
Clock and Compass
How John Byron Plato Gave Farmers a Real Address
Mark Monmonier(Author)
University of Iowa Press
Will be published approx. on 12. April 2022
Book
Paperback/Softback
196 pages
978-1-60938-821-8 (ISBN)
Description
A city guy who aspired to be a farmer, John Byron Plato took a three-month winter course in agriculture at Cornell before starting high school, which he left a year before graduation to fight in the Spanish-American War. He worked as a draftsman, ran a veneers business, patented and manufactured a parking brake for horse-drawn delivery wagons, taught school, and ran a lumber yard. In his early thirties he bought some farmland north of Denver, Colorado, and began raising Guernsey cattle, which he advertised for sale in the local paper. When an interested buyer eager to see his calves couldn't find his farm, Plato realized that an RFD postal address was only good for delivering mail.
Plato's solution was a map-and-directory combo that used direction and distance from a local business center to give farmers a real address, just like city dwellers. He patented his invention called the "Clock System" and tried to sell it to the Post Office Department. What follows is a tale of persistence and failure as rural farming declined and technology and capitalism overtook John Byron Plato's chances at geographic immortality.
Plato's solution was a map-and-directory combo that used direction and distance from a local business center to give farmers a real address, just like city dwellers. He patented his invention called the "Clock System" and tried to sell it to the Post Office Department. What follows is a tale of persistence and failure as rural farming declined and technology and capitalism overtook John Byron Plato's chances at geographic immortality.
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
Iowa
United States
Dimensions
Height: 227 mm
Width: 149 mm
Thickness: 16 mm
Weight
262 gr
ISBN-13
978-1-60938-821-8 (9781609388218)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions

E-Book
04/2022
University Of Iowa Press
€24.49
Available for download
Person
Mark Monmonier is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Geography and the Environment at Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. He has authored twenty books, including How to Lie with Maps. He lives in Syracuse, New York.
Content
- Preface
- 1. No Real Address
- 2. Denver
- 3. Semper
- 4. Exploiters and Advocates
- 5. Ithaca
- 6. Ohio
- 7. Washington, DC
- 8. Camp Plato Place
- 9. Remission
- 10. Postmortem
- Acknowledgments
- Notes
- 1. No Real Address
- 2. Denver
- 3. Semper
- 4. Exploiters and Advocates
- 5. Ithaca
- 6. Ohio
- 7. Washington, DC
- 8. Camp Plato Place
- 9. Remission
- 10. Postmortem
- Acknowledgments
- Notes