My First Geography Writings

Human Geography Exercises for Independent Study

The following questions have been taken from the book, Human Geography: Places and Region in Global Context. Page numbers on which the questions are to be found are noted in parentheses.
Chapter One, question five (53): The Evolving Landscape of Oakland Lake Park
Oakland Lake Park is a popular place to walk or jog, feed ducks, and picnic. The lake, like almost all in Texas, was created artificially. An earthen dam blocks the natural stream that once trickled northward into White Lake, a former cow tank on the site of the old White dairy farm, now glorified by real estate developers. The stream-bed still exists, and parts of it hold water year-round, but it is now fed only by run-off from Oakland Lake.
Nearly seventy years old, the dam was constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps, along with the original sidewalks and the Pavilion, the park being one of many projects launched by the Works Progress Administration during the 1930s. Typical of the CCC’s practices, the Pavilion was built from local materials—stones of varying kinds, probably extracted as part of the dam-building process. Two water fountains, of the same masonry construction, once provided stone-cold water on even the hottest summer afternoons, but were removed by the city almost twenty years ago.
Cattle once grazed where lovers now tryst, and cheapskate golfers practice their swings along the edge of the grove of native post oaks. Squirrels play on the metal box that recently had housed U.S. Geological Survey sensing equipment, removed after a year’s survey, the box now abandoned. Teenagers sneak down by the storm drains to smoke marijuana unobserved by the car patrols of police officers. The drains feed storm water runoff into the lake, dumping lawn fertilizers and pesticides along with a strange silt that has formed a large sandbar at the lake’s southern end. Ducks and turtles nest around and behind the shallows formed by the sandbar, a natural windbreak that shelters them from the prevailing north-south winds channeled by the treeline.
A mile-long sidewalk circles the lake, inlaid marble tiles marking its quarter miles. Three signs also decorate this jogging circuit, each warning of the contamination of the lake’s fish. Possession of said fish is punishable by up to a $2,000 fine, but this does not deter sport fishermen from practicing their casting. Some even take home their poisoned and meager catches. Twenty-five years ago, the lake was a popular spot for retired men to fish the day away, sometimes sharing their knowledge of the art with children passing through the park on their way home from the nearby elementary and secondary schools.
More than one hundred years ago, the park was a lightly wooded grassy area. Local cowmen grazed their stock here, before taking them to auction at the downtown stockyards. As houses began to dot the prairie, and dirt roads became paved, the lands were parceled off to stave off foreclosing banks, the locale found new life as this neighborhood park. To say it has been modified by human activity is an understatement. The squirrels inhabiting the oaks are descended from ones brought in by a local resident for game, more than two generations ago—two human generations.
No cattle remain. But the lake is now a stopping point for migrating ducks, of no less than eight varieties, and some years, as many as twenty. Songbirds also thrive here, as well as two varieties of gulls seeking fairer weather from the coast, and juvenile blue herons fish along the marshy southern shore. Catfish, sunperch, and carp live, are poisoned, and die where once no lake existed.
From the vantage point of the Pavilion’s stone wall, one can watch intramural softball games, bicyclists, and the nocturnal muskrats that gnaw, beaver-like, on the trees lining the lakeshore. From the vantage of the mind’s eye, one cannot so easily imagine buffalo, quail, and white-tail deer.
Disease is slowly taking the oaks. Concrete is taking the grass, as law enforcement vies for better sightlines from the street. The contamination of the lake is taking the fish, and probably also damages the birds that eat them. And humans, it is suspected, are eating the geese—three remain from a gaggle of more than twelve.
Already, the park is off-limits for twelve hours of every day, a curfew having been enacted shortly after the murder of an off-duty police officer. A last vestige of nature in this part of east Fort Worth, Oakland Lake Park may soon pass altogether.

Chapter two, question 3 (101): Specialty Products
The main economic specialties for the countries listed below were obtained through the Encarta Online encyclopedia. All currency figures are in U.S. dollars.
BOLIVIA—mineral extractions of tin, gold, zinc, and silver; 1995 exports were estimated at $1.186 billion.
GHANA—mineral extractions and agricultural products, exporting gold, cacao, lumber, and electricity (to nearby countries); 2000 exports totaled $1.94 billion.
GUINEA—mineral extractions, with agriculture as the principal economic activity, exporting foodstuffs such as pineapples, peanuts, palm kernels, and coffee, as well as the chief mineral exports of bauxite, diamonds, and gold. Export revenues were not listed.
LIBYA—petroleum contributes 95% of Gross Domestic Product, exporting 504 million barrels of crude oil, and 6.2 billion cubic meters of natural gas. Other exports included marine salt and potash, however, revenue figures from exportation were listed as “unavailable.”
NAMIBIA—mineral extractions included 1.5 million carats of gem-quality diamonds, as well as uranium, copper, tin, lead, silver, vanadium, tungsten, and salt. Export revenues were not listed.
PERU—world’s leading exporter of fish meal, but also mineral extractions of copper, silver, lead, and zinc. A “significant” export is petroleum, at 35.5 million barrels, and 0.37 billion cubic meters of natural gas, as well as iron ore and sugar. Export revenues for 2000 were $6.8 billion.
ZAMBIA—copper mining accounted for nearly half of its export earnings of $0.8 billion, comprising 241, 200 metric tons. Other exported mineral included cobalt, gold, silver, and gem-quality emeralds.


Chapter three, question one (150): Population Distribution in My Home State
By 1990, 80% of the Texan population resided in urban areas. Texas had few natural lakes, the largest being Caddo Lake, along what is now the Louisiana border. Settlements therefore followed the river systems. Settlements grew into towns, towns grew into cities, and the rivers that once flowed freely now are mostly dammed, serving as municipal reservoirs.
But it was the railroads, not the waterways, that drove settlement. Texas became a major producer of cotton as rail lines opened the West, linking it to major national and international markets. Cattle production, too, exploited this rapid transit, as barbed wire began to criss-cross the nation, interfering with the Chisholm, and other cattle trails. Cow towns, like the nickname of my hometown of Fort Worth, were the hubs of rail activity, and the end-destinations of cattle. Meat-packing became a significant industry, and Fort Worth was home to both the Swift and Armor companies, which later merged. In its heyday, over 100, 000 head of cattle passed into the Fort Worth Stockyards per day.
In 1901, oil was tapped at Spindletop, changing the destiny of Texas forever. Texas became the leading state in the production of petroleum products. The industry spurred the growth of the Texas economy with forward linkages to petrochemicals and related manufacturing, especially of industrial machinery and sheet metals. Increasingly, the economy shifted from an agricultural and ranching base to an urban one related to and supporting the petroleum industry. Commercial shipping was widely developed along the Gulf Coast, a leading factor in the growth of Houston’s population, the state’s most populous city at almost two million.
Overall, Texas is the second most-populous state in the Union, not surprising being the largest geographic one of the lower forty-eight. Numbering approximately three million in 1900, by 2000, Texas had swarmed to over twenty million residents. Though they do not rival the density of such great cities as New York City or Mexico City, Texas cities like Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio contain over one million each, and many more number in the hundreds of thousands. Fort Worth, still affectionately known as Cowtown, has more than a half-million humans, and is the thirty-first fastest growing city in the U.S., with a rate of 2.6%.
Most Texans are descended from pioneers who migrated from other states in the nineteenth century. Many of these were of questionable character. One of my own ancestors fled from the Carolinas after faking his own death to avoid the vengeance of a cuckolded gun-duelist. However, significant immigration came from across the seas, as well, including Germans, who founded Fredericksburg, Irish rail workers who settled Donegal near the Oklahoma border, and many from China and Vietnam, among other Asian countries.
The aforementioned Houston is the home of NASA’s Johnson Space Center, named for the great Texan and U.S. president Lyndon B. Johnson, is a major facility in the U.S. space program. With the potential development of space-related industries, Houston, and all of Texas may play an increasingly important role in the world economy, spurring even greater population growth.
Chapter four, question two (191): Paleolithic Denton
Chapter five, question two (233): Little Vietnam in Haltom City
Chapter six, question one (272): My Home Town
The city of Fort Worth is Where the West Begins, as the motto has it. The city capitalizes on its Old West image. For example, The Fort Worth Livestock Show and Rodeo is internationally famous, drawing tourists to the Will Rogers Memorial Complex, the stock show’s home since it grew too large for the original location in Fort Worth’s historic Stockyards. The Will Rogers complex is a marvelous example of art-deco architecture, all the more grand after its recent renovation.
Nearby Casa Mañana Theater was one of only three true theaters-in-the-round in the U.S. Two generations of schoolchildren were introduced to live theatre under Casa’s famous geodesic dome roof, based on designs by the famous architect, Buckminster Fuller. I, myself, apprenticed there for six years before rising to a staff position.
Across West Lancaster, the Kimbell Art Museum exhibits works of Picasso and Rembrandt in its permanent collection. The world-class museum also houses tours that travel to museums the like of Paris’s Louvre and the New York Metropolitan. Tours that include the Kimbell sometimes include as few as three museums in the world. The moving sculpture of the Kimbell’s reflecting pool is a favored spot of art lovers as well as young lovers on dates.
West of the Kimbell, is the Amon G. Carter Museum of Western Art. Besides its near life-size sculptures of cowboys bulldoggin’, and Native Americans in mournful isolation, it is the home of one the finest collections of western photographs.
To complete the circuit, and recrossing Lancaster to the west of Will Rogers, one finds the Fort Worth Museum of Natural Science and History, home of the Omni Theatre. In my childhood, one could pass from the scenic sculpture of a Paleolithic surgery, through an Old West town, and onto the most technologically sophisticated theater of its time. The Omni is still one of the few Omnimax screens in the world.
Returning to my childhood, we made our way home via Interstate 30 east, and would pass by the Mrs. Baird’s Bread Factory, shortly after the neck-craning attempt to read the Episcopal Church’s thoughts for the week, usually an obscure and enigmatic passage from the Bible. The tantalizing aroma of baking bread permeated the area from the Trinity Bridge to the hospital district. Like Casa Mañana, schoolchildren toured the Mrs. Baird’s facility every year. At the end of the tour, the children were rewarded with a free snack, freshly packaged. Sadly, the factory moved out of town almost ten years ago.
The last stop, for me at least, was my grandmother’s house. Her homemade rice-crispy treats beat the hell out of those fake Twinkies from Mrs. Baird’s, though I still miss the smell of the place.

Chapter seven, question three (325): Agglomeration Effects in a Local Business Park
Riverbend Business Park is a commercial-light-industrial business park along the Trinity River, though its location exploits the river in name only. The river is not large enough to support barge traffic, though there once were such grandiose plans for it. Instead, the business park is situated at the intersection of Loop 820 and State Highway 121, as well as their junctures with U.S. 377 and Interstate 30. A major rail line passes by the north side, but unfortunately no rail traffic exploits this opportunity. The major agglomeration effect functioning here is the convenience to the highway system, utilized by workers, customers, and large trucks.
The park was designed with large passages, easily navigable by box-trucks and even tractor-trailer rigs. All of the resident storefronts possess at least one full-size loading bay with a floor-level dock. This feature seems to be the major reason for the businesses’ proximity to one another.
Unlike the model for agglomeration outlined in the book, Riverbend’s raison d’être as a hub is the industrial use of space. The large warehouse-type construction of the buildings attracts businesses with a need for large open work spaces or storage needs. Half-Price Books, for example, maintains an operation here, though not as part of its retail sales operation. The park also is home to Motorola, Otis Elevator, and Johnson Limousine.
Perhaps as many as one hundred businesses operate here. They are an eclectic collection: Veterinarian Solutions is next to Tool Supply; the limousine service next to an embroiderer’s; Harris Dental just down from Lonestarr Recording studios—a boon, perhaps for teeth-grinding audio technicians, but other linkages are not so apparent.
There is a sports and athletics consultant, and the enigmatic Answers, Etc., alongside the Bar Mart. The D/FW Regional Office of the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality sits across from a U.S. Post Office, the latter an ancillary service for the whole park, no doubt. So, too, the drop boxes for Fed/Ex, UPS, Airborne Express, and the probably local Lone Star Express.
Other ancillary businesses should include the Catered for You Café, which looks to be a storefront eatery as well as catering service, and the healthy-sounding Obee’s Soup and Salads. But the less directly related services are outside the park proper. Nearby is a McDonald’s restaurant, several gas stations, a day-care facility, and a ladies-only gym. Within the development is a regional bank, but the extent to which it is available to the park’s workers is undetermined—it has no “drive-thru” operation, and the storefront is secluded.
Despite the presence of firms such as Business Forms and Tyco Fire and Security, there seem to be few linkages between the businesses. The most notable seems to be one between Westbridge Printing and Impression Inks, though admittedly, my impression of their linkage is due to their sharing of a common wall. In truth, the printers may have more truck with obviously misnamed Oceanside Graphics, at the opposite end of the park.
The park’s businesses do not even benefit from a contract with a single waste management company, for both Waste Management and Trinity Waste dumpsters were observed, though the one may subcontract with the other. Presumably the grounds are kept by one firm, but no evidence of this was apparent.
Open space attracted the developers Newell and Newell, as well as the likely lower property tax rates, for the property falls within Richland Hills, not Fort Worth. But access is its selling point. The test of this will be when a change to the mode of transit and shipping reduces the cost-benefit of trucking and highway travel.

Chapter eight, question three (360): USDA Subsidies

Chapter nine, question one (410): U.S.-Mexico Border Issues
A survey of more than two hundred articles on international news reveals that the more things change, the more they stay the same. Migration across the U.S.-Mexico border is the single most important issue between the two countries. One historian has called the border a “fictional frontier,” and indeed, the fiction of its boundary is read only by governments.
Maquiladoras pepper the southern edge of Texas, taking advantage of tax-free zones in Mexico as well as the low-wage workforce. Easily trucked back into the lucrative markets of the U.S., the multinational businesses running such productions enjoy the best of both worlds—low wages and high sales. Indeed, the line between these two worlds—the first world and the second—are blurred like lines drawn in the windswept sand. The city of El Paso, Texas, has sprawled into Mexico, where it is known as Ciudad Juárez, but the “two” cities in reality comprise one metropolitan area, the melding raising political issues over wages, housing and municipal water rights.
Nationally, water rights have become frustratingly confused. Mexico owes the U.S. billions of gallons from the water of the Rio Grande, while the water of the Colorado, dammed in the U.S. state of Arizona, and diverted for irrigation in California, scarcely reaches Mexico at all.
Extradition is another troubling aspect of this international flow. Mexico consistently refuses to extradite fugitives who would face the death penalty in the U.S. Some bounty hunters face charges in Mexico for kidnapping such fugitives.
Drug trafficking and gun-running stories frequent the pages of the international desk. Drug production in Mexico is cheap and involves little risk, most of that being part of the smuggling operations. Lucrative drug markets in the U.S. create enormous profit incentives, while guns flow south to help protect the cartels from rivals and the Federales.
Such flows of illegal goods and peoples constrain both countries to tighten border security. Especially after the incidents on 9/11/2001, border security on both sides has increased. Non-Mexican migrants seek entrance into the U.S. through Mexico’s borders. Central and South Americans view Mexico as a “stepping stone” into the U.S., but so do people from abroad—most notably from the Middle East.
Not surprising, then, is the contention over the validity of visas and other identification documents. U.S. authorities warn that the Mexican federal identity card is so easily forged that it should no longer be accepted by U.S. banks or housing management. False U.S. Social Security cards have become one of the most forged in the world.
Increasingly, restricting access along the border makes little practical sense. The AFL-CIO has been working to unionize workers in Mexico. Operating under the principle that Mexican low wages steal U.S. jobs, or at least drive down American wages, the union organizers have begun visiting Mexico for the first time since 1924.
Of course, soccer is important, too. World cup rivals, the U.S. and Mexico use the unlikely sport of soccer as an arena for international diplomacy—an inspiration for the U.K.
Mexico’s government has a reputation for graft and corruption that is unrivaled by any except Louisiana’s. Mexico remains seen as a haven for fugitives, a getaway destination for the wanted and get-to destination for the sexually unwanted who seek the pleasures of brothels and cheap liquor. It is perhaps this image of Mexico that keeps the border a firm barrier to its barrios. More’s the pity.

Chapter ten, question one (448): The Ten Fastest-Growing U.S. Cities
The ten fastest growing cities in the U.S. are:
1. Gilbert, AZ 6. Chandler, AZ
2. North Las Vegas, NV 7. Chula Vista, CA
3. Rancho Cucamonga, CA 8. Olathe, KS
4. Henderson, NV 9. Cape Coral, FL
5. Joliet, IL 10. Peoria, AZ
See the attached table from the U.S. Census Bureau for percentage increases.

Chapter eleven, question four (500): Haltom Plaza, An Ordinary Cityscape
Despite its provocative nomenclature, the strip mall is meant for shopping. Haltom Plaza is one of the more appealing of such places, with a uniform single roof-line and vintage neon lighting. It is more than a mere strip, in fact, with several shops housed in freestanding storefronts, one at either end, and one in the middle, landmarks for the major driveways in and out of the strip mall’s parking lot. The black asphalt parking lot is neatly apportioned with white parking slot outlines and yellow lane markings that coordinate well with its lima-bean-colored roof and mauve stucco-like buildings.
This tenth-of-a-mile strip of U.S. Highway 377 is an oasis of commerce in the predominantly residential city of Haltom City—a redundant name proudly displayed on city documents, but sadly, not featured in the plaza of Haltom Plaza. Across the highway, a few auto mechanics specialize in wheels and mufflers, alongside such other greasy operations as Taco Bell, Papa John’s, and Twisters Tenders. These small independent buildings contrast with the comparatively stately colonnade of the plaza, an almost historic site due to its long-time existence.
A variety of retail stores inhabit the plaza. There is an optical clinic, Taylor’s Dry-Cleaners with an on-site seamstress, a secondhand store, a hardware store. Big Lots! discounts housewares; Smoke City trades in tobacco products. Video and pc games can be found with one GameStop. There is a newly opened ladies’ gym, the appropriately named Curves, as well as the beauty boutique of Smart Looks, appealing, perhaps, to multi-tasking persons who place themselves in the good hands of Allstate Insurance. Those with time on their hands as they await treatment at the Med Alert industrial health clinic might window shop at the store whose fashions have but OnePrice.
The working-class neighborhoods surrounding Haltom Plaza also support a Hancock’s fabric store, as well as a Radio Shack, and the discount grocery, Sack ’N Save. To pay for it all, one may get Checks Cashed at the middle island storefront, while credit is extended at the Rentacenter.
There is a family dental practice, and two other satellite medical centers provide alternate choices to the pain and injury management of the previously mentioned Med Alert. Pro Cuts is the choice of those not so concerned with Smart Looks.
Busy shoppers, medical patients, and miscellaneous errandrunners may sneak a dozen rings at one of the two donut shops, catch an early or late breakfast at The Café, a late lunch at Joe’s Pasta and Pizza, whose slightly schizophrenic store-window sign reminds passersby it is the home of Joe’s Pizza & Pasta, or grab a drive-thru dinner from the local Pizza Hut, the spice of life not flavoring food in Haltom City (indeed, leaving the Plaza, one could also stop for pizza at the ironically named Mugger’s Pizza, Mr. Jim’s, or the newly opened Enzo’s Pizza and Subs). For more special occasions, one can gorge on the Jumbo China Buffet, the misleadingly named restaurant with normally sized plates.
The strip mall identifies its surroundings as suburbia as much as do the tract homes and school zones and churches that intermingle with the muffler shops, banks, and quick-lube service shops that front along the highway. The stores of Haltom Plaza provide the basic needs of the suburban home, rather than the luxury items destined for greater retail sales at the more manorly North Hills shopping mall, several miles east. It is a bazaar for those in need of specific items to complete their chores at home, the bizarre solution to sprawl.
Chapter twelve, question three (539): Effects of Economic Globalization on Fort Worth, Texas
The last meat-packing plant in Fort Worth closed in 1971. Yet, the Fort Worth Stockyards is still home to animal auctions, albeit much reduced in number. The advent of satellite television and communications created a new and different market for these sales. Ostrich farms in Oklahoma competed with ones in Australia over television airwaves while businessmen bid on them in Texas.
Change is resplendent all along Hell’s Half-Acre, the section of downtown Fort Worth that led to the Stockyards. Once inhabited by the cheapest of hotels, domino parlors, bars, and their rough and sometimes murderous patrons, it is now a place for shopping tourists and traveling business conventioneers. Walking tours of the Stockyards area entertained travelers from Japan to Norway. Billy Bob’s Texas boasts of being the largest honky-tonk in the world as well as having the world’s only permanent indoor rodeo.
Sadly, globalization often means the loss of jobs. A long-time Fort Worth-based book publisher, ultimately Harcourt College Publishers, had survived many mergers and name changes since its origins. Acquired by a Canadian firm more than five years ago, the operations in Fort Worth were suspended. Many fine editors were forced into unwanted relocation and retirement, or the ranks of the unemployed.
Some changes have been good. Local grocery store delis now serve box sushi, an alternative to red meat and pork products that once ruled here. Indeed, since Oprah won the lawsuit launched by Texas cattlemen, sushi restaurants have become relatively commonplace. Likewise, Indian and Mediterranean foods have begun to show themselves.
International films have but a single outlet, near Hulen mall, but that is more than there once was. Mainly appealing to patrons of independent and arthouse films, the Hulen 10 theater presents exclusive engagements, and enjoys an exclusive hold on that market.
The Sierra Club once held an office downtown. Though focusing mainly on U.S. environmental policy, it also has engaged in world realty. The Sierra Club has bought rainforest lands in South America for preservation.
The Fort Worth Zoo has also been of great importance in this arena. As a “world-class” zoo, it has been a pioneer in naturalized habitats. The zoo also is a leading research facility in veterinarian medicine. Far superior to its only nearby rival, the Dallas Zoo, Fort Worth’s is a frequent stop for touring exhibits such as China’s panda bears, and the infamous Komodo Dragons.
The Kimbell Art Museum recently presented works by Italian painter Amedeo Modigliani. Other tours have been presented there such as the Figures of the Buddha, which displayed works from ancient India, Japan, Myanmar, and Thailand among others. The increasing global reach of the Kimbell has grasped cryptedl treasures from China, ancient Egypt, and pre-Columbian Mexico.
Texas has no state income tax, and the appeal of this has attracted many upper-income bracket families to the state. The flavor of Fort Worth is changing to take advantage of their disposable incomes, reflecting their broader tastes. No longer merely a cow town, Fort Worth rather successfully blends its Old West image with world cuisines and cultures, Where the West Begins, and the rest fit in.
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