Disarming the Prairie

In this volume, landscape photographer Terry Evans offers images of the impact of America's military-industrial complex on the environment and the transformation of a former military base into a nature preserve and public recreation area. Located 40 miles southwest of downtown Chicago, the Joliet Army Arsenal was once the world's largest TNT factory. Wartime security and safety measures demanded that the Joliet installation be surrounded by 19,000 acres of open lands - farmlands, meadows, wetlands and forest. Abandoned by the post-Cold War era military, the plant and its surroundings have been given a new purpose. Inspired by the vision and efforts of environmentalist and residents, the federal government transferred the land from the Department of the Army to the US Forest Service in 1997 and created Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie. Evans seeks to capture the moment of this transformation in her pictures, contrasting the decayed monuments of 20th-century warfare with the pastoral beauty and historic structures preserved within the boundaries of the former installation. She explores the militarization of the American landscape and its legacy with images of the arsenal and the countryside around the base. In his introduction, Tony Hiss notes that installations similar to the Joliet Arsenal were built across the USA during World War II and at the height of the Cold War, eventually occupying 30 million acres of land. He explores the debate over what to do with the sprawling munitions factories for which the post-Cold War military has no use.