The offer of free farmland after World War II may not have sparked the same stampede that it did in frontier days, but, as Brian Cannon shows in this path-breaking study, postwar homesteading continued to shape the modern West in important ways. Between 1946 and 1966, the Bureau of Reclamation opened up over 3,000 farms on irrigated public lands in the West to returning servicemen. Although involving fewer people than those flocking to western cities, this mini-land rush represents an important continuity in western tradition through the cultivation of values-hard work, security, independence, family stability-long associated with frontier life. Cannon examines these new agricultural settlements and the values they reflected and reinforced, following them through the end of the twentieth century and exploring specific key homesteading and federal reclamation projects.Cannon describes how the Bureau of Reclamation used lotteries to make available free land that had previously been part of Indian reservations, used for Japanese internment, or abandoned by unsuccessful settlers. He then traces the new homesteaders' experiences in establishing a farm, "proving up," and gaining title to the land, contrasting the realities of modern homesteading with iconic views of the frontier.Combining archival research with oral history, Cannon opens up genuinely human vistas in the homesteading process. He chronicles the hard life that many of the settlers faced and details wrangling over water policy—which both influenced and was influenced by westerners' shifting perception of the frontier—as well as the impact of shifting values and priorities on agricultural communities. Examining a number of homesteading efforts, he focuses particularly on the failed Riverton Project in central Wyoming, where after fifteen years a group of settlers petitioned Congress for restitution; and the Klamath Project in northern California, where attempts to open new homesteads aroused nationwide opposition from wildlife and sportsmen's organizations.Cannon concludes by examining the continued appeal of homesteading even in the twenty-first century, as individuals seeking to reorient their lives—and local governments seeking to repopulate their districts—have reinvented homesteading. Reopening the Frontier opens up a little-studied aspect of modern western history to show that the pioneer spirit lives on.

Reopening the Frontier: Homesteading in the Modern West

History

Cannon, Brian Q.

Americas

University Press of Kansas

This is the first in-depth account of the federal resettlement program that relocated more than a thousand impoverished families from submarginal dryland farms to federally sponsored irrigated farms in New Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, Utah, Idaho, and Montana during the 1930s and early 1940s. Each resettlement community was an agricultural, economic, and social experiment that tested the government's ability to create profitable, self-sufficient farms and communities and the relocatees' adaptability to new technologies, social relationships, and political economy. The history of farm resettlement in the Mountain West demonstrates that humankind can respond rationally to social crisis and economic adversity. Using oral history, weekly field reports, and local newspapers to reconstruct the story of the Rocky Mountain resettlement communities, Brian Q. Cannon adds a new chapter to the history of pioneer farming in the American West.

Remaking the Agrarian Dream: New Deal Rural Resettlement in the Mountain West

Business & Money

Univ of New Mexico Pr

This book is a collection of essays showcasing cutting-edge research and innovative approaches that a new generation of scholars is bringing to the study of immigration in the American West. Often overlooked in general studies of immigration, the western United States has been and is an important destination for immigrants. The unique combination of ethnicities and races in the West, combined with political and economic peculiarities, has given the region an immigration narrative that departs significantly from that of the East and Midwest. This volume explores facets of this narrative with case studies that reveal how immigration in the American West has influenced the region’s development culturally, economically, socially, and politically. Contributors offer historical narrative and theory to illuminate factors that have galvanized immigration and the ways that agency, cultural resources, institutions, and societal attitudes have shaped immigrant experiences. With chapters written by scholars from multiple fields, the book’s interdisciplinary framework will make it of interest to readers from a variety of backgrounds.

Immigrants in the Far West: Historical Identities and Experiences

Embry, Jessie L.

University of Utah Press

The half century between statehood in 1896 and the end of World War II in 1945 was a period of transformation and transition for Utah. This book interprets those profound changes, revealing sweeping impacts on both institutions and ordinary people. Drawing upon expertise honed over decades of teaching, researching, and writing about Utah’s history, the authors incorporate fresh archival sources, new oral histories, and hundreds of scholarly articles and books as they narrate the little-known story of the crucial formative years when Utah came of age.
During its sometimes awkward years of adolescence and maturation, Utah was gradually incorporated into the American political, social, and economic mainstream. Urban and industrial influences supplanted agrarian traditions, displacing people socially, draining the countryside of population, and galvanizing a critical crisis in values and self-identification. National corporations and mass labor movements took root in the state as commerce expanded. Involvement in world events such as the Spanish-American War, two world wars, and the Great Depression further set the stage for entry into the modern, globalized world as Utahns immersed themselves in national politics and became part of the democratic, corporate culture of twentieth-century America.

The Awkward State of Utah: Coming of Age in the Nation, 1896-1945

Peterson, Charles S.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Cannon, Brian Q.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Cannon, Brian Q.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Cannon, Brian Q.. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Reopening the Frontier: Homesteading in the Modern West

Remaking the Agrarian Dream: New Deal Rural Resettlement in the Mountain West

Immigrants in the Far West: Historical Identities and Experiences

The Awkward State of Utah: Coming of Age in the Nation, 1896-1945