SEGMENT: LAND, CONSERVATION, & CROPS
Gray Herndon>UIS Collection H-I>UIS Collection H-I, Segment 4
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- LAND
- Speculates on how many farms were owner-operated versus rented or sharecropped. Perhaps flatter land was more rented, as timber land was settled earlier and owner-operated. Timber soil was more subject to erosion if it was plowed on a slope. Prior to 1980s, forty acres was the size of farm that a man and team of horses could farm in corn and oats. As machinery came in, farms got bigger.
- CROPS
- Winter wheat planted in fall here, not spring wheat. That was planted in Kansas, Nebraska, and the Dakotas.
- CONSERVATION
- Installation of grass waterways. Around 1914, Herndon made a grass waterway on his farm he rented out. Explains how he planted Timothy grass in the swales so the runoff rainwater would course over the grass and not erode the soil, unless it was running too fast. Rare in this area.
