Agricultural Literature And The Early Illinois Farmer

Study of midwestern agricultural patterns, focusing on the farmer and his problems, by the president of the Agricultural History Society.

Jane Adams focuses on the transformation of rural life in Union County, Illinois, as she explores the ways in which American farming has been experienced and understood in the twentieth century. Reconstructing the histories of seven farms, she places the

With reports of County farmers' institutes for the year ...

This project contributes to our understanding of rural Midwesterners and farm newspapers at the turn of the century. While cultural historians have mainly focused on readers in town and cities, it examines Midwestern farmers. It also contributes to the "new rural history" by exploring the ideas of Hal Barron and others that country people selectively adapted the advice given to them by reformers. Finally, it furthers our understanding of American farm newspapers themselves and offers suggestions on how to use them as sources.

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in Non-Fiction. This book is a landmark in American political thought. Preeminent Richard Hofstadter examines the passion for progress and reform that colored the entire period from 1890 to 1940 with startling and stimulating results. The Age of Reform searches out the moral and emotional motives of the reformers the myths and dreams in which they believed, and the realities with which they had to compromise.