ABSTRACT
This chapter draws on a growing literature in the history of United States (US) Empire that emphasizes the complex movement of ideas and institutions, not only between colony and metropole, but also within and among colonies, including areas of so-called 'informal' empire, and across imperial boundaries. Scholars have examined how imperial practices were shared and adapted as part of the production of everyday spaces, like hotels, households, and military bases. Approaching the history of ecological stations from this perspective, it becomes clear that the campaign for an 'American tropical laboratory' at Cinchona was more than simply an effort to recreate a station like Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in the tropics. At Cinchona, US ecologists consciously emulated and fused European colonial models, and their claims on tropical ecology took place within a broader regional context of contested political and scientific power.
