The 4-H Harvest: Sexuality and the State in Rural America

The 4-H Harvest shows how 4-H, like the countryside it often symbolizes, is the product of the modernist ambition to efficiently govern rural economies, landscapes, and populations.The book is published by University of Pennsylvania Press."Original, surprising, deeply-sourced, convincing, and a delightful read." (James C. In their place, 4-H would cultivate efficient, capital-intensive farms and convince rural people to trust federal expertise.Gabriel N. As the first comprehensive history of the organization, The 4-H Harvest tracks 4-H from its origins in turn-of-the-century agricultural modernization efforts, through its role in the administration of federal programs during the New Deal and World War II, to its status as an instrument of international development in Cold War battlegrounds like Vietnam and Latin America.Organizers believed the clubs would bypass backward patriarchs reluctant to embrace modern farming techniques. Rosenberg's masterful history of 4-H is the first in-depth study of an institution that every historian of agriculture, not to mention every rural American, recognizes as an essential component of the modern rural