Farm Boys: Lives of Gay Men from the Rural Midwest Read Online Free PDF

addition to producing goods for commercial markets.
    Technology brought many changes to farming. From the 1920s to the 1950s, work horses and mules were replaced by gasoline-powered tractors. Electrical power became available to the majority of farmers from the mid-1980s through the 1950s. The use of hybrid seed and synthetic fertilizers proliferated during this century, as did the use of chemicals to control weeds and insect pests. These technological changes made greater mechanization possible, meaning that fewer farmers could farm more land more efficiently. Consequently, the number of farms declined and farm size increased as smaller farms were consolidated into fewer, larger operations using larger machinery.
    To meet the market demands of an increasingly urbanized population, midwestern farms became more specialized as they became larger. Today, many farms produce only one kind of crop or livestock and even the farms that remain small and diversified have become more specialized. Hogs and beef cattle are of primary importance in midwestern livestock farming, followed by dairy cattle, poultry, and lamb. Crop farming in the Midwest hascome to be dominated by corn and soybeans, thanks to lots of level land, fertile soil, and a warm, moist growing season. Secondary crops are hay, oats, grain sorghum (milo), barley, flaxseed, rapeseed, rye, sugar beets, and wheat. As climate, soil conditions, topography, and market access vary throughout the Midwest, so does the variety of crops grown in any particular area.
    The men whose stories are presented here grew up on farms that were extremely varied, reflecting not only regional differences within the Midwest, but also changes in farming during this century. Some of the farms on which they lived were relatively small operations that represented only a portion of the family’s livelihood; one or both parents worked at off-farm jobs as well. Other farms were larger operations that were the family’s sole livelihood. Some farms were family-owned, others were rented. Some farms were specialized, but most had some mixture of animals and crops. On farms that specialized in grains, with little or no livestock, spring and fall tended to be exceptionally busy times, as the crops were planted and harvested. Summer and winter were much less busy. On farms that raised animals as well as the crops to feed them, work demands were more consistent from one time of year to the next. Farm animals, especially dairy cattle, guaranteed the daily grind of chores—feeding, milking, and cleaning.
COMMUNITY
    In the early decades of the twentieth century, midwestern farming was an enterprise that relied heavily on relationships with neighbors and kin. Since then, it has become a highly individualized and mechanized enterprise. Technological changes beyond those related to farming methods have contributed greatly to this change. Automobiles, all-weather roads and high-speed highways, telephone, radio, and television have reduced the cultural insularity of farm communities. In doing so, they have eroded the differences between rural and urban life, contributing to a “suburbanization” of farm life.
    A technology-induced decline in the rural population has been a major force in the disintegration of rural communities. The closing of rural and village churches and businesses, the demise of one-room country schools, the consolidation of school districts and the bussing of children to towns and cities all represent the loss of institutions central to community life. And as farming operations have become larger, farmers have spread out over the countryside, impeding neighborly relations.
    These kinds of changes were lamented by Martin Scherz, who grew up on a small, diversified livestock and crop farm in southeastern Nebraska.
    In the area where I was raised, the old patterns of farming are disappearing year by year. You don’t see nearly as much pasture and livestock. All you see is corn and soybeans,