A Cold Welcome: The Little Ice Age and Europe’s Encounter with North America
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.48 (810 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 0674971922 |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 350 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2015-02-18 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
This period of climate change has come to be known as the Little Ice Age, and it played a decisive role in Europe’s encounter with the lands and peoples of North America. The average global temperature had dropped to lows unseen in millennia, and its effects were stark and unpredictable: blizzards and deep freezes, droughts and famines, and winters when even the Rio Grande froze. In A Cold Welcome, Sam White tells the story of this crucial period in world history, from Europe’s earliest expeditions in an unfamiliar landscape to the perilous first winters at Santa Fe, Quebec, and Jamestown.Weaving together evidence from climatology, archaeology, and the written historical record, White describes how the severity and volatility of the Little Ice Age climate
His analysis of the Little Ice Age in North America makes the crucial point that failure to understand and adapt to climate change has been fatal. I found it hard to put down. In fact, there were dozens of attempts to penetrate the continent, but all ended in starvation, disease, violence, and death. (J.R. (Daniel Headrick, author of Power over Peoples)In the barbarous early years of European colonization of North America, there have long been three acknowledged Horsemen of the Apocalypse: poor planning, cultural incomprehension, and bad
. Sam White is Associate Professor in the Department of History at The Ohio State University