Unless somebody reminds us...
We Forget How Many Ways America Is Changing The British Newspaper The Guardian Reminds us... (Those Brits, always reminding of stuff we'd rather forget) The American family farm is disappearing I miss my people. 1950 (Scooter was in the 7th grade) Total population: 151,132,000; farm population: 25,058,000 ; Number of farms: 5,388,000; average acres: 216 (About 5 folks per farm family) 1998 (Olde Scooter was about to retire) Total population: 275,900,000; farm population: 2,987,552 ; Number of farms: 2,143,150; average acres: 461 (About 1.4 folks per farm "family") I.e. In one man's work life, about 22 million folks left their farms. Huge "industrial" farms frequently have NO ONE living on the farm. Maybe a few thousand hogs or tens of thousands of chickens, or endless waves of grain - soy and corn mostly. We sort of know all this. It just slips out of consciousness without a reminde...