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THE PICTORIAL TRADITION AT |
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THE
PICTORIAL TRADITION AT by
The use of old representations and
depictions to make inferences about past natural conditions and character at "All the historical evidence that
we possess upon the subject [of recession] proves the falls to have receded:
and, although there have been no monuments established, yet the representations
of early travelers, when compared with the present condition of the falls,
proves that a change has taken place, though we can not be certain of its
precise amount." Hall produced a facsimile of a print of
the falls seen from the west side of the gorge of the original published in
F. Louis Hennepin's work (1697). In this print Hall noticed a
"cross-fall" flowing from west to east from what is now the
Canadian shore. The print "represents a projecting rock upon the west
side of the river which turned a part of the water across the main fall, as
seen in the sketch." This waterfall did not exist in the later
nineteenth century. Hall also mentioned the visit of Peter
Kalm, student of Linnaeus, in 1750, who visited the falls seventy-two years
after Hennepin. Kalm "distinctly alludes to the projecting rock, which
forced the water out of its direct course, causing it to fall across the
great fall. He speaks of this rock having fallen down a few years previous,
and in his view of the falls the spot is indicated. In this interval of
seventy years we find that the recorded observations of these two travelers
prove precisely the same kind of change to have taken place, as we suppose to
have occurred previously, and which has subsequently altered the outline and position
of the falls." The physiognomy or structural appearance
of plant communities can be seen in broad outlines from these early
depictions at Among the various cautions to be made in
ascribing factual weight to aspects of any drawing of the vicinity of the
cataracts, is the apparent practice of taking sketches or earlier depictions,
especially those used as illustrations, and altering them, usually back in
Europe in the earliest pictures, to improve, clarify or otherwise enhance the
information provided by the earlier sketch. The tendency in this sort of
practice is to reduce the visual complexity (and accuracy) of the view, to
simplify and embolden the image. Another is to remove "blemishes"
such as blasted trees, de-vegetated areas, and the like. Occasionally it
appears that the conifer species (Pine and Hemlock) of the first drawing
tends to resemble a European species, such as a Spruce, probably because the artists
producing the second drawing were not the artist of the first, and were using
imagery with which they were familiar. One artist who did not "spruce
up" or repair his Niagara trees was Thomas Davies, who painted This picture shows the peculiar conifer
vegetation fronting It is obvious in this drawing that the
forest had been cleared away to provide a greensward, or grassed and closely
mown area on which picnics could be had. Such a lawn could not have existed
here without personnel hired by the island owners to tend it. The crest woods
had been stripped to provide a prospect out onto the river. This process of
opening up the high bank forest may have created the condition of exposure by
which the deciduous trees lost their crowns. This particular depiction, and another
after a drawing by the same artist (Adamson, 1985 No. 108, "The Falls of
Niagara. View of Horse-shoe Fall from Below Goat Island, 1857") are
valuable because they give some evidence of conditions before the invention
and general use of the camera. Prospect areas in the vicinity of the Falls
were probably the first forested areas to be cleared. By the time photography
came into general use, these areas probably looked totally different than
they had originally, if for no other reason than the reality of trampling by
thousands of visitors. The two depictions drawn after Cockburn's drawings
"originally engraved in 1833" (Adamson, 1985), one of Porter's
Bluff overlooking Terrapin Rocks, or what is now known as Terrapin Point, and
the other of the base of the gorge probably near what was known as the
American Landing, or the American Stairs, now the base of Prospect Point,
show how dense the coniferous element was - almost certainly Eastern Hemlock
(Tsuga canadensis), although this extraordinary density
may be the result of later "touching up" of an earlier drawing.
Later photographs of the wooded slope overlooking the Terrapin Rocks in the early
years of this century, show a more open forest of younger trees dominated by
deciduous trees with occasional conifers - probably not the primitive
condition. A whole series of early, pre-photography paintings and drawing
show a dense conifer forest on the islands in the American channel, the
island and mainland shorelines, crested areas of hills and gorge, and
particularly at the very base of the talus slope at the bottom of the gorge.
Loss of this forest today, and by the time photographs were widely used
disguise the ecological response of the primitive forest to early lowered
water levels in the Niagara River here when the area was above the falls, and
the extent of what is probably now a rare herbaceous community established on
the exposed riverbed. Saw mills were some of the earliest
human establishments at Niagara on both sides of the river, coinciding with
the need of explorers and voyageurs for planks for ships, continuing into the
military requirements of later history in the region, and culminating in one
of the largest log, paper and pulp milling industries in New York State
(Recknagel, 1923; Scott & Scott, 1983). Baring a biological cause for the
early loss of this forest community at Niagara, such as inability to adapt to
higher pollution regimes, the paper and related industries, now mostly gone
with the depletion of the region's forest reserves, might be presumed a
reason for the disappearance of this forest component (Recknagel, 1923). Out of this treasury of representation,
and compared with the visual characteristics of the present landscape at Guessing the species of deciduous trees
depicted in two centuries of drawings, is more hazardous than that of
conifers, except where the bark is painted white and peeling, when Paper, or
Canoe Birch (Betula papyrifera) is likely the species
depicted, such as occur in the crest forests of the Niagara gorge, and which
are frequent today on the crest of the gorge, especially on the American
side. We are fortunate in that the crest
forest is frequently drawn, since all of the famous prospects take place
within a framework of trees. The crest is a relatively harsh place, in the
face of the prevailing winds on the American side, and with shallow soils on
the Canadian when not on the exposed crests of slopes. Conifers and birches
are frequently painted, and Oaks are as frequent, and Staghorn Sumach occasional
- primarily in early paintings where the observer is on the Canadian side
looking across the gorge at Goat Island, as in paintings by Edward Hicks
around 1830. Even Arbor Vitae (Thuja occidentalis) is
sometimes drawn sprouting, with its characteristic bent-back growth form, out
of fissures in the unlikely habitat of the dolomite caprock, easily seen in
the gorge today. A full account of the illustrated
tradition at Kalm's facsimile print, used by Hall
above, also showed an interesting distinction between a perimeter habitat on The primitive iconography of deciduous
and evergreen trees is simple and without question - useful characteristics
to employ in interpreting tree and habitat types from all sorts of
illustrations depicting the falls: deciduous trees are drawn in oval or
circular outline, evergreens in triangular, spiky outlines; deciduous trees
are always lighter in color than the evergreens, and in autumn and winter
scenes the contrast with the dark colorations of the conifers is unambiguous. The coniferous possibilities are only
four: White Pine (Pinus strobus), Hemlock (Tsuga
canadensis), Arbor Vitae, or White Cedar (Thuja occidentalis),
and Red Cedar (Juniperus virginiana) with a small
likelihood of Balsam Fir (Abies balsamea), as this tree
is and has been rare in the region (Zenkert, 1934) with a station reported
for Niagara Glen, several miles downstream at the base of the Niagara River
gorge (Hamilton, 1943). I have taken it that the vegetation in
most depictions of the falls environment is not distorted beyond credibility
through attempts at idealization or romaticization of nature so much as it is
simplified to signs indicating tree species and community types. Most of the
depictions consulted in the present study were made by people attempting to
report back to an incredulous but skeptical and well-educated public a
stupendous natural phenomena during times when the intended readers were
experiencing a cultural explosion in the elucidation of natural history. They
had an interest in being factual knowing full well, as the eighteenth and
nineteenth century seemed to produce many travelogues, that their presentations
would be tested sooner or later - as would their pictures. Their ability to
accurately relate their experiences in one particular would relate to their
credibility as a whole. Also, the floristic representations are
corroborated through time by different authors and painters, so diverse in
time and origin as to be unlikely that they deliberately participated in a
tradition based on authority rather than their own experience. Vegetational characteristics seem to
correspond to the distribution of species as they occur today, and as they
are likely to occur - for example, today Arbor Vitae enjoys cold, wet boggy
soil as may have occurred in the saturated soil margins on Goat Island, as
drawn, and it occurs today in rocky bluffs in the dolomite caprock of the
Niagara gorge, the talus below and the talus slopes in the plunge pool basin
area at the head of the gorge - none of which contradicts early drawings on
conifers in these areas. It is probable that at least the
shoreline visible around Goat Island was covered with Arbor Vitae because
Francois Andre Michaux said "Goat Island ... is seen from the banks of
the river to be bordered with Arbor Vitae" (1819). Wied-Neuwied (1843)
indicated that "The shores of [ White Pines overtop the deciduous canopy
of the primaeval forest, and several old paintings show this contrast (for
discussion see section on the central woods of In Petrides' (1958) identification
manual of trees and shrubs, in which silhouettes of various tree species are
given, certain useful characteristics may be used to differentiate various
conifer species. Generally, an attempt may be made to distinguish Red Cedar
from Arbor Vitae, in that in the former, the branches may be higher off the
ground, exposing the stem, than in the latter, where the branches descend
almost to the ground, covering the stem or trunk. White Pine has graceful
limbs extending horizontally with the extremities gently ascending. The long,
bare trunk differentiated from a crown, and long plumelike needle-leaves
growing in bunches of five and imparting a dense look to the limbs of the
White Pine contrasts with the trunk covered with old or young limbs of the Hemlock,
not displaying a distinct crown in its rather triangular silhouette. Hemlock
presents a looser, tattered silhouette, with short needless, its branches not
in the bold, heavy strokes of the Pine, but feathery, light tracery. In White
Pine, the trunk may be seen in the crown as the needles are borne away from
it out to the sunlight, but in Hemlock, the upper trunk is usually hidden in
the foliage. Habitat will also serve to separate Red
Cedar from Arbor Vitae in photographs: Red Cedar: intolerant of shade, open,
sunny habitats, dry soils, isolated individuals, needles usually to the tree
tops, sucessional: with weedy growth. Arbor Vitae: tolerates shade, shaded
habitats, wet soils [also along the calcareous rim rock where Red's might
also grow], individuals clumped or contiguous, tree tops in old specimens
frequently denuded, may be a climax species on river edges, with native
growth. One interesting study might be to
examine a century of promotional and souvenir photographs of the Falls on
postcards and other commercial printings to detect the relative distance of
the observer in these pictures from the actual surface of the vegetation. It
may be that with more and more destruction of the shrub communities,
eradication of the herb and shrub layers in Aerial and other distance views distort the
impression of the extent of vegetation on Pictures, painted or photographed,
constitute a rich resource for indirect evidence of the condition of the
early environment at
Facsimile of the drawing of the Falls
printed in Hennepin's narration, English edition, 1698 (
Squalor, naturally, is best emphasized
in winter views (Disfigured Banks, Repulsive Scenery Around Visitor
Approaching Goat Island Bridge for First View of Rapids," ca. 1879,
Plate VIII from James T. Gardner, 1880, in Adamson, 1985). BIBLIOGRAPHY Adamson, J. E. 1985. Hall, J. 1843. Geology
of Hamilton, G. H. 1943.
Plants of the Niagara Parks System of Hennepin, F. L. 1697. A
New Discovery of a Vast Country in Michaux, Francois
Andre. 1819. Published edition 1841. North American Sylva; or, a Description
of the Forst Trees of the Unitec States, Canada, and Nova Scotia, J. Dobson,
Philadelphia. Olmsted, F. L. 1880. in
Gardner, J. T., Director. 1880. Petrides, G.A. 1958. A
Field Guide to Trees and Shrubs. Peterson Field Guide Series. Houghton
Mifflin Co. Recknagel,
A. B. 1923. The forests of Robinson, W. 1875.
Alpine Flowers. John Murray, Scott, S. D. & P.
K. Scott. 1983. The Wied-Neuwied, M. A. P.,
Prinz von. 1843. Travels in the interior of Zenkert, C. A. 1934.
Flora of the |
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