Business geography - PDF - Ellsworth Huntington
Business geography has become a definite science. Its principles are so well defined that a knowledge of the physical conditions under which a race has lived and now lives gives a reasonably reliable indication as to the capacity, activity, occupations, and business relations of that race.\
In studying this growing science the first step is to understand the main principles. That is the reason for Part I of this book. A second step is to apply the principles to concrete problems as is done in Part IJ.
There the community engaged in a particular line of activity is taken as the unit in order that the geographical relationships may first be studied in relatively simple forms before going on to the more complex regional studies of Parts III and IV. In the regional chapters, the aim is to give a clear conception of the way in which geographic conditions influence the products of a region, the capacity of the people, the direction in which their activities are turned, and the nature and extent of their business relations with other regions.
The present book stands in an intermediate position between two books by Huntington and Cushing, namely Commercial and Industrial Geography (World Book Company), and Principles of Human Geography (John Wiley & Sons, Inc.). Although each is complete in itself and occupies a separate field, the three books form a connected series.
If the students who use Business Geography have not already taken a course in Commercial Geography in the seventh, eighth or ninth grade, the teacher is advised to have them use the first of the books named above and some other books such as J. R. Smith’s Commerce and Industry (Henry Holt & Co.), for supplementary reading.
If the pupils are to get a thorough grounding in the broader principles of geography in general and thereby see how business geography is related to the physical, sociological, and political phases of the subject, the teacher is advised to supplement the present book with a course based on some one of the several textbooks that especially stress physiography, and.on Principles of Human Geography, and Bowman’s The New World (World Book Company).
