
Inventing the Beach: The unnatural history of a natural place (2016) - softwaredoug
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/inventing-beach-unnatural-history-natural-place-180959538/
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tanatocenose
Only related tangentially: Los Angeles’ famous beaches, some 31 miles worth,
are all man-made.

“In 1947, for example, nearly 14 million cubic yards of sand were removed to
make way for El Segundo's Hyperion power plant. They were deposited onto Santa
Monica's beaches. Another million cubic yards came a couple years later, the
sand this time recovered from dredging operations along a nearby breakwater.
In all, some thirty million cubic yards of sand have been dumped onto the
beaches of Santa Monica and Venice. That's almost as much, by volume, as all
the concrete used to build the Three Gorges Dam in China.“

[https://www.kcet.org/shows/earth-focus/rewilding-santa-
monic...](https://www.kcet.org/shows/earth-focus/rewilding-santa-monicas-
thoroughly-artificial-beach)

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wittyusername
I live on the beach. Like actually I wake up and there it is staring at me in
bed, my porch is covered in corrosion and salt air persists everywhere.

It may be an invention but a few years into living here damned if it isn't one
of the few things that resists hedonic adaptation. I feel way more relaxed
here, granted I was coming from a major metro but I sometimes things that get
hyped up actually are great!

~~~
chris_t_98
Do you mind sharing where you live? One day I think I'd like to live on the
beach.

~~~
wittyusername
Puerto Rico! If you are a US citizen you can just get up and move here. Lots
of videos on YouTube to describe what it’s like and what it’s like to move
here.

~~~
ponker
Before anyone gets too excited, keep in mind that the homicide rate for the US
is 5 per 100,000, El Salvador (the highest) is 52 per 100,000, and Puerto Rico
is 30... closer to El Salvador than to the US which isn't even that low.

~~~
readarticle
An incomplete list of contiguous US city homicide rates PR is closer to than
El Salvador as of 2018:

 _X 60.94 - St. Louis_

 _X 58.64 - Baltimore_

38.88 - Detroit

37.09 - New Orleans

28.52 - Memphis

22.78 - Washington DC

22.12 - Philadelphia

22.07 - Buffalo

20.70 - Chicago

18.88 - Cincinnati

18.84 - Pittsburgh

18.46 - Indianapolis

17.74 - Atlanta

16.62 - Milwaukee

16.27 - Oakland

14.95 - Fort Wayne

14.88 - Tulsa

13.60 - Orlando

13.45 - Toledo

13.26 - Nashville

12.62 - Greensboro

12.32 - Albuquerque

12.18 - Jacksonville

11.77 - Houston

11.38 - Dallas

11.09 - Columbus

10.54 - Stockton

09.72 - Miami

~~~
juniper_strong
Does the 'X' mean that those cities have clinched the division title?

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simonebrunozzi
In short: In the 18th and 19th century the British Elite, the most powerful
back then, started to use beaches as a place to restore and rejuvenate. Then
extended this to the Mediterranean and Baltic seas.

The article fails to mention that the main reason for the elite to seek solace
in coastal shores was health-related: iodized fresh air on the beach helped
(or at least was considered of help) with several diseases that were common
back then.

~~~
EamonnMR
It's kind of striking how much faith they used to put in the power of climate
to affect health. Histories of the period very frequently include people
moving specifically because they are told the climate will improve their
health. I wonder if there was anything to it or if it was the equivalent of a
fad diet.

~~~
variaga
Probably a mix; for respiratory conditions, the _abysmal_ air quality in
London (look up the "Great Stink" of 1858) and other industrial(izing) cities
meant a move to somewhere the air was cleaner would have a rapid, measurable
effect on health. (The Victorian understanding of the word "climate" would
have included "air quality" as a factor.)

Other medical conditions (Cholera) that were exacerbated by poor sanitation
would also show lower prevalence in the countryside, but the "climate" would
be correlation, instead of causation.

And some of it was undoubtedly just a way of showing off in an "I spend 4
months a year on the French Riviera for the climate, on advice of my Doctor.
PS I am wealthy enough to summer in France and have a personal Doctor." sort
of way.

~~~
flukus
> but the "climate" would be correlation, instead of causation.

Two I've heard in the modern era are asthma and allergies. I'm not sure if it
helps with asthma but different climates definitely affect allergies,
particular the prevalence of more evergreen trees in warmer climates means
there's a reduced/missing allergy season.

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OldHand2018
> From antiquity up through the 18th century, the beach stirred fear and
> anxiety in the popular imagination. The coastal landscape was synonymous
> with dangerous wilderness; it was where shipwrecks and natural disasters
> occurred.

It's still actually a very dangerous place [1]. Keep in mind that very few
people knew how to swim back then.

[1] [https://glsrp.org/statistics/](https://glsrp.org/statistics/)

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flukus
Some of the history is surprisingly recent too, still in living memory. My mum
has a newspaper front page clipping of her friend being led away in handcuffs
for the heinous crime of wearing a bikini. I think Grandma was the first
generation of women that was allowed to swim at all and at least in some
places they had gender segregated times. To add insult to that on the way back
from the weekly beach trip Grandad liked to stop at the pub for a couple,
women and children weren't allowed so they had to sit in the car.

Through the 20th century the beach has been a close parallel (usually lagging)
of gender equality.

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danw1979
As a local, I was thrilled to see Scarborough on the Yorkshire coast mentioned
as one of the first places where the idea of the beach transformed from a
nightmarish hellscape into an idyllic retreat.

I also feel entitled to mention how - at this particular location - things
have, in a way, come full circle.

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christefano
What are the historical views and experiences of people outside of Europe?

Sadly this article is written exclusively from a Euro-centric perspective.
Even the “Inventing the Beach” part of the title is colonialist.

