(livinghistoryfarm.org/farming-history/)
Grades 3-12, with parental supervision
This website is a companion to a real “Living History Farm” in Nebraska, where you and your children can learn about the history of agriculture in America and how technology has changed it.
You can also learn about the man, David Wessels, whose estate made possible his vision of a Living History Farm. One of his major concerns was “that today’s kids – both urban and rural – have almost no idea how farmers went from essentially a medieval system of plowing with horses to huge tractors run by computers with global positioning systems and air-conditioned cabs.”
The story told on the website, goes back to Native Americans who first cultivated the fields, through the first European immigrants staking out the prairie ground, to boom and bust cycles, and then the incredible technological innovations of the 20th Century.
When you get to the site you’ll find information on:
- Farming in the 1920s
- Farming in the ’30s
- Farming in the ’40s
- Farming in the ’50s
- 70’s to Today
You’ll see videos and/or graphics and sound for each, along with links to these categories:
- Farm Life
- Making Money
- Water
- Machines
- Crops
- Pests & Weeds
- World Events
Listen to interviews on many aspects of farming history as well.
Also, on the left sidebar, be sure to check out the link for Ted Kooser – podcasts from a former U.S. Poet Laureate. And the video link has all the videos in one place.
The Living History Farm seeks to educate everyone about the role agriculture plays in providing nourishment to the world. If you can’t make it to Nebraska to explore the farm in real-time, this is the next best thing.
