In the 1930s, America was having difficult times, and the economy was failing. Farmers in the Dust Bowl region had the worst troubles. In the Great Plains, people were continually hit by dust storms. The arrival of inexperienced farmers led to the creation of the Dust Bowl. Poor farming techniques, technological advancements, and severe drought were all major contributing factors to the Dust Bowl. Poor farming techniques were one of the factors leading to the Dust Bowl. With the arrival of thousands of hopeful farmers due to the Homestead Act, the short grass was removed to make way for crops. According to a Texas sheepherder, “It’s [grass] what saves us all… Grass is what holds the earth together.” Grass held the grains of dirt on the ground,
From the expanding of railroads country wide, to limiting laws on the goods farmers sold and transportation of the goods,to starvation of the economy, agriculture began to take its own shape from 1865 through to 1900 in the United States.
The farmers had torn out millions of miles of prairie grass so that they could farm there. Without the grass, dust began to kick up and storm around the air causing dust storms.
Through the period of 1865-1900, America’s agriculture underwent a series of changes .Changes that were a product of influential role that technology, government policy and economic conditions played. To extend on this idea, changes included the increase on exported goods, do the availability of products as well as the improved traveling system of rail roads. In the primate stages of these developing changes, farmers were able to benefit from the product, yet as time passed by, dissatisfaction grew within them. They no longer benefited from the changes (economy went bad), and therefore they no longer supported railroads. Moreover they were discontented with the approach that the government had taken towards the situation.
The period between 1870 and 1900 was a time to change politics. The country was for once free from war and was united as one nation. However, as these decades passed by, the American farmer found it harder to live comfortably. Crops such as cotton and wheat, once the cash crop of agriculture, were selling at prices so low that it was nearly impossible for farmers to make a profit. Improvements in transportation allowed larger competitors to sell more easily and more cheaply, making it harder for American yeoman farmers to sell their crops. Finally, years of drought in the Midwest and the fall of business in the 1890s devastated the farming community. Most notably, the Populist Party arose to fight what farmers saw as the issues affecting the agricultural community. During the last thirty years of the nineteenth century, many farmers in the United States saw railroads and banking enterprises threaten their way of life; their work to fight these elements eventually led to a change in national politics.
The Dust Bowl was the name given to the Great Plains area in the 1930s. Much of the region was an agricultural area and relied on it for most of their economy. Combined with The Great Depression and the dust storms, farmers in the Great Plains area were severely hurt. These farmers were seeking opportunity elsewhere near the Pacific where they were mistreated by the others already there. The mistreatment is a form of disenfranchisement, by excluding and segregating a group of people from the rest of society. The disenfranchisement of the Oklahoma farmers during the 1930s was caused by a combination of the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression which led to the farmers being forced to move west where they were mistreated because there were not enough jobs.
Hard Times’ ‘The Dirty 30s’ ‘The Great Depression’ (Ganzel n. pag.)This quote describes so much about 1930’s especially farming. Farming was hard because there was a really bad drought. Was out they rain no crops could grow. And the crops can't hold the soil together and not blow away. Which was really bad for the soil to blow away. Also the farmers didn't know that the equipment they were using would tear up the soil too much and it would blow away. The farming in the 1930s was bad because of the dust bowl and the price of everything was low.
The Dust Bowl occurred for many reasons, most all our fault. “Some of the reasons that the Dust Bowl occurred were over-farming, livestock overgrazing, drought and poor farming practices.” (Dust Bowl facts and summary) Because of this negative experience it now teached us to be careful and now we know what to do to prevent this.“When drought struck from 1934 to 1937, the soil lacked the stronger root system of grass as an anchor.”("Dust Bowl Facts and summary") That's really bad for the farmers because then the wind can easily pick up the dirt off the
Many believe the Dust Bowl was caused solely by bad weather, but Egan shows a multitude of factors that led to the catastrophe. In Timothy Egan’s book, The Worst Hard Time, Egan believes that the syndicate and government, overproduction of the land, and drought were all factors that caused the Dust Bowl.
Many factors, contributed to the creation of the Dust Bowl – soil subject to wind erosion, drought which killed the soil holding vegetation, the incessant wind, and technological improvements which facilitated the rapid breaking of the native sod. This is not to say that mechanized agriculture irreparably damaged the land – it did not. New and improved implements such as tractors, one-way disk plows, grain drills, and combines reduced plowing, planting, and harvesting costs and increased agricultural productivity. Increased productivity caused prices to fall, and farmers were compensated by buying more sod for wheat.
Farming was the major growing production in the United States in the 1930's. Panhandle farming attached many people because it attracted many people searching for work. The best crop that was prospering around the country was wheat. The world needed it and the United States could supply it easily because of rich mineral soil. In the beginning of the 1930's it was dry but most farmers made a wheat crop. In 1931 everyone started farming wheat. The wheat crop forced the price down from sixty-eight cents/ bushels in July 1930 to twenty-five cents/ bushels July 1931. Many farmers went broke and others abandoned their fields. As the storms approached the farmers were getting ready. Farmers increased their milking cowherds. The cream from the cows was sold to make milk and the skim milk was fed to the chickens and pigs. When normal feed crops failed, thistles were harvested, and when thistles failed, hardy souls dug up soap weed, which was chopped in a feed mill or by hand and fed to the stock. This was a backbreaking, disheartening chore, which would have broken weaker people. But to the credit of the residents of the Dust Bowl, they shouldered their task and carried on. The people of the region made it because they knew how to take the everyday practical things, which had been used for years and adapt them to meet the crisis.
One of the factors in the dust bowl was the drought. These farmers are now planting drought resistant strains of corn and wheat. “We have really widespread irrigation use, which allows many farmers to buffer the effects of drought more than they would’ve been able to do in the 1930s.” ("Lieberman") Irrigation use is huge now. SO many farmers use it. Farmers when the dust bowl happened would not have been able to buffer the effects of drought. This is a farming practice that has been very important. “Fortunately, the next major drought will not cause a second dust bowl, as we are now better able to prevent soil erosion.” ("Lieberman") We are now better able to prevent soil erosion because of new farming practices implanted since the Dust Bowl.”Poor agricultural practices and years of sustained drought caused the Dust Bowl.” ("About the Dust Bowl" This is now preventable because we have new farming practices since the dust
During the late nineteenth century, the agrarian movement evolved into a political force that energized American farmers to voice their political and economic grievances like never before. Although the movement essentially died after William Jennings Bryan's loss of the 1896 Presidential election, many of the reforms they fought for were eventually passed into law.
As you walk to the other end of the stage and look out into the sea of blue and gold corduroy, you realize this it! This is the moment you’ve worked toward for the last four years. You’ve stayed long hours after school working on you record book, spent grueling hours memorizing speeches, experienced the joy of winning first place at a state CDE contest, and best of all you met so many amazing people and doors were opened to opportunities you never imagined. Finally, after all of your hard work, you’re receiving your State FFA Degree! All of this from making one simple decision your freshman year of high school, signing up for the FFA. What you didn’t realize at the time was that this wonderful organization would help you build leadership skills and teach life skills that you are going to need in the coming years.
The Dust Bowl was "the darkest moment in the twentieth-century life of the southern plains," (pg. 4) as described by Donald Worster in his book "The Dust Bowl." It was a time of drought, famine, and poverty that existed in the 1930's. It's cause, as Worster presents in a very thorough manner, was a chain of events that was perpetuated by the basic capitalistic society's "need" for expansion and consumption. Considered by some as one of the worst ecological catastrophes in the history of man, Worster argues that the Dust Bowl was created not by nature's work, but by an American culture that was working exactly the way it was planned. In essence, the Dust Bowl was the effect of a society, which deliberately set out to take all it could from the earth while giving next to nothing back.
Farmers everywhere in the United States during the late nineteenth century had valid reasons to complaint against the economy because the farmers were constantly being taken advantage of by the railroad companies and banks. All farmers faced similar problems and for one thing, farmers were starting to become a minority within the American society. In the late nineteenth century, industrialization was in the spotlight creating big businesses and capitals. The success of industrialization put agriculture and farmers on the down low, allowing the corporations to overtake the farmers. Since the government itself; such as the Republican Party was also pro-business during this time, they could have cared less about the farmers.