This book takes a thorough look at the history of walls in New England and New York. Susan Allport appears to have unearthed a mine of information on the development of what was once estimated to be around a staggering 250,000 miles of wall, much (most) of which has long since disappeared.

From the ice age through colonial settlement and various boundary laws it provides an interesting look at a very different development process than we saw in Britain, although there are some interesting parallels, the enclosure of common land for similar reasons - but via a completely different process, being one. Of course the problems associated with walls are perhaps not surprisingly apparently the same the world over, such as the reported conversation which included the idea that 'most stone walls appeared to be "tossed together for no purpose but to afford the quadrupeds of the place the means of taking practical lessons in the art of jumping"'.

It does however occasionally get a little repetitive, and takes diverting tangents when looking at the debate as to whether the balancing stones of the area are glacial features or some evidence of pre-colonial contact (they are vaguely similar to dolmens).

It also takes a look at wallers themselves, both ancient and modern, as well as including two "case studies" of actual walls - the lace walls of Martha`s Vineyard, and Shaker Stone Walls. These sections are interesting but I somehow felt that the author didn't really grasp/understand walls/walling at some almost intangible level, much like Brookes in the original BTCV "Dry Stone Walling". It becomes obvious from close reading that he took certain regional, and occasionally idiosyncratic, ideas at face value, presenting them as the norm, or misconstruing them leading to misrepresentations. I felt that this could have been the case here, especially with the handling of the 'lace-walls' and some of the quotes of modern wallers. The whole book also tended to be a bit confusing when dealing with work-rates.

That said there was interesting information on the problems of walling in a cold climate and the idea of 'Whiskey walls' where the owner or foreman "placed a bottle of whiskey a good work distance down the line. The bottle was consumed when that point was reached." Not heard of that one and a fine idea - but practical? Apocryphal probably (although presented as gospel). I'm sure Nant Ffrancon needs such incentives, although I'm not certain that on a wet, windy day I wouldn't skip the intervening 'gap' and then not be fit for much et alone getting the job finished!

Overall a bit of a specialist book, with limited appeal to those this side of the pond, except for real 'stone-heads', like me.