This first full-length study of the cattle tick eradication program
in the United States offers a new perspective on the fate of the
yeomanry in the twentieth-century South during a period when state
and federal governments were both increasing and centralizing their
authority. As Claire Strom relates the power struggles that
complicated efforts to wipe out the Boophilus tick, she explains
the motivations and concerns of each group involved, including
large- and small-scale cattle farmers, scientists, and officials at
all levels of government.
In the remote rural South--such as the piney woods of south
Georgia and north Florida--resistance to mandatory treatment of
cattle was unusually strong and sometimes violent. Cattle often
ranged free, and their owners raised them mostly for local use
rather than faraway markets. Cattle farmers in such areas, shows
Strom, perceived a double threat in tick eradication mandates. In
addition to their added costs, eradication schemes, with their
top-down imposition of government expertise, were anathema to the
yeomanry's notions of liberty.
Strom contextualizes her southern focus within the national
scale of the cattle industry, discussing, for instance, the
contentious place of cattle drives in American agricultural
history. Because Mexico was the primary source of potential tick
reinfestation, Strom examines the political and environmental
history of the Rio Grande, giving the book a transnational
perspective. Debates about the political and economic culture of
small farmers have tended to focus on earlier periods in American
history. Here Strom shows that pockets of yeoman culture survived
into the twentieth century and that these communities had the power
to block (if only temporarily) the expansion of the American
state.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
(2)
