I spent a couple of days in the heartland this week. I flew into the Indianapolis airport and took the two lane highway 36, from Indiana into the heart of Illinois. A drive, straight as an arrow, that takes you though some of the richest agricultural land in this country. Small towns were planted every five to ten miles, even an oddly placed suburb in what seemed the middle of nowhere, and vast oceans of farmland.
Having nothing better to do with my time, I counted vegetable gardens. I counted as I drove through towns on the highway. I counted as I passed subdivisions. I counted as I passed farms by the dozens. Finishing the trip two and half hours later with a grand total of zero vegetable plots spotted. My recent digs at neighbors for not planting gardens now seem misplaced, because well over half of the homes in our valley have some sort of vegetable garden. But zero?
Now we can assume I missed plenty. But I was diligent in looking and even a casual survey should have turned up the odd patch of tilled ground behind a house or two. But I also didn’t see any small orchards or vines. Most homes in our valley sport at least a pear tree or two in the front yard.
What could account for a food desert in this landscape? Was this the curse of rich land and commodity prices? Or was it that I was simply looking at 200 miles of an industrial park disguised as an agrarian landscape. A bit like those fake Hollywood towns of yore, looks the look at first glance but nothing supporting it.
It was odd to see old farmhouses with the corn and soybeans tilled and planted up to the driveways. The houses bobbing on the landscape like lost boats at sea. Gone were the outbuildings and barns of the past, now replaced with corrugated buildings housing supplies and gargantuan equipment. No room in this landscape for the personal or something as humble as a vegetable patch or fruit tree. No need for the homestead pig or grapevine, the message is clear, this is valuable land.
Yet what explained the absence in towns of vegetable gardens? As is my wont, I’m no doubt guilty of reading too much into this simple lack of observable gardens. But vegetable gardens, a few chickens and a fruit tree or two make a statement. And their absence in our rich heartland is a statement, something darker, a yielding of ones will or culture.
Perhaps it is better to farm or garden on land that requires a bit more struggle?
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Reading this weekend: Plain Folk of the Old South, by Frank Lawrence Owsley. One of the Southern Agrarians, this is his classic examination of the non-slaveholding southern yeoman class.
Nicely put – in ‘The Unsettling of America’ I think Berry talks about the push in American agriculture to get farmers to stop producing for themselves and to devote all their efforts to cash crops. Is it that the land is too valuable for self-provisioning, or that the mindset has changed? Either way, it’s high time for a rethink, I reckon.
Thanks. I certainly had that essay in mind as I thought about the implications. Interesting how different areas of the country seem to respond to the idea of self-provisioning (I like that term). Again, I think areas with less productive land are a bit ahead of the curve when it comes to self-sufficiency. Kind of like the towns that still have most of their solid nineteenth century architecture, are the same that missed the boom periods of the late 20th century, when those building were torn down. And it may turn out that areas in this country that have not benefited as directly from the industrial economy may weather re-localization better.
Yes – wonder whether countries with a more extant peasant agriculture might similarly be better placed. Interesting little blog comment and debate which comes at this from another angle here: http://oxfamblogs.org/fp2p/who-wants-to-farm-hardly-any-young-people-it-seems-shouldcould-that-change/
I was a little surprised at how many of the development experts contributing to it buy in to the ideology that Berry so trenchantly opposed.
Odd how many of the commenters saw an agricultural life as something to avoid at all costs. For some reason I was reminded of the fact that in 1980, 90% of American high schools had vocation training. Today less than 10% offer such training: i.e. welding, surveying, electrician, carpentry, etc. etc. The assumption is that everyone is going to obtain their college degree and get a job in the high tech future. Of course the youth internalize that message and fail to get any real preparatory work for the real world. And, as a consequence, have zero chance at that high tech world.
What a world, what a world.
“Get big or get out” that’s the american ideal :-\. MURICA!!
Wow, this tugs too hard at my little heart. I used to own a small farm just 3.5 miles north of Hwy 36 in Hendricks County IN (where your plane touched down). I had a garden there, but that was it… a neighbor actually farmed the farm. This was back in the early 90’s, and I know there were a few other gardens in the community. But if I were to characterize the places with gardens it might get even more depressing. Find an old two story frame farmhouse – vintage 1930 or older; signs of life, a mowed yard, a working mailbox. There are likely a few very old trees in the house lot. If an elderly couple still lives on the place, or a farmer’s widow, then one might find a kitchen garden (and perhaps a small chicken coop). Habit. Habit of a disappearing generation.
So Danville, IN would have been one of the first towns you’d have driven though. It is the Hendricks County seat. Haven’t been there in over 20 years now, but it still surprises me you didn’t find any gardens.
Yes, the land values are quite high. This partly explains the lack of animal ag. in the area. The sophistication of the current cropping technology is also somewhat to blame. Many is the farmer who contracts to have someone else apply fertilizer and weed control chemicals. Too time consuming – with over a thousand acres to plant, and only a couple weeks to do so, one ends up farming from the driver seat of a pickup with a cell phone, a laptop; a daughter, son, nephew, neighbor’s kid… actually driving the tractor. One eye on the radar, another on seed, fuel, and spare parts. Days come and go, and you lose a sense of time. It will rain at some point and then you can catch a breath, mend an ailing piece of equipment, pay a few bills, make sure all the help still have all their fingers.
This has been a symptom of our go-go ag for quite a while – but I’d actually thought this just some of the farms – not every single one along the path you’ve described.
This past weekend here in central Ohio has been the sort described above. It finally dried out for the second go round (some corn had been planted earlier). My own little garden now waits for me to be done with this… for this pays the rent. (if one misspells rent with an ‘a’ you get rant… may need to puzzle on that sometime)…
But I think there is another angle not examined here yet. And Brian has touched on it here before. The admonition to ‘get your hands dirty’ would often be heard by most farmers as an insult. They do after all get their hands pretty dirty. But where I’m headed is the broad sense of being capable of growing lots of different things. All the go-go mentioned above… GIS this, radar that; computers in the tractor cab, new hybrids with traits that you can’t explain without a B.S. degree, diesel engines that have to meet new emissions policies (and a handful of different technologies to achieve the same)… it is a 24/7 technological frenzy. Just to grow 2 or 3 species. So who knows of grapes or endive? Why plant a potato when they’re so cheap at the market? I know you have answers… I’m just offering a narrative that might explain some of this. [I seem to recall someone thinking those were onions in Brian’s garden…turns out it was garlic… my bad… if they’d have been soybeans I might have even suggested some husbandry techniques 🙂 ]
So if the Mrs. is having a medical issue that you can’t suffer from – would she see a dentist? Am I honestly comparing medical practice to modern farming? Yep, in a way.
But if I were to characterize the places with gardens it might get even more depressing. Find an old two story frame farmhouse – vintage 1930 or older; signs of life, a mowed yard, a working mailbox. There are likely a few very old trees in the house lot. If an elderly couple still lives on the place, or a farmer’s widow, then one might find a kitchen garden (and perhaps a small chicken coop). Habit. Habit of a disappearing generation.
Clem,
Thanks for the terrific response, quite eloquent in your descriptions of disappearing habits. And I certainly reiterate that I’m sure missed some gardens along the route. I was after all conducting my survey from the window of a moving car. But the absence was so stark that it made the sheer numbers of gardens in the South stand out in comparison. And the lack of the “self-provisioning” at the large farms was not un-expected. But it was in the small towns, Danville included, that I was shocked not to see the gardens. Particularly, as many of the towns seemed to suffer economically.
It would be interesting for someone to conduct a more formal survey of these types of household economies nationwide: gardening, food preservation, small livestock, etc. and see if there really are regional differences.
One of my underlying points, I hope, is that it is one thing for our national economic policy to push all citizens into being consumers and not producers. But it is quite another problem if we let it.
Good to hear from you,
Brian
Oh – and hello and howdy to Chris. Nice to discuss an ag issues in a different venue. We’ll burn Brian’s minutes for a change.
Something else just struck me… grapes – or the lack thereof on Hwy 36. Seems grapes (and tomatoes… but especially grapes) are VERY sensitive to 2,4D. This particular herbicide has made a pretty strong comeback these last few years with the spread of roundup resistant weeds. So along Hwy 36 it would be the rare sport who could muster the fortitude to keep planting grapes in the face of this challenge. [rant off…]
Yikes!