Farmers & PopulismMr. ErmerU.S. HistoryMiami Beach Senior High

Benchmark SS.912.A.3.1

•Analyze the economic challenges to American farmers and farmers’ responses to these challenges in the mid to late 1800s

Industrial Agriculture• Homestead Act of 1862• Farmers move to the western frontier, face challenges• Lack of trees encourages building of sod houses• Lack of water encourages deep water wells with hand pumps

• The Wheat Belt• Wheat is best option for farming in the Great Plains• A&M Universities develop industrial farming techniques

• Dry Farming• Bonanza Farms

Sod Houses of the 1800s

Problems on the Plains

• Railroads needed to bring crops to growing cities• New industries grow rich, create vertically

integrated monopolies• 1880s: USA=world’s largest wheat exporter• 1889: Oklahoma is last frontier, settlers rush in• Falling wheat prices + Drought = failing farms• 1900: 1/3 of farmers are tenants on their own

land

Farmers Organize

• 1867: National Grange of the Patrons of Husbandry • Organized marketing cooperatives, “cut out the middle man”• Lobby for government regulation of railroads• Granger cooperatives and politics fail due to inexperience

• 1875: The Farmers Alliance• Same concerns as the Grangers• The Ocala Demands • political organization political success

• 1892: The People’s Party, a.k.a. Populists

Populism

• The Populist Platform• Rejection of laissez-faire economics• Favor “free silver” and greenbacks against gold standard• Government ownership of railroads and communication

• William Jennings Bryan • The Cross of Gold Speech (1896)• Outlines populist vision at Democratic National Convention