Download or read book Gaining Ground written by Forrest Pritchard and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2013-05-21 with total page 341 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With humor and pathos, Forrest Pritchard recounts his ambitious and often hilarious endeavors to save his family’s seventh-generation farm in the Shenandoah Valley. Through many a trial and error, he not only saves Smith Meadows from insolvency but turns it into a leading light in the sustainable, grass-fed, organic farm-to-market community. There is nothing young Farmer Pritchard won’t try. Whether he’s selling firewood and straw, raising free-range chickens and hogs, or acquiring a flock of Barbados Blackbelly sheep, his learning curve is steep and always entertaining. Pritchard’s world crackles with colorful local characters—farm hands, butchers, market managers, customers, fellow vendors, pet goats, policemen—bringing the story to warm, communal life. His most important ally, however, is his renegade father, who initially questions his son's career choice and eschews organic foods for the generic kinds that wreak havoc on his health. Soon after his father’s death, the farm becomes a recognized success and Pritchard must make a vital decision: to continue serving the local community or answer the exploding demand for his wares with lucrative Internet sales and shipping deals. More than a charming story of honest food cultivation and farmers’ markets, Gaining Ground tugs on the heartstrings, reconnecting us to the land and the many lives that feed us.

Download or read book Farm and Other F Words written by Sarah K Mock and published by . This book was released on 2021-04-26 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: We love The American Farmer. We trust them to grow our food, to be part of children's nursery rhymes, to provide the economic backbone of rural communities, and to embody a version of the American dream. At the same time, we know that "corporate farms" are disrupting the agrarian way of life that we so admire, and that we've got to do something to stop it. So what's our plan for saving the farms we love? In Farm (and Other F Words), Sarah K Mock dismantles misconceptions about American farms and discovers what makes small family farms work, or why they don't. While exploring the intersection of farming and wealth, Mock offers an alternative perspective on American agricultural history, and outlines a path to a more equitable food system moving forward. Calling for change, Farm (and Other F Words) tackles questions like: Do farmers really get paid not to farm? Are "big corporate farms" the future? How much good has the food movement done for small family farmers? Ultimately, Mock suggests a solution without putting the onus for change on struggling consumers and reminds us that, "the future of American agriculture is not yet decided."

Download or read book Family Farming written by and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2008-06-01 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Americans decry the decline of family farming but stand by helplessly as industrial agribusiness takes over. The prevailing sentiment is that family farms should survive for important social, ethical, and economic reasons. But will they? This timely book exposes the biases in American farm policies that irrationally encourage expansion, biases evident in federal commodity programs, income tax provisions, and subsidized credit services. Family Farming also exposes internal conflicts, particularly the conflict between the private interests of individual farmers and the public interest in family farming as a whole. It challenges the assumption that bigger is better, critiques the technological basis of modern agriculture, and calls for farming practices that are ethical, economical, and ecologically sound. The alternative policies discussed in this book could yet save the family farm, and the ways and means of saving it are argued here with special urgency. ø This Bison Books edition includes a new introduction by the author providing a more national perspective, underscoring the repetitive cycles of American agriculture over the decade, and assessing the major policy issues that have dominated agriculture in recent years.

Download or read book Getting Organized written by Christy Anderson Brekken and published by . This book was released on 2019-12-05 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Family Farm written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Agriculture. Subcommittee on Family Farms and published by . This book was released on 1956 with total page 40 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Going Over Home written by Charles Thompson, Jr. and published by Chelsea Green Publishing. This book was released on 2019-10-03 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Booklist Editors’ Choice “Best Books of 2019” An intimate portrait of the joys and hardships of rural life, as one man searches for community, equality, and tradition in Appalachia Charles D. Thompson, Jr. was born in southwestern Virginia into an extended family of small farmers. Yet as he came of age he witnessed the demise of every farm in his family. Over the course of his own life of farming, rural education, organizing, and activism, the stories of his home place have been his constant inspiration, helping him identify with the losses of others and to fight against injustices. In Going Over Home, Thompson shares revelations and reflections, from cattle auctions with his grandfather to community gardens in the coal camps of eastern Kentucky, racial disparities of white and Black landownership in the South to recent work with migrant farm workers from Latin America. In this heartfelt first-person narrative, Thompson unpacks our country’s agricultural myths and addresses the history of racism and wealth inequality and how they have come to bear on our nation’s rural places and their people.

Download or read book A Family Farm written by Robert L. Switzer and published by Center for American Places. This book was released on 2012 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Switzer's memoir covers four generations of life on the family farm in Illinois. The tale is enhanced with photographs plus watercolors and woodblock prints by the author's wife and son. Frank E. Barmore adds information about the nineteenth-century history of this family farm, the Barmore family, and the settling of that area of Illinois.

Download or read book The Family Farm a Socioeconomic Institution written by Beryl Blake Maurer and published by . This book was released on 1954 with total page 52 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Bet the Farm written by Beth Hoffman and published by Island Press. This book was released on 2021-10-05 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Eloquent and detailed...It's hard to have hope, but the organized observations and plans of Hoffman and people like her give me some. Read her book -- and listen." -- Jane Smiley, The Washington Post In her late 40s, Beth Hoffman decided to upend her comfortable life as a professor and journalist to move to her husband's family ranch in Iowa--all for the dream of becoming a farmer. There was just one problem: money. Half of America's two million farms made less than $300 in 2019, and many struggle just to stay afloat. Bet the Farm chronicles this struggle through Beth's eyes. She must contend with her father-in-law, who is reluctant to hand over control of the land. Growing oats is good for the environment but ends up being very bad for the wallet. And finding somewhere, in the midst of COVID-19, to slaughter grass finished beef is a nightmare. If Beth can't make it, how can farmers who confront racism, lack access to land, or don't have other jobs to fall back on hack it? Bet the Farm is a first-hand account of the perils of farming today and a personal exploration of more just and sustainable ways of producing food.

Download or read book Harvest of Hope written by Lorraine Garkovich and published by University Press of Kentucky. This book was released on 2021-12-14 with total page 315 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The image of the family farm as storehouse of the traditional values that built this nation—self-reliance, resourcefulness, civic pride, family strength, concern for neighbors and community, honesty, and friendliness—persists, as many recent surveys show. But the reality of this rich tradition is rapidly changing, eroding the security once represented by these nostalgic images of rural America. Although the United States is still by far the world's leading overall producer of agricultural products, the number of American families making their livelihood through farming is much diminished, and if our demographers are correct, the number of family-operated farms is destined to fall still further in the coming decades as consolidation, cycles of boom and bust, and corporate invasions redefine who will farm the land. Harvest of Hope is a story of farm family life through the words of those who live it. The saga of the generations who have lived and worked on Basin Spring farm in western Kentucky is the thread that binds together the stories of eighty other farm families. They talk about their family businesses, their way of life, and the forces reshaping their lives. The challenges of making a living in farming either strengthen families or break them. Technology, government programs, and community changes that are supposed to be the hope for their future often come with unexpected drawbacks. The stories in this book—tales of growing up in farming, working in a multifamily business, juggling jobs on and off the farm, and struggling to maintain financial security and comfortable working relationships—reveal what American farming families know about hope and survival in a changing world. The authors offer a multifaceted view of the present situation, as well as suggestions for ways of enhancing the positive elements that have enriched and inspired Americans in the past. It is an analysis that highlights the myths and realities of a business and way of life that has a powerful hold on the American imagination. The reader comes away from this work with a clear idea of the tribulations farming families endure and the delicate balance between the spiritual and other rewards of farm life.

Download or read book Family Farming In Europe And America written by Boguslaw Galeski and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2020-09-23 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Much has happened since agricultural economists and rural sociologists met at the University of Chicago in 1946 to discuss family farming. The problems and issues related to the structure of agriculture have been intensified by current economic considerations, which promote the growth of larger-scale commercial farming operations and edge out many smaller farms owned, operated, and worked by families. In this book, contributors from eleven nations in Europe and North America provide a comparison of farm structure under different economic and political systems, including Poland as an example of a non-market economy. In addition to providing information on how local, state, and international policies have affected the agricultural enterprise, they look at the role of farmers' organizations in policy formulation and take note of changes in farm patterns and policies that have had an impact on farm production, off-farm work, and the welfare of farm families and rural communities.

Download or read book The Family Farm in a Globalizing World written by Michael Lipton and published by Intl Food Policy Res Inst. This book was released on 2005 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: References p. 25-28.

Download or read book American Harvest written by Marie Mutsuki Mockett and published by Graywolf Press. This book was released on 2020-04-07 with total page 416 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An epic story of the American wheat harvest, the politics of food, and the culture of the Great Plains For over one hundred years, the Mockett family has owned a seven-thousand-acre wheat farm in the panhandle of Nebraska, where Marie Mutsuki Mockett’s father was raised. Mockett, who grew up in bohemian Carmel, California, with her father and her Japanese mother, knew little about farming when she inherited this land. Her father had all but forsworn it. In American Harvest, Mockett accompanies a group of evangelical Christian wheat harvesters through the heartland at the invitation of Eric Wolgemuth, the conservative farmer who has cut her family’s fields for decades. As Mockett follows Wolgemuth’s crew on the trail of ripening wheat from Texas to Idaho, they contemplate what Wolgemuth refers to as “the divide,” inadvertently peeling back layers of the American story to expose its contradictions and unhealed wounds. She joins the crew in the fields, attends church, and struggles to adapt to the rhythms of rural life, all the while continually reminded of her own status as a person who signals “not white,” but who people she encounters can’t quite categorize. American Harvest is an extraordinary evocation of the land and a thoughtful exploration of ingrained beliefs, from evangelical skepticism of evolution to cosmopolitan assumptions about food production and farming. With exquisite lyricism and humanity, this astonishing book attempts to reconcile competing versions of our national story.

Download or read book The Family Farm written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Agriculture and published by . This book was released on 1963 with total page 190 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Status of the Family Farm written by and published by . This book was released on 1979 with total page 64 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Family Farm written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Agriculture. Subcommittee on Family Farms and published by . This book was released on 1956 with total page 52 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Obstacles to Strengthening Family Farm System written by United States. Congress. House. Committee on Agriculture. Subcommittee on Family Farms, Rural Development, and Special Studies and published by . This book was released on 1977 with total page 754 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: