Yeoman No More: The Industrialization of American Agriculture

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Professor Fitzgerald is continuing her work that seeks to locate the scientific and technological transformations in American agriculture within the broader framework of industrialization. Research so far indicates that agricultural innovations were a direct response to both the severe agricultural depression and the emergence of agricultural engi neers and economists as new professional groups, both of whom brought to agriculture the views of urban engineers and economists. In the 1920s one can see a series of attempts to model agricultural practice on manufacturing practice, in both material and ideological terms. Topics in this project include the emergence of agricultural experts in economics and engineering; the creation of an ethos of agricultural efficiency and abundance; the mechanization of agriculture; the trend toward large-scale, "factory" farming; a case study of such a farm; and the role of collectivization as a model for large-scale farms. Thi s project seeks to offer both a more interpretive account of agricultural change in America and a new set of cultural and intellectual benchmarks for the scientific and engineering practitioners of the past, whose material reshaping of our culture has been so pronounced.