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Doing genealogy I've seen a pattern (my own relatives) of moving, post Civil War, to the midwest where I think there was plenty of land to farm. Then they move
by JKCalhoun 2y ago
Doing genealogy I've seen a pattern (my own relatives) of moving, post Civil War, to the midwest where I think there was plenty of land to farm.
Then they moved from rural communities to cities around the beginning of the 20th Century. Jobs were plenty in the cities and perhaps they had no desire to continue farming like their parents.
Post-WWII there was some migration westward (California, etc.). Perhaps the jobs and lifestyle appealed to my midwestern relatives. No doubt the interstates and car proliferation contributed.
But college, jobs, and opportunity have continued to send myself, my father, mother, sister to the four corners of the U.S.
Recently I am aware of relatives moving from places like California to places with more affordable housing.
- wrp 2y ago> perhaps they had no desire to continue farming like their parents. I think it is also that making a living in farming became harder. I had an ancestor who was a small farmer in the 1880s-90s, and his career was one of increasing prosperity. His son worked just as hard but it was a struggle, and he eventually lost the farm in the late 1920s and went to work at a factory.