Are St. Louis and New Orleans the last "eastern" cities?

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

yeah, that resonates with me.

as a lifelong chicagoan, when i hear the phrase "eastern city", my mind IMMEDIATELY goes to bos-wash.

the cities of the midwest/rustbelt are in another category in my mind.

I've always thought of every city east of the Mississippi as an "eastern" city. I don't consider "eastern city" and "east coast city" to mean the same thing.

[MolsonExport]

In an article from an old edition (80s) of the National Geographic on the twin cities, St. Paul (Minnesota) was referred to as "the Last of the Eastern Cities" (a quote attributed to Mark Twain)

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I've always thought of every city east of the Mississippi as an "eastern" city. I don't consider "eastern city" and "east coast city" to mean the same thing.

yes, when i step back and think about things on the macro-scale, i understand that.

but when i hear the phrase "eastern city", my mind does naturally conflate that with "east coast city".

as a life-long midwesterner, anything with the label "east" has a bit of an unfamiliar quality to it.

[niwell]

Originally Posted by pj3000

I agree that New Orleans does have a distinct feel, though I definitely feel that it gives off a significant eastern vibe. I lived there for about 4 years, and I would find myself taking mental notes of things and experiences (both subtle and overt) that reminded me of Pittsburgh or Buffalo or Philly or Brooklyn. Its historical factors really set the stage:

Good summary.

It's common to say that NOLA is it's own thing, and that would be a fair assessment to make for many, many reasons. But in the context of the US (and North America as a whole) it fits solidly into the broad category of "Old" cities even if one doesn't want to use the term Eastern. It was the only real big city in the South for some time, and certainly the only one that could come close to rivaling the industrial NE in any capacity.

[edale]

So far, we have the following characteristics suggested as identifiers of east vs west:

- Precipitation (the dry west vs the wet east)
- Building materials
- Religion (Catholic = east?)
- Historical presence of ethnic groups
- Age of development
- Presence of heavy industry

Any others? I think I might add substantial Black population. There are a few concentrations of Black people in the West (South LA, Oakland, Texas cities), but by and large, cities in the eastern half of the country have large Black populations usually exceeding 30% of the city, while cities in the West do not.

I think this is a very interesting conversation. While I agree that Great Lakes/Midwest cities are their own thing, I think it's undeniable that they have more in common with the east than the west. Cincinnati is definitely midwestern, but its lineage is absolutely eastern. Growing up, visiting East Coast cities felt pretty familiar, whereas my first visits to the West Coast and Mountain West felt very foreign. The scale of the blocks and width of the streets in SLC, for example, was immediately noticeable to me as being strange, even as a kid who knew nothing about cities.

[Obadno]

The Mississippi has long been seen as the division between the older eastern USA and the empty wild western USA

I see no reason to change that now. There are more detailed regional break downs but if we are looking big picture binary division I think it still largely makes sense and population wise the division is still clear. There is bleed over but would anyone consider Fort Worth, Kansas City and Omaha as "Eastern USA" .... ? Of course not.




Of Course as an Arizonan I personally consider anyone East of Denver "East Coast" watching the disgust form on a Texan's face being called "east coast" is cathartic.

[Obadno]

Originally Posted by edale

So far, we have the following characteristics suggested as identifiers of east vs west:

- Precipitation (the dry west vs the wet east)
- Building materials
- Religion (Catholic = east?)
- Historical presence of ethnic groups
- Age of development
- Presence of heavy industry

This list makes no sense. Age of Development? Tucson and Santa Fe were founded before the USA was founded. "Catholic" ? the southwest is all catholic. "Ethnic groups" the west has literally the oldest ones... "Heavy Industry" what do you think goes on in California, Washington? Rain? The rainiest places in the USA are in the west. Etc.

This list is awful.

[Steely Dan]

^ when you look at that population density map, the east/west dividing line appears to be more generally along the I-35 corridor.

west of there is really where "the emptiness" begins.

[Obadno]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ when you look at that population density map, the east/west dividing line appears to be more generally along the I-35 corridor.

west of there is really where "the emptiness" begins.

Sure but that's because rainfall and elevation turns the classic Midwest Corn farmland into dryer range and cattle land. But Id still pick the Mississippi as a clear, easy definable split based on geography, history and culture.

[Crawford]

NOLA is a Catholic outlier in the South. It isn't an East-West thing, it's a North-South thing, also a Sunbelt-Establishment thing.

The only other sizable Deep South Catholic populations are in geographies with a lot of recently arrived Northerners. And even then, nothing like NOLA. I believe Mississippi, very close to NOLA, is around 2% Catholic.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

huh???

st. louis gets more annual precipitation than chicago does, and i would hardly call chicago a "semi-arid" climate.

Yeah - I was completely surprised to read that several years ago after a trip to the Dirty Kanza bike race - but it's obvious that some combination of the prevailing soil and rock and atmospheric conditions cause the rain to run off or evaporate more quickly, as the woods and farmland near St. Louis are quite obviously not as robust as those just 10-20 miles east of the Mississippi River.

The effect is even more pronounced at the Missouri/Kansas line, or just past in the Flint Hills. The former Dirty Kanza is now called "Unbound Gravel". The landscape is undeniably arid as compared to Illinois, despite it receiving almost 40 inches of rain per year: https://www.unboundgravel.com/

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Obadno

Sure but that's because rainfall and elevation turns the classic Midwest Corn farmland into dryer range and cattle land.

but iowa and minnesota (and even eastern nebraska) are FAR more aligned with "classic Midwest Corn farmland" than they are with "range and cattle land" of the great plains.

here's a map of the great midwest cornbelt:




the mississippi is a very nice, neat, and mostly vertical natural geography demarcation, which is why it's so often seen as the great dividing line.

but strictly from a population density perpsective, the divide is actually futher west out along the I-35 corridor.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Crawford

NOLA is a Catholic outlier in the South. It isn't an East-West thing, it's a North-South thing, also a Sunbelt-Establishment thing.

There are also a fair number of black Catholics in New Orleans, a subgroup that is pretty much non-existent in the St. Louis/Milwaukee/Cincinnati German Catholic triangle.

[Obadno]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

but iowa and minnesota (and even eastern nebraska) are FAR more aligned with "classic Midwest Corn farmland" than they are with "range and cattle land" of the great plains.

Where did I say it wasnt? You can see in population density where corn and soybeans are grown vs where it becomes range land and more arid/drier crops.

[Steely Dan]

^ gotcha, i misunderstood what you wrote.

still, from a precipitation/population density perspective, the divide is roughly I-35, not the mississippi river.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by edale

So far, we have the following characteristics suggested as identifiers of east vs west:

- Presence of heavy industry

Probably more like, historical presence and legacy of heavy industry, in order to distinguish from cities in the western US which have much more recently engaged in heavy manufacturing.

There's obviously major differences between cities that were built up in the age of iron forges and textile mills and those that were built up in the age of jet engine assembly and semiconductor fabrication plants.

Originally Posted by Obadno

This list makes no sense. Age of Development? Tucson and Santa Fe were founded before the USA was founded. "Catholic" ? the southwest is all catholic. "Ethnic groups" the west has literally the oldest ones... "Heavy Industry" what do you think goes on in California, Washington? Rain? The rainiest places in the USA are in the west. Etc.

This list is awful.

One can hardly claim that Tucson and Santa Fe (or anywhere else in the southwest, northwest, mountain west, etc. US for that matter) developed as cities earlier and in the same sense that eastern US cities developed.

We're talking about American cities here -- that's the context. Not pueblos, not pre-Colonial settlements. You're attempting to make an argument that is way outside of the context of what everyone else is talking about.

[edale]

Originally Posted by Obadno

This list makes no sense. Age of Development? Tucson and Santa Fe were founded before the USA was founded. "Catholic" ? the southwest is all catholic. "Ethnic groups" the west has literally the oldest ones... "Heavy Industry" what do you think goes on in California, Washington? Rain? The rainiest places in the USA are in the west. Etc.

This list is awful.

Well it's a list of reasons that have been cited in this thread, not my own list. People were claiming New Orleans is eastern because it's Catholic, industrial, old, and ethnic. I guess I should have specified European ethnic. I do think several of the posts about New Orleans are more relevant to a North/South split than East/West. NOLA definitely feels more like a northern outpost in the south than an eastern outpost in the west.

No point arguing with you about the rain comment. It's already been shown on precipitation maps in this thread that the east is generally much wetter than the west. Yes, the western portions of Oregon and Washington and extreme northern CA receive lots of rain. The mountains obviously receive lots of snowfall. But most of the west is much drier than the east. St. Louis has flora that looks much more like DC than Phoenix.

[pj3000]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

but iowa and minnesota (and even eastern nebraska) are FAR more aligned with "classic Midwest Corn farmland" than they are with "range and cattle land" of the great plains.

here's a map of the great midwest cornbelt:




the mississippi is a very nice, neat, and mostly vertical natural geography demarcation, which is why it's so often seen as the great dividing line.

but strictly from a population density perpsective, the divide is actually futher west out along the I-35 corridor.

Interesting to see that the western half of Ohio is where it starts to transition to the darker greens... which is where the terrain changes to flat land, with the corresponding change to vast areas of land dedicated to agriculture. It's probably as good of an eastern line of demarcation for the geographical Midwest as there is.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by edale

So far, we have the following characteristics suggested as identifiers of east vs west:

- Precipitation (the dry west vs the wet east)
- Building materials
- Religion (Catholic = east?)
- Historical presence of ethnic groups
- Age of development
- Presence of heavy industry

Any others? I think I might add substantial Black population. There are a few concentrations of Black people in the West (South LA, Oakland, Texas cities), but by and large, cities in the eastern half of the country have large Black populations usually exceeding 30% of the city, while cities in the West do not.

I think this is a very interesting conversation. While I agree that Great Lakes/Midwest cities are their own thing, I think it's undeniable that they have more in common with the east than the west. Cincinnati is definitely midwestern, but its lineage is absolutely eastern. Growing up, visiting East Coast cities felt pretty familiar, whereas my first visits to the West Coast and Mountain West felt very foreign. The scale of the blocks and width of the streets in SLC, for example, was immediately noticeable to me as being strange, even as a kid who knew nothing about cities.

Your “number of blacks” metric is an even better one that you think: your “Texas exception” isn’t an exception.

Blacks correlate strongly with humidity in Beaumont, Houston, Lubbock, El Paso. Both being factors of “Easternness”.

If you’ve got very few of them you have few trees and a drier climate and are near New Mexico; if you have a significant share of them then you have lush vegetation, a rainier and more humid climate, and are near Arkansas or Louisiana.

[edale]

Originally Posted by pj3000

Probably more like, historical presence and legacy of heavy industry, in order to distinguish from cities in the western US which have much more recently engaged in heavy manufacturing.

There's obviously major differences between cities that were built up in the age of iron forges and textile mills and those that were built up in the age of jet engine assembly and semiconductor fabrication plants.



One can hardly claim that Tucson and Santa Fe (or anywhere else in the southwest, northwest, mountain west, etc. US for that matter) developed as cities earlier and in the same sense that eastern US cities developed.

We're talking about American cities here -- that's the context. Not pueblos, not pre-Colonial settlements You're attempting to make an argument that is way outside of the context of what everyone else is talking about.

Totally agree. Also, I wouldn't classify either Tuscon or Santa Fe as major cities. Phoenix is a major city/metro, but it is almost entirely a product of the 20th century. San Diego and LA are mostly newer cities, too. SF is the oldest major city in the West, and it really grew into something substantial around the same time as Chicago, which is obviously a newer city than the NE cities, and even further east Midwest cities like Cincinnati. So I think age of development into a major city is a fair metric for east/west distinction.