Behind every blade there's one of the biggest stories

in the world.”

Here's a big story for you:

the history of the American lawn.

Those rows of small green plants

that require endless upkeep, host

countless communal rituals, and, for many,

symbolize the pride of homeownership.

All this has made grass the most irrigated plant

in the country.

But pursuing the perfect lawn has led Americans

to dump millions of pounds of pesticides

onto their grass, some of which

can potentially leach into water supplies.

Gas lawnmowers and other equipment

have emissions that contribute to climate change.

All of this to create land that has

limited habitat potential.

But check this out.

Most of this grass wasn't always here.

It's not native to the United States.

So how did all this begin?

How do we get from pristine wilderness

to identical rows of manicured nature?

Let's start in the 1600s.

Europeans are colonizing America.

They bring farm animals.

Those animals love the local grass.

They love it so much, they consume it all.

There's no more left.

The animals start to starve.

So the colonists import foreign seeds

to grow new grass for the animals to eat.

Example: You know that famous Kentucky Bluegrass?

It covers sports stadiums and countless lawns —

not from Kentucky.

It's actually native to places like Europe and North Africa.

So the new foreign grass grows.

The colonies grow.

Tensions between the colonists and Britain grow.

Then there's a revolution.

And what's General Washington doing a month

after independence is declared?

He's writing home to his estate manager

about landscaping plans.

He's talking about things like flowering shrubs

and planting locust trees, making groves.

See, Washington and Thomas Jefferson

are die-hard fans of European landscape architecture.

The rich in Europe are building

great, sprawling lawns that have no agricultural value.

They're purely status symbols.

So Washington and Jefferson help popularize

these great lawns in America, but only

for those who can afford it.

And these lawns come on the backs of slaves.

Tools like these keep the grass groomed.

It's grueling, endless work.

Time goes by.

It's the early 1800s when there's

a big mechanical innovation in lawn care.

An engineer in southwest England

is working on machinery for a clothing mill

when he gets an idea.

Maybe the same mechanics at the clothing mill

could work for cutting grass.

He's right and files a patent for the first lawnmower

in 1830.

Lawnmowers reached the U.S. about 40 years later.

But for most of America, lawns still aren't all that common.

In her book “The Lawn,” author Virginia Scott Jenkins uses

this painting as an example.

The ground where these boys play

is covered with wildflowers and packed dirt.

There's no manicured lawn.

But by the 1870s, we also see American culture slowly

start to embrace lawns for the privileged masses.

Suburbs had begun to grow after the Civil War.

Some are designed with large, grassy areas.

They're inspired by new urban parks

with their own sprawling lawns.

Then there's the cultural impact of this highly

influential book from 1870, “The Art of Beautifying

Suburban Home Grounds.”

It tells wealthy suburbanites what

needs to be done to have the perfect lawn, in detail.

It also tells them that having the perfect lawn

is part of what makes a model citizen.

After all, the spread of railroads and streetcars

means more people are on the move for greater distances,

gazing out windows and possibly

judging the neighborhoods they travel through.

Then just before Christmas in 1871, a man from Buffalo, N.Y.

gets some good news.

His name is Joseph Lessler

and his patent application has been approved.

It's for the first sprinkler that

connects to a garden hose.

And garden hoses are only possible because cities

can now pipe water into individual homes

on a grand scale.

This is when the lawn care market becomes big business.

We see ads for mowers that are “easy to operate,”

“self-sharpening.”

The effectiveness of ads gets a boost from advances

in color printing and the advent of these so-called

trade cards.

They're basically like business cards.

They pop with color.

They advertise the hell out of lawn and garden products.

And as more people get flashier ads,

those ads change from simply selling tools

to selling ideas about the lawn's place in society.

Take a look at this trade card from around 1880.

What's it telling us?

It's selling a lawnmower,

that's obvious enough.

But look in the background.

There's people playing lawn sports.

It's a subtle hint that a well-kept lawn

can lead to good times, especially

for the wealthy, who can afford clothes like these

and a house like this.

In 1914, The Times publishes a short piece

about former President Teddy Roosevelt.

The news is he'd just mown his lawn for a day to take

a break from politics.

It just goes to show that even back then,

this idea of yard work as a relaxing pastime

is already becoming part of the culture.

By the 1920s, something else is becoming a big part

of American culture —

golf.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture

develops tougher, lower-maintenance grass

spurred by demands of golf courses.

So the grass gets better and more

people have lawns because all those

returning World War II veterans get low-cost home loans.

And there's more access to suburbs

because the interstate system is expanding.

Historian Ted Steinberg calls these rows of tidy lawns

an “outdoor expression of '50s conformitism.”

But that conformitism isn't meant for everyone.

“I moved here because it was a white community.”

“And we understood that it was going to be all white

and we were very happy to buy a home here.”

People of color often faced discrimination

when buying in these new suburbs.

Lawns become iconic symbols of an American dream that's

recognized by most, but attainable only to some.

Those who can, continue to chase the dream.

This graph, published by historian Virginia Scott Jenkins,

shows the number of lawn care articles appearing

in popular magazines over time.

The post-World War II lawn boom

is here, the beginning of the modern lawn care era.

Better technology brings more ways

to spend time and money to achieve the perfect lawn.

And so it continues.

So that's how we got here.

If you've ever had to spend your Saturdays mowing lawns,

there's a long list of characters you have to thank.

About five minutes into the video,

I mentioned this Times article about Teddy Roosevelt

cutting grass.

It's kind of wild that Roosevelt's lawn care was

considered news fit to print.

So just in case you're curious about this front-page news,

let me read part of it to you.

“Colonel Roosevelt refused to discuss politics today.

He got in a lot of good vigorous exercise.

For three hours he pushed a lawnmower about on the lawns

at Sagamore Hill, and the exercise did not seem to tire

him at all.”