Saturday, January 8, 2011: 9:00 AM
Room 202 (Hynes Convention Center)
In the late colonial period American farmers on the eastern seaboard began to notice alarming declines in yields caused by years of over-cropping. Responding to this evident problem, several prominent farmers—George Washington, for example—began to adopt the more sustainable farming techniques developed in the European agricultural revolution that began toward the end of the Middle Ages. New crop rotations, improved tillage, and the heavy use of various soil amendments constituted the chief innovations.
By the early national period many of these so-called gentlemen farmers, imbued with nationalist sentiment, sought to disseminate their knowledge in order to raise the level of American farming. To do so they began to form organizations typically designated “societies for the promotion of agriculture.” Starting in the late 1830s, this effort flowered into a full-fledged movement to reform American agriculture as agricultural societies, publications, and fairs proliferated across the country.
If this proliferation signaled increased farmer interest in improvement, however, it did not, of itself, signal success. On the contrary, once reformers trained their attentions on the day’s commercial news and Census returns, they began to formulate the problem of soil depletion in much larger terms. They now contended that an international commerce in which Americans shipped agricultural produce to Europe in exchange for manufactured goods, removed from the soil its invaluable nutrients—it’s “capital stock,” as one put it. To remedy this imbalance, domestic industry should be encouraged. By thus bringing the “consumer by the side of the producer,” urban and industrial waste products could be returned to the land to restore its productivity. If this vision always remained more speculative hype than realizable goal, it nevertheless reflected the modernizing impulses of a still overwhelmingly agrarian America.
By the early national period many of these so-called gentlemen farmers, imbued with nationalist sentiment, sought to disseminate their knowledge in order to raise the level of American farming. To do so they began to form organizations typically designated “societies for the promotion of agriculture.” Starting in the late 1830s, this effort flowered into a full-fledged movement to reform American agriculture as agricultural societies, publications, and fairs proliferated across the country.
If this proliferation signaled increased farmer interest in improvement, however, it did not, of itself, signal success. On the contrary, once reformers trained their attentions on the day’s commercial news and Census returns, they began to formulate the problem of soil depletion in much larger terms. They now contended that an international commerce in which Americans shipped agricultural produce to Europe in exchange for manufactured goods, removed from the soil its invaluable nutrients—it’s “capital stock,” as one put it. To remedy this imbalance, domestic industry should be encouraged. By thus bringing the “consumer by the side of the producer,” urban and industrial waste products could be returned to the land to restore its productivity. If this vision always remained more speculative hype than realizable goal, it nevertheless reflected the modernizing impulses of a still overwhelmingly agrarian America.
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