Family farming, as Iowa knew it in the 20th century, is irreversibly gone. A countryside dotted with 160-acre farms, each with its house and barn and vegetable garden, has all but disappeared. The profound change has significance far beyond economics. It is altering Iowa dramatically, in ways not yet fully known. At stake is a way of life wound tightly around a way of doing business.
Family farming gives Iowa a certain sense of uniqueness, and hopefully pride.
When we lose it, it really becomes a question of what we will become over the generations. I think so. In places like Manning, a whole town cheers wildly for a tournament-bound girls' basketball team. A week later, the same town finds itself weeping alongside a grieving farm widow. Manning is one small Iowa town, like hundreds of others, tied to the farmland around it.