1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910820626203321

Autore

Fitzgerald Deborah Kay

Titolo

Every farm a factory : the industrial ideal in American agriculture / / Deborah Fitzgerald

Pubbl/distr/stampa

New Haven, : Yale University Press, c2003

ISBN

1-281-73158-7

9786611731588

0-300-13341-3

Edizione

[1st ed.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (255 pages)

Collana

Yale agrarian studies series

Disciplina

338.1/0973

Soggetti

Agriculture - Economic aspects - United States - History - 20th century

Family farms - United States - History - 20th century

Agricultural credit - United States - History - 20th century

Farms, Size of - Economic aspects - United States - History - 20th century

Farm mechanization - Economic aspects - United States - History - 20th century

Agriculture - Capital investments - United States - History - 20th century

Farm mortgages - United States - History - 20th century

Business cycles - United States - History - 20th century

Farm foreclosures - United States - History - 20th century

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references (p. 197-234).

Nota di contenuto

Front matter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction -- 1. The Industrial Ideal in American Agriculture -- 2. By the Numbers: Economics and Management in Agriculture -- 3. Agricultural Engineers and Industrialization -- 4. Farms as Factories: The Emergence of Large-Scale Farming -- 5. The Campbell Farming Corporation -- 6. Collectivization and Industrialization: Learning from the Soviets -- Conclusion: Changing the Landscape -- Appendix -- Abbreviations -- Notes -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

During the early decades of the twentieth century, agricultural practice in America was transformed from a pre-industrial to an industrial



activity. In this book Deborah Fitzgerald argues that farms became modernized in the 1920's because they adopted not only new machinery but also the financial, cultural, and ideological apparatus of industrialism. Fitzgerald examines how bankers and emerging professionals in engineering and economics pushed for systematic, businesslike farming. She discusses how factory practices served as a template for the creation across the country of industrial or corporate farms. She looks at how farming was affected by this revolution and concludes by following several agricultural enthusiasts to the Soviet Union, where the lessons of industrial farming were studied.