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Entitled to Power: Farm Women and Technology, 1913-1963
The advent of modern agribusiness irrevocably changed the patterns of life and labor on the American family farm. In Entitled to Power , Katherine Jellison examines midwestern farm women's unexpected response to new labor-saving devices.
Federal farm policy at mid-century treated farm women as consumers, not producers. New technologies, as promoted by agricultural extension agents and by home appliance manufacturers, were expected to create separate spheres of work in the field and in the house. These innovations, however, enabled women to work as operators of farm machinery or independently in the rural community. Jellison finds that many women preferred their productive roles on and off the farm to the domestic ideal emphasized by contemporary prescriptive literature. A variety of visual images of farm women from advertisements and agricultural publications serve to contrast the publicized view of these women with the roles that they chose for themselves. The letters, interviews, and memoirs assembled by Jellison reclaim the many contributions women made to modernizing farm life.
Originally published in 1993.
A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.
Federal farm policy at mid-century treated farm women as consumers, not producers. New technologies, as promoted by agricultural extension agents and by home appliance manufacturers, were expected to create separate spheres of work in the field and in the house. These innovations, however, enabled women to work as operators of farm machinery or independently in the rural community. Jellison finds that many women preferred their productive roles on and off the farm to the domestic ideal emphasized by contemporary prescriptive literature. A variety of visual images of farm women from advertisements and agricultural publications serve to contrast the publicized view of these women with the roles that they chose for themselves. The letters, interviews, and memoirs assembled by Jellison reclaim the many contributions women made to modernizing farm life.
Originally published in 1993.
A UNC Press Enduring Edition -- UNC Press Enduring Editions use the latest in digital technology to make available again books from our distinguished backlist that were previously out of print. These editions are published unaltered from the original, and are presented in affordable paperback formats, bringing readers both historical and cultural value.
240 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1993
About the author
Katherine Jellison
6 books2 followersKatherine Jellison is associate professor of history at Ohio University and author of Entitled to Power: Farm Women and Technology, 1913-1963.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 9, 2023
Who knew tractors & farm women’s liberation had so much in common!
August 31, 2014
A. Summary
1. Thesis: Midwestern farm women wanted technology but not the idea of homemaking
2. Federal farm policy in 1900 treated women as consumers, not producers. Jellison argues that many women preferred this productive role over the domestic, consumer idea championed by prescriptive literature. This literature emphasized that the adoption of modern equipment would release women from their productive role on the farm and allow them to become a full time home maker. The farm women fought against this modern vision. It is also a cultural history attempting to find the meaning behind advertising and governmental policy towards farm women. This meaning was a modernization message to accept the domestic technology and become consumers of the new products.
B. The beginnings of technological reform on the farm: Country life movement and Smith-Lever Act
1. The Country Life Movement was set up by T. Roosevelt to see how progressive goals (improve the quality of farm life) could be met on the farm
a) The result of the commission (1909) was the suggestion to make rural life more like urban life
b) Bring technology to the field and home
2. Smith-Lever Act (1914) provided funding for farm mechanization. But in doing so it divided the money into 2 spheres; farm and housework
C. The modernization message of the 1920s
1. This message was that farm women must be remade in the image of the urban housewife
2. The key to this was to ensure that women had domestic technology
3. The farm women’s own needs were not addressed (improved communications technology). Instead they were shown new washing machines and other domestic appliances.
4. This message was sent through advertising, radio, and prescriptive literature in magazines and newspapers
5. The attempt to urbanize farm women met with limited success in the 1920s. Farm women resisted as they held on to their role as farm producer.
D. Great Depression and the New Deal:
1. During the Depression many farm women wrote letters to the government claiming poverty. The example that they used was their lack of farm equipment.
2. At the end of the 1930s farm women were in a better position than a decade earlier. Ex. electrified farms, radios, AAA
3. Therefore, New Dealers achieved partial success in getting farm women to acquire modern equipment
E. “Tractorettes” go to war
1. Women were called upon to raise the food during the war and make use of masculine machinery
2. These women were the “tractorettes” or the equivalent of “Rosie the riveter”
3. After the was ads picturing women using farm equipment disappeared
4. The value of women’s fieldwork disappeared and policymakers once again used women as housewives
F. The postwar era
1. Women continued to resist their role as a homemaker
2. Economic constraints required that farm women earn a living outside the farm
3. Within the patriarchal system the women maintained some power through wage-earning activities
1. Thesis: Midwestern farm women wanted technology but not the idea of homemaking
2. Federal farm policy in 1900 treated women as consumers, not producers. Jellison argues that many women preferred this productive role over the domestic, consumer idea championed by prescriptive literature. This literature emphasized that the adoption of modern equipment would release women from their productive role on the farm and allow them to become a full time home maker. The farm women fought against this modern vision. It is also a cultural history attempting to find the meaning behind advertising and governmental policy towards farm women. This meaning was a modernization message to accept the domestic technology and become consumers of the new products.
B. The beginnings of technological reform on the farm: Country life movement and Smith-Lever Act
1. The Country Life Movement was set up by T. Roosevelt to see how progressive goals (improve the quality of farm life) could be met on the farm
a) The result of the commission (1909) was the suggestion to make rural life more like urban life
b) Bring technology to the field and home
2. Smith-Lever Act (1914) provided funding for farm mechanization. But in doing so it divided the money into 2 spheres; farm and housework
C. The modernization message of the 1920s
1. This message was that farm women must be remade in the image of the urban housewife
2. The key to this was to ensure that women had domestic technology
3. The farm women’s own needs were not addressed (improved communications technology). Instead they were shown new washing machines and other domestic appliances.
4. This message was sent through advertising, radio, and prescriptive literature in magazines and newspapers
5. The attempt to urbanize farm women met with limited success in the 1920s. Farm women resisted as they held on to their role as farm producer.
D. Great Depression and the New Deal:
1. During the Depression many farm women wrote letters to the government claiming poverty. The example that they used was their lack of farm equipment.
2. At the end of the 1930s farm women were in a better position than a decade earlier. Ex. electrified farms, radios, AAA
3. Therefore, New Dealers achieved partial success in getting farm women to acquire modern equipment
E. “Tractorettes” go to war
1. Women were called upon to raise the food during the war and make use of masculine machinery
2. These women were the “tractorettes” or the equivalent of “Rosie the riveter”
3. After the was ads picturing women using farm equipment disappeared
4. The value of women’s fieldwork disappeared and policymakers once again used women as housewives
F. The postwar era
1. Women continued to resist their role as a homemaker
2. Economic constraints required that farm women earn a living outside the farm
3. Within the patriarchal system the women maintained some power through wage-earning activities
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews