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A Year in the Life of an American Family Farm
by Ted Genoways
Book Reviewed by:Is there still a place for the farm in today's America?
The family farm lies at the heart of our national identity, yet its future is in peril. Rick Hammond grew up on a small ranch, and for forty years he has raised cattle and crops on his wife's fifth-generation homestead in York County, Nebraska, in hopes of passing it on to their four children. But as the handoff nears, their small family farm - and their entire way of life - are under siege.
Rising corporate ownership of land and livestock is forcing small farmers to get bigger and bigger, assuming more debt and more risk. At the same time, after nearly a decade of record-high corn and soybean prices, the bottom has dropped out of the markets, making it ever harder for small farmers to shoulder their loans. All the while, the Hammonds are confronted by encroaching pipelines, groundwater depletion, climate change, and shifting trade policies. Far from an isolated refuge beyond the reach of global events, the family farm is increasingly at the crossroads of emerging technologies and international detente.
Following the Hammonds from harvest to harvest, Ted Genoways explores this rapidly changing landscape of small, traditional farming operations, mapping as it unfolds day to day. This Blessed Earth is both a concise exploration of the history of the American small farm and a vivid, nuanced portrait of one family's fight to preserve their legacy and the life they love.
Ted Genoways, a Nebraskan with family roots in farming, is a poet and journalist whose previous works include The Chain: Farm, Factory, and the Fate of Our Food (2014). For this new book he followed Rick Hammond's family and farm workers over one critical year, October 2014 to October 2015. He vividly conveys the rhythms of farming and reflects on the historical shifts that have brought this way of life to a point of crisis. At times I wondered if the book's niche subject and specific family history could limit its readership. An interest in farming and food production is probably necessary to truly appreciate it. If you enjoy books by Wendell Berry and Michael Pollan, for instance, or have read and liked what could be considered the U.K. counterpart of this book, Land of Plenty by Charlie Pye-Smith, you will appreciate This Blessed Earth...continued
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(Reviewed by Rebecca Foster).
The Keystone Pipeline is a 36-inch-diameter oil pipeline between Alberta, Canada and Texas. It transports 550,000 barrels of crude oil from Canada to refineries and distribution centers in the United States every day. It was constructed in three phases, with the first – stretching to southern Nebraska and then across to two refineries in Illinois – completed in 2010. Extensions to Oklahoma and onwards to Texas were finished in 2011 and 2014, respectively. The pipeline now crosses eight states: North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Oklahoma, and Texas.
Keystone was in the news in 2016 and 2017 because of the controversial XL (for "export limited") expansion. This supplementary pipeline, running ...
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Barry Estabrook, author of Tomatoland and Pig Tales
It's not fair to claim that you are concerned about the country's food system unless you truly understand the millions of unsung conventional family farmers who produce our corn, soybeans, and beef. Genoways portrays just such a family in a book that is factual, rich in history, and filled with characters you will come to know as friends. He writes with an investigative journalist's mind and a poet's soul.
