Unit

The World ofAgriculture

Discuss the term agriculture and what it involves.

Explain why agriculture is a science.

Discuss the role of the agricultural industry in meeting human needs.

Identify agricultural events in history and its impact on America.

Discuss the impact of Native Americans and the Chisholm Trail on agriculture.

Explore the Dust Bowl and its effects on agriculture.

Discuss how machines used in agriculture have evolved.

Compare and contrast American and world agriculture.

Discuss scientific research and agriculture in the 21st century.

Objectives

agriculture celluloid clanscombine custom operators exportharvest headers hoboimport mechanizationmigrationrailhead reapers shocks synthetictenant farmertribes

Key Terms

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

Agriculture. What do you think of when you hear that word? Farming, livestock, wide-open spaces, tractors? Agriculture is all that and much more.

Agriculture is the art and science of raising crops and livestock. As one of the oldest industries on Earth, agriculture is practiced in every part of the world. Did you ever wonder how agriculture impacts your life? For some of you, agriculture takes up much of your life. After getting up this morning, you may have cared for livestock before leaving for school while other students may have never grown a plant or touched an animal larger than a dog.

Why Is Agriculture a Science?

By definition, the word “science” is used to describe the observation, identification and explanation of natural phenomena. In simpler terms, science is the study of facts or truth as they relate to nature and the world around us. If you think of agriculture in these terms, you can see why agriculture is a science. No other field of study uses nature to its benefit like agriculture. Think about other areas of science: biology, chemistry, physics and geology. These also deal with the facts of nature and all are part of agriculture.

Of all these sciences, which do you think is the most important? Agriculture, of course. Agriculture provides us with food that keeps us healthy. Without this food, we would not be able to live. Amazingly, less than half of the people in the United States are actually involved with providing food for the rest of the population. In 1940, the average American farmer produced enough food and fiber to feed 19 people; by 1970, enough for 73 people. Today, each farmer produces enough food and fiber for 143 people.

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The World of Agriculture

Number of People Fed Annually by One Farmer

1940

1950

1960

1970

1980

1990

2000

Today

19

27

46

73

115

129

143

139

Along with farmers, many people help in the manufacturing and distributing of agricultural products. Actually, most involved in agriculture work in the industry rather than on the farm. Less than 2% of our population are true farmers. Without farmers and other individuals like food researchers, processing supervisors and retail managers, we would not have many of the food luxuries we have today. Without the services of these people, we would have to spend most of our time growing and producing our own food to eat.

DiD You

Know?

?Almost one in every

five Americans works in an agriculture-related job. How many in your class

would that be?

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

Agriculture and Human Needs

Agriculture affects your life whether you live in a large city or on a farm. The food you eat, the clothes you wear, the paper you write on and even the air you breathe is part of agriculture. Green lawns, zoos and flower shops all relate to agriculture. Products made from agricultural yields include photographic film, medicines, synthetic rubber, cosmetics and many others.

You might never see a plastic tree, but plastics are frequently made from agricultural products. The first plastic, celluloid, was made from the chemicals found in plant cell walls. The plastic used to make phonograph records and rubber comes from resins in evergreen tree sap. Plastic is such an important part of our world, and technology is finding newer and better methods for making plastics from agricultural products.

Rayon cloth is made from corn and wheat stalks, straw, and wood pulp. Synthetic fabrics, like spandex, nylon, and polyester, have been made from many agricultural products, including the hooves of slaughtered animals.

Agriculture not only provides wonderful products, it also improves our lives. In addition to being one of the most effective means for controlling environmental pollution and cleansing our air and water, agriculture provides jobs and income for over 21 million Americans.

Efficient agricultural practices make food in America safe, fresh, nutritious and low-cost. In fact, Americans spend an average of 10.3 percent of their income on food, compared with 18 percent in Japan, 31.9 percent in Mexico, and 52.6 percent in India. In the graphic shown, the shaded portion is the amount spent on food. The remaining piece of the dollar is the amount of money on average people have to spend on other items like housing, utilities and transportation. As you can see, people in India spend such a large portion of money on food that less than half of their income is available for paying for other necessary expenses.

DiD You

Know?

?Blue jeans were invented in the 1870s.

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The World of Agriculture

Agricultural History

What one single force helped build the Roman Empire, led to the discovery of the New World, spurred Westward Expansion and led to both the Revolutionary and Civil Wars? The answer is agriculture.

Agriculture shaped much, or perhaps most, of the world’s history. Clans and tribes claimed land for planting and growing crops, raising livestock and hunting grounds. The first towns in the world sprang up around agricultural trading centers. Letters and numbers were devised to record agricultural trades. Later, explorers searched for trade routes to agricultural riches. These voyages led to the discovery of America.

Agricultural trade united city-states into nations and strengthened bonds between allies. Taxing agricultural products, on the other hand, led to revolution in American history. The American Revolution started when the British tried to tax the colonists on agricultural products such as tea. Shortly after the Revolution, the new American government taxed corn, and farmers threatened to rebel. Newly elected President George Washington called for the first civil use of Federal troops to stop the uprising known as Shay’s Rebellion.

The Civil War was primarily a clash between a manufacturing-based northern economy and a southern agriculture-based economy. Native Americans fought for the preservation of their hunting grounds and entered into bloody conflict with settlers when the food supply was threatened. In an effort to avoid the 1991 Gulf War, America and its allies withheld agricultural products from Iraq. Later, the lack of affordable agricultural products contributed to the demise of the Soviet Union.

Hardly a war, alliance, or exploratory voyage has occurred that was not related to agriculture. Agriculture has led to man’s greatest discoveries and inventions and shaped our cultures, our world and our history.

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

Native Americans and the Chisholm Trail

After the Civil War, Native Americans also had the difficult job of rebuilding just like the Confederacy. Many homes and schools had been destroyed. The Five Indian Nations in Oklahoma worked tirelessly to regain what they once had, which included agriculture. Soon, many tribes were able to replant fields or rent land to tenant farmers. These tenant farmers received a share of the crop in payment for working the land. This method of farming allowed Native Americans to produce crops on their land while owning stores in town or working in the coal or timber industry.

Each drive could have anywhere from 1,500 to 2,000 cattle. Stock Photo

As Native Americans worked to rebuild their economy through agriculture, business and education, other changes occurred throughout the Midwest. Cattle herds grew and eventually outnumbered buffalo. Where wagon tracks once paved the land, railroads took their place. In Texas, Longhorn cattle roamed the grassland and eventually outgrew their demand. Ranchers began to move cattle East where the market for cattle was better. Cattle were scarce in the East due to industrialization, and a rancher could get almost twenty times more for his cattle in eastern markets compared to the markets in Texas.

DiD You

Know?

?Many cowboys on the trails were

only 12 to 18 years old.

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The World of Agriculture

Tascosa TrailPlummer TrailGreat Western Cattle TrailChisolm TrailWest Shawnee TrailEast Shawnee Trail

Perryville

Colbert’s FerryPreston

Hatfield Mission

Union Mission

Fort Gibson

North ForkTown

Boggy Depot

Fort Washita Eagletown

Rock CreekCrossing

In order to move cattle to these eastern markets, herds had to be driven to railheads, where they were then shipped to slaughterhouses for processing. These cattle drives usually took anywhere from one to three months to complete. The most famous cattle trail was a direct route from Texas to Abilene, Kansas, “The Cow Capital of the World.” The Chisholm Trail was named after a goods trader of Scottish-Cherokee descent named Jesse Chisholm. Chisholm used this route that follows much of present-day Oklahoma Highway 81. It has been estimated that nearly five million cattle and one million horses used this trail for the greatest migration of livestock in world history.

Dust Bowl

At the beginning of the 1930s, farmers were called upon to produce as many crops as possible in response to the war. To take advantage of productive land, farmers were encouraged to plant their crops from fence row to fence row, tilling the native grasses to make way for seasonal crops. Unfortunately, drought along with strong winds created dust storms that blew away valuable topsoil that was once covered by grass. The dust covered everything and found its way through the smallest of cracks in a house. Many homes and cars were covered by drifts of sand. People even developed illnesses from inhaling fine dust particles.

A great ‘roller’ moves across the land during the Dust Bowl. Courtesy: USDA-NRCS

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

The term Dust Bowl was first used by a reporter to describe the conditions in the Plains to readers in other parts of the country. Drought and high winds affected parts of Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Kansas, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas. The hardest hit areas were southwestern Kansas and the panhandles of Oklahoma and Texas.

Farmers were devastated by the loss of productive soil, but many remained with their land through the troubled times. Tenant farmers who rented the land they farmed left their land for better climate. The Dust Bowl taught some very important agricultural lessons. Agricultural conservation programs to prevent such loss of land were implemented. Farmers began to till less, plant trees for wind breaks and rotate crops. These practices are still used today to preserve our valuable land.

A ‘black roller’ moves across the Plains, carrying soil from unprotected farmland during the Dust Bowl. Courtesy: USDA-NRCS

DiD You

Know?

?Soil was lifted as high as 8,000 feet into the air.

DenverTopeka

Santa Fe

Oklahoma City

OKLAHOMA

KANSAS

COLORADO

NEW MEXICO

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The World of Agriculture

Agricultural Mechanization(Reprint Permission — OK Ag in the Classroom)

During World War I, states of the Midwest and Great Plains began growing large crops of wheat. Since the fields in Europe had been destroyed by the war, American farmers stepped in to grow extra food to help feed the people there. The machinery wheat farmers now use had not yet been invented. So when it was time to bring in the wheat harvest, farmers needed a lot of help.

From the early 1900s to the mid 1920s, the wheat fields of the Midwest and Great Plains were scenes of great activity. While only a few workers were needed to plant the wheat crop, large numbers of workers were needed for the harvest. Wheat harvesting required as many as 250,000 men who moved from field to field, following the ripening crop.

A harvest worker carries a bundle of wheat. Stock Photo

In May, the migration or movement of workers started in Texas and moved steadily northward reaching North Dakota by the middle of August, and then passing into Canada. This area of wheat harvesting is known as the Wheat Belt.

While smaller operations might get help from family and neighbors, most wheat farms required outside labor to bring in the grain. The need for workers depended upon the type of

machinery used. Smaller wheat farms used binders, which cut the unripened wheat and bound it into shocks. This required only two to four men – called “shockers” – to follow the machine, collect the bundles, and turn them upside down to ripen. The work was slow because the binder could only harvest about 10-12 acres a day.

DiD You

Know?

?Today’s average farm is 417 acres compared to 147

acres in 1900.

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

Most of the wheat was harvested or cut by machines called headers. The header simply cut off the heads of the ripened grain. Because ripe grain could shatter and scatter its seeds, the workers had to get it in as quickly as possible. Header operations required a large number of men working intensively over a period of a few days. Horse-drawn reapers picked up the wheat after it was cut. Then the wheat was transported in wagons and stored in ricks.

Header crews included men who drove the horse-drawn reapers, men who drove wagons called “barges” that transported the harvested grain, and laborers who arranged the wheat in the wagons for transport and storage. Headers could cut about 30 acres a day, which meant that workers were on each farm for about one week before moving on to the next one. A man who worked on one of these header crews was often called a hobo or a migrant worker.

The work was hard, and conditions were difficult. Harvesters labored in the intense heat and humidity of summer, and many suffered sunstroke and heat exhaustion. Even travel to the fields could be deadly. Newspapers regularly ran stories about young men killed while trying to hop freight trains for the Wheat Belt. Brakemen often threw workers from trains, while hi-jacks – robbers who preyed on the migratory workers – probably murdered others.

Many workers stayed in jungle camps outside the town. They slept in hay stacks, empty boxcars or even out in the open. They scrounged for food, sometimes boiling wheat for a thin-cooked cereal called gruel, or grinding wheat to make flour for pancakes. Some workers would concoct a “hobo’s delight” from young alfalfa and bacon rinds. Wages ranged from $2 to $4 a day, sometimes dropping as low as 50 cents a day, depending upon the supply of workers.

Stacks of wheat left to ripen before collecting. Stock Photo

Combines now cut and thresh the wheat in one step. Stock Photo

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The World of Agriculture

Mechanization or the use of machinery for the wheat harvest ended the Great Wheat Belt Migration. The combine harvester cut and threshed the grain in a single operation and made hand shocking unnecessary. With the combine, five men could do the work once done by 320 men.

Shaking screen

Tailingselevator

Grainelevator

Enginecompartment

Beater

Conveyor

FeederRevolvingreel

DividerCutterbar

Auger

Threshingdrum

Fan

Grainsieve

Grainauger

Tailingauger

Cha�

Straw

Grain

Because farm machinery is so expensive today, many farmers hire custom operators or custom cutters who bring their own machinery and crews for the harvest. Custom operations follow the same migration that migrant workers followed in the early part of the last century, moving north as wheat ripens for harvesting.

You’ve heard that Eli Whitney’s cotton gin removed the seeds from

cotton and made processing it easier and more profitable. History

indicates that the cotton gin played a role in the Civil War. Even today,

the cotton gin continues to be used for all cotton processing. Few

inventions have been as important as the cotton gin. But Eli Whitney

didn’t invent it alone.

Whitney was good at fixing machines and was encouraged by Mrs.

Catherine Littlefield Greene to create a machine that would speed the

cotton cleaning process. Whitney was living with Mrs. Greene during

college, and with her help, Whitney invented the gin. Although Greene

didn’t invent the cotton gin, many inventions developed by women at that time were credited to men

because it was believed nobody would buy a woman’s invention.

Stock Photo

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

Agriculture and the World

Agriculture has kept us dressed and fed, given us letters and math, and changed the world. But primarily, agriculture is a business. One of the goals of agriculture is making money.

Growing crops, raising livestock, processing agricultural products and selling those products are very profitable businesses. Much of our agricultural profit comes from selling products to other countries. Agriculture in the U.S. is one of the few industries where we sell more than we buy from foreign countries, creating a positive trade balance for our economy.

International trade of agricultural commodities is one of the most powerful forces in the world’s economy. After all, every person has to eat. In fact, trade is such a powerful force that it shapes political influence and relationships around the world. The United States both imports and exports commodities. An import is a product that is brought to the U.S. from another country. An export is a product sent to another country from the United States.

Agricultural products are exported to nations in emergencies, especially when the nation’s government is friendly with American policies. On the other hand, when foreign nations adopt policies we oppose, agricultural trade is decreased.

Agriculture in the 21st Century

What faces us in the future? What problems will we have? How will they be solved? In many cases, the answer lies in agriculture. More than any other industry, agriculture will be called upon to deal with the rapidly growing world population. Feeding and clothing the world will be very difficult because land will also be needed for housing and other uses. In 1980, approximately 4.45 billion people lived on Earth. By the year 2000, that number had grown to 5.9 billion. Today, the world population has grown to a staggering 7 billion people. Each year, the world’s population is expected to grow by nearly 96 million people.

An antenna on this SUV monitors soil productivity. Courtesy: USDA-NRCS

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The World of Agriculture

Career SpotlightAgricultural Marketing Coordinator

How do people learn where milk, bacon and eggs come from if they never took an agriculture class in school? Many people just assume these products are made in a factory. It’s important for agriculture to educate its consumers about the food they eat and clothes they wear. In order to accomplish this goal, Agricultural Marketing Coordinators are hired to spread the word about agriculture. Jason Harvey of the Oklahoma Department of Agriculture,Food and Forestry works each day to teach youth and adults about agriculture. He has worked to promote Farmers Markets and the Made in Oklahoma program. Harvey believes, “my agriculture education classes gave me a well-rounded understanding of the agriculture industry, which I use today when talking with producers across our state.” Communication and interpersonal skills are very important for this type of position. Coordinators spend a lot of time on the phone or in front of people talking or answering questions.

An Agricultural Marketing Coordinator can have a starting annual salary of $28,000-$30,000. A college degree is often needed for a position of this nature. Harvey says his favorite part of his job is, “the people. I have the opportunity to assist small family farmers who are looking for new innovative ideas for their agriculture operations.”

Agricultural marketing is a vital part of the agriculture industry. Individuals who are passionate about agriculture get to promote it each day by sharing the new and exciting products and ideas with the world.

The huge population will generate more pollution and waste. Wildlife will be at an increased risk while natural resources will be exhausted even more quickly than they are today. Using today’s farming techniques, it would take a piece of land about the size of a football field to provide food and fiber for the average American.

As the world changes, so does agriculture. Computers and new communication devices make farmers and ranchers more efficient. More Americans will have agricultural careers that focus on trade and technology, rather than farming. New farming techniques conserve soil and protect the environment. Farming will take place not just on land, but on ocean floors or possibly in specially-built communities in space. These changes will help American farmers continue to feed the world.

Stock Photo

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Unit 2 — Student Edition

Unit Summary

Agriculture is the foundation of our lives and the economy of the nation. For centuries, agriculture has affected the way many cultures live and work. Technological advances address the needs of an expanding population. From harvesting by hand to combine harvesters, agriculture leads the way in finding new and more efficient ways to produce the products we need. Without agriculture, we would be without our favorite pair of blue jeans and the cereal we eat for breakfast. Through conflicts and wars, agriculture has always rebounded and will continue to do so for many years to come.

Unit Review

1. Why is agriculture considered a science? 2. How many people are fed by each farmer today? 3. What are some products made with agricultural sources? 4. What events in history did agriculture affect? 5. What role did Native Americans play in agriculture after the Civil War? 6. What was the Chisholm Trail? 7. What caused the Dust Bowl in the 1930s? 8. What were some of the effects of the Dust Bowl? 9. Before the invention of the combine, how was wheat harvested? 10. How did the combine make harvesting more efficient? 11. What creates a positive trade balance for the United States? 12. What changes does agriculture face in the 21st century?