The Potomac Unveiled: History, Nature, and Culture of a National River
Among natural landmarks, the Potomac River doesn’t seem all that remarkable. It doesn’t possess the grandeur or the fame of the Grand Canyon, Mount Rushmore, or even the Mississippi River. But in her new book Potomac Fever: Reflections on the Nation’s River, Charlotte Taylor Fryar treats the river with the reverence and respect of a national treasure by tracing its history, expounding on its ecological diversity, and illustrating the way nature relates to racial division in the capital city and surrounding areas.
Fryar is more intimately connected to the Potomac River than most regional residents could ever dream of being. She not only hikes along the shore but also swims in the waters and harvests regional plants to concoct unique culinary creations. Hailing originally from North Carolina, Fryar has come to find the river a beloved home, but grapples with her feelings of ownership over the river as a white American in a city where Black residents have long been excluded from the natural world around them.
Each chapter centers on an element of the river and its surrounding ecosystem: sycamores, bald eagles, and honeysuckles, just to name a few. Residents of the greater D.C. area will delight in learning more about a river we all interact with regularly but may not know. For example, Fryar reveals that the Potomac River is part of an ecotone, a transitional area between ecosystems. Due to this overlap, ecotones are richer in species than the places on either side. There are rare plants on the banks of the Potomac, a select few not found anywhere else in the world.
But Fryar’s book is less an ecological tome than a look at the social history and culture of the D.C. area. Her work poses the question: If Washington D.C. is a place that encompasses all other places—embassies for other nations, representation for all other states—can it contain its sense of place as well? She begins to answer it by unraveling the turbulent racial history of Washington, D.C.
“The river’s geography and ecology are the terrain and living material that have made the nation’s history, rooted in white supremacy, colonialism, capitalism, and land depredation.
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While the culture of Washington D.C. is intertwined with the grinding of the political machine, causing some to view the city as “fundamentally placeless,” Fryar aptly points out that the real sense of place in this city has been built by Black communities, many of whom have made D.C. their home since slavery was made illegal in the District in 1862.
But this doesn’t mean D.C. was a safe haven. Black residents of D.C. have faced tremendous hardship, including the segregation of Rock Creek Park until the 1970s, pollution of the Anacostia River, located in a primarily black area, and the modern gentrification of black neighborhoods that forces longtime residents out. Fryar reminds us that Washington, D.C., seen as the center of democracy, was once also the center of the nation’s southern slave trade.
Author Charlotte Taylor Fryar
The Potomac River serves as a reminder that even nature has been used as a weapon of racism. Fryar writes about public beaches along the Potomac that existed in the early 20th century but were eradicated by white residents in the face of desegregation. Rather than share the natural world, white residents chose to eliminate the opportunity for everyone. While some may tout that nature belongs to everyone, Fryar points out that this isn’t always true in practice, especially along the shores of the Potomac.
Fryar describes D.C. as a city with a split psyche. It’s a city that not only houses local history, but also the history of the entire nation. A city defined by Black culture that happens to serve as the capital of a white settler nation. In response to this historical fracturing, Fryar says: “But in that place, there is a river, and in that river remains the possibility of common belonging.”
While her examination of social history is that of a well-trained academic, Fryar’s deep attention to the natural world is that of a poet. Potomac Fever will delight readers with lovely descriptions of the flora and fauna of the river throughout all four seasons. Fryar’s love for the Potomac River is evident in her evocative and detailed accounts of everything from small tufts of weeds to a bald eagle’s nest.
Utterly devoted to the “nation’s river,” Potomac Fever: Reflections on the Nation’s River is a book for anyone who wants to share in the reverence for this corner of the world, while learning about the complicated relationship between nature and racial division in Washington D.C. Fryar doesn’t shy away from the ugly pieces of the river’s history, and instead, makes it her mission to shape its future, asking herself, and prompting us to ask ourselves: “How do I make sure my love for the world—its people, its rivers, its eagles–is not used to exclude and destroy?”
You can pick up the book at Lost City Books or Barnes & Noble.
Haley Huchler lives in Virginia and has written for Northern Virginia Magazine and the Washington Independent Review of Books. She has a B.A. in English and Journalism from James Madison University, where she was editor-in-chief of Iris, an undergraduate literary magazine.