Podcast Summary: The American West — Ep. 13: A Western Geography of Hope

Host: MeatEater
Guest: Dan Flores
Release Date: October 21, 2025

Overview

In this episode of The American West, host MeatEater is joined by historian Dan Flores for a deep exploration into how iconic Western landscapes became "geographies of hope" for a fractured America, particularly during the turmoil of the Civil War. The episode beautifully intertwines tales of painters, photographers, and adventurers—Bierstadt, Moran, Jackson, and others—whose depictions of wild Western beauty provided psychological respite and national inspiration during the country’s darkest hours.

Major Themes and Purpose

• Western Landscape as Healing Force: The episode argues that the American West, through its grand and sublime landscapes, offered a psychic cure and source of optimism for a nation ravaged by war.
• Artists and Photographers as Cultural Healers: Figures like Albert Bierstadt, Thomas Moran, and William Henry Jackson were not just chroniclers but curators of hope, redirecting the public gaze toward breathtaking wilderness and away from the horrors of conflict.
• Mythmaking and Reality: The creative assembly of idealized landscapes—often splicing multiple real places—helped cement the mythic status of the West as a uniquely American touchstone of freedom and potential.

Key Discussion Points and Insights

Western Landscape as National Therapy

[01:51–11:15]

• Flores explains how, as the U.S. fractured over the Civil War, artists and photographers ventured west to chronicle landscapes that could provide emotional and spiritual relief.
• He draws connections from ancient coyote tales through literary Romanticism (Catlin, Cooper, Thoreau, Melville), illustrating how nature has always been a refuge from political and social turmoil.
  • "The Western landscape has never been mere background, but a life shaping, almost living presence." – Dan Flores [01:54]
• The 1860s obsession with the sublime—where landscapes represented a direct encounter with the divine—fed into the depiction of Western mountains, valleys, and deserts as near-religious spaces.

The Sublime and the Civil War

[11:15–22:00]

• Contrasts battlefield photography (Matthew Brady, et al.) with the artists who turned public attention to beauty and wonder.
  • "What Bierstadt's, Jackson's and Moran's adventures offered … was a Western psychic salve for the agonies of the war, a positioning of life over death." – Dan Flores [09:12]
• Albert Bierstadt’s first journey west in 1859 is recounted—his "religious rapture" on seeing the Wind River Range, seeking not specific geography but capturing an effect: the sublime.
• Painting as mythmaking: Bierstadt's monumental canvases (e.g., "Rocky Mountains, Lander's Peak") amalgamate real and imagined Western features to produce a transcendent vision of American possibility.

The Pioneering Adventurers: Art, Science, and Landscape

[23:39–37:10]

• Focus shifts to William Henry Jackson’s intrepid photographic ventures in the Rockies and the Tetons, and Thomas Moran’s partnership in Yellowstone.
  • "Jackson would work beside an almost cadaverous young painter named Thomas Moran … the summer made Moran famous and he sold his best painting, the huge Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, to the US Congress for $10,000, where it served as prize example of the kind of magical landscape Americans now knew lay in the West." – Dan Flores [27:54]
• Examines how their artistic output didn’t just portray the land but helped found American conservation, influencing the creation of Yellowstone as the world’s first national park.
• Not all landscape grandeur sought was vertical—horizontal expanses (plains) were largely ignored despite their size and beauty.

The Enduring Mythos and Evolving Draw of the West

[52:22–59:02]

• Discussion turns philosophical: Can the West remain a symbol of freedom, space, and adventure? Will it lose its mystique as new cultural winds blow?
• The hosts reflect on cultural phenomena (the Gold Rush, “A River Runs Through It”, “Yellowstone” TV series, legalization of marijuana) that cyclically draw Americans to the West for new reasons.
  • "The west has managed over and over again in a way that the other regions don't seem to have done. The west has managed to come up with something, some sort of cultural development that suddenly causes people to want to kind of do a rush on a particular part of it." – Dan Flores [54:46]

Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• On Sublime Western Experience:

  • "A place that could affect you with sublime feelings was a place of religious power, for the sublime was an emotion you felt in the presence of God." – Dan Flores [08:11]

• On Photographers and Early Cameras:

  • "The first photographs are taken in the... 1840s. And so by... William Henry Jackson, for example, is taking photographs during the Civil War..." – Dan Flores [40:39]
  • Describes the complexity and patience required to photograph landscapes with 8x10 wet plates, favoring static scenes—mountains and canyons—over people or action.

• On Military, Art, and Exploration:

  • "So what everybody did, what these artists were obviously doing, was traveling with the military when they could... In other words, you sort of attached yourself to a group that provided... numbers that could keep you safe." – Dan Flores [50:05]

• On the Perpetual Lure of the West:

  • "I think... what they were doing was they were searching out and finding these larger than life landscapes that became a part of the western mystique for people all over the world." – Dan Flores [58:10]

Timestamps for Important Segments

• Opening & Setting the Stage: 01:51–05:45
  • The role of the landscape in Western and national identity.
• Bierstadt, the Sublime, and Mythmaking: 05:45–16:55
  • Romantic artists and their attempts to heal a wounded nation through art.
• Western Art, National Parks, and Conservation: 23:39–34:00
  • How artists and photographers led to Yellowstone’s preservation.
• Art, Science, and the Military: 49:14–51:45
  • Early artists/naturalists’ reliance on military expeditions and the federal government.
• The West’s Future Mystique: 52:22–59:02
  • Evolving reasons for the West’s allure and potential changes in perception.

Conclusion

This episode presents a rich, nuanced portrait of the American West as both real geography and enduring idea—an ever-evolving "geography of hope." Through vivid storytelling and analysis, Flores and the hosts bring alive the historical figures who mythologized the landscape, and challenge listeners to consider how those myths still shape our sense of place and possibility.

For anyone fascinated by the intersection of nature, history, and American culture, this episode offers both scholarship and inspiration.