Reopening the frontier
Subtitle: homesteading in the modern West
By: Brian Q. Cannon.
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Published: 2009
Place of publication: Lawrence
Language: eng
Number of pages: 307
ISBN-13: 9780700616572
Subjects: Frontier and pioneer life -- West (U.S.); Reclamation of land -- West (U.S.) -- History -- 20th century; Community life -- West (U.S.) -- History -- 20th century; Farmers -- West (U.S.) -- History -- 20th century; Veterans -- West (U.S.) -- History -- 20th century; World War, 1939-1945 -- Veterans -- United States; Environmental policy -- West (U.S.) -- History -- 20th century; West (U.S.) -- History -- 1945-; West (U.S.) -- Social life and customs -- 20th century; West (U.S.) -- Environmental conditions
Description: "The offer of free farmland after World War II may not have sparked the same stampede that it did in frontier days, but, as Brian Cannon shows in this path-breaking study, postwar homesteading continued to shape the modern West in important ways. Between 1946 and 1966, the Bureau of Reclamation opened up over 3,000 farms on irrigated public lands in the West to returning servicemen. Although involving fewer people than those flocking to western cities, this mini-land rush represents an important continuity in western tradition through the cultivation of values - hard work, security, independence, family stability - long associated with frontier life. Cannon examines these new agricultural settlements and the values they reflected and reinforced, following them through the end of the twentieth century and exploring specific key homesteading and federal reclamation projects. Cannon describes how the Bureau of Reclamation used lotteries to make available free land that had previously been part of Indian reservations, used for Japanese internment, or abandoned by unsuccessful settlers. He then traces the new homesteaders' experiences in establishing a farm, "proving up," and gaining title to the land, contrasting the realities of modern homesteading with iconic views of the frontier"--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Creating a "new frontier of opportunity" : World War II veterans and the campaign for Western homesteads; title: "Ah, for the life of a farmer" : the chimera of free land; title: Proving up and proving themselves; title: "Gold mine in the sky" : the farmers' dreams for themselves and their land; title: The best year of their lives? : women on Western homesteads; title: "The firm foundation of our community" : opportunity and its limits on   the Bureau of Reclamation's Riverton Project; title: A conflict of interests : the battle over reclamation homesteads; title: Repeal of the Homestead Act; title: "Our dream was changed into a nightmare" : the homesteaders at homesteaders at the dawn of the twenty-first century.