now new electronic, aerospace, high technology, and service industries surpassed the older economic staples.

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