Working Americans 1880-2020
Subtitle: volume XVI: farming & ranching
Publisher: Grey House Publishing
Published: 2020
Place of publication: Amenia, NY
Language: eng
Format: Hardcover
Number of pages: 600
ISBN-13: 9781642654844
Copyright date: 2020
Notes: From family farms to big agriculture, organic farming to hydroponics, this new volume covers what life was and is like for American farmers & ranchers across the decades. Profiles cover the span of the entire country, providing a thorough examination of the lives of all types of Americans in this business. The volume is divided into easy-to-use, decade-long chapters, so readers can quickly locate details on a particular time period. Some of the farmers and ranchers covered in this volume include: 1904 - Mary Wiggington: a potato farmer in Washington state. Members of her family have belonged to the Grange, the fraternal agricultural organization, since its founding in 1867. In recent years, the organization's popularity has declined due to poor management and fiscal difficulties, but Mary tries to increase membership with a hard-fought local campaign. 1940 - Thomas Jefferson Cameron: an African American cattle wrangler (cowboy) who works at a ranch in Oklahoma. With the development of more modern cattle trucks as well as a shift to ranches selling their products to more local markets, he worries that his skills leading cattle drives will no longer be in demand. 1994 - Lamar Beauregard: a Texas man who owns a huge farm that produces corn and other grains. He is excited by the passage of NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Association) because it removes trade tariffs between the U.S. and Mexico and allows him to competitively sell his products to Mexico. 2011 - Ramon Gutierrez: a Salvadorian ranch hand living in Georgia. Ramon fled his native El Salvador because of gang violence, settling in Georgia as an undocumented immigrant. Although he found work as a ranch hand, after the passage of Georgia's anti-immigration HB 87, he is worried that he may not be able to continue his job. 2020 - Jason Rourke: a small organic soybean farmer in Illinois. Jason has become increasingly alarmed about the threat of climate change in recent years and has taken steps in his farming to lessen his impact on global warming. In addition to profiles that span both life at home and life at work and in the community, this volume also. includes a Glossary of Political Terms, Further Reading, and Index. - Publisher.