Urban and Rural America: Shifting Demographics

Tony Gonzales

Background on Hamlin Garland and “Under the Lion’s Paw”

Background: Hamlin Garland• Born 1860 in West Salem, WI

– Second of four children• Lived in WI for 8 yrs

– Visited every year• Lived in Boston, became writer

“Under the Lion’s Paw”• “Under the Lion’s Paw” is one of eleven short stories

in Garland’s book Main-Travelled Roads• “Naturalist emphasis for economic reform” (487)• Inspired by Henry George’s Progress and Poverty

– Argument for “Single Tax”– End “land speculation” (see Cultural and Historical

Ramifications)• Jim Butler (492)

“Under the Lion’s Paw” (cont’d)

• In 1892, Garland read “Under the Lion’s Paw” before a national convention of the People’s Party

• Later became spokesman for Populists

Political Ramifications

Political Ramifications

• People’s Party or Populists (1891)– Cotton and wheat farmers crusaded against banks,

railroads, and other elites– Coalitions and labor unions

• Child Labor– No labor laws for children at farms– Women and children could work up to 10 hours (law

passed in MA, 1874)

Political Ramifications (cont’d)

• Homestead Act of 1862– Signed by Pres. Abraham Lincoln– One of three federal laws– Gave each applicant a “freehold title” of up to 160

acres of land (west of Mississippi River)– Example: Far and Away

Cultural and Historical Ramifications

Cultural and Historical Ramifications

• Homestead Act of 1862– Number of farms tripled from 2 million (1860) to 6

million (1905)– 22 million living on farms (1880)– Farm value went from $8 billion (1860) to $30

billion (1906)– “Land Speculation”

Cultural and Historical Ramifications (cont’d)

• Throughout the world, prices in wheat and cotton drop due to sharecropping– This increased planting, which saturated wheat and

cotton• “[S]ought usually to retain the former owner as

tenant” (492)– Tenant farmers shared up to ½ of their crops with

landowners• Tenants became “land poor”

Cultural and Historical Ramifications (cont’d)

• Large migration from other countries– Haskins family’s parents are from Canada– Haskins family had nowhere to go (research migrating

families)– Haskins mentions grasshoppers (490)

• Farm life (family was overworked)– Eldest boy (Tommy) worked hard on farm (494)

Demographics

Demographics: 1890

• Whites: 47,345,528 (86.17%)• Negroes: 6,337,980 (11.5%)• Mulattoes: 956,989 (1.7%)• Quadroons: 105,135 (0.19%)• Octoroons: 69,936 (0.13%)• Chinese: 107,475 (0.195%)• Japanese: 2,039 (0.0037%)• Civilized Indians: 58,806

(0.11%)0

20

40

60

80

100

Percent

Whites

Negros

Mulattoes

QuadroonsOctoroons

Chinese

Japanese

Demographics: 2010

• Urban (city and its suburbs): 82%

• Rural: 18%

(U.S. Census)

0102030405060708090

United States (2010)

UrbanRural

Demographics: 2010 (cont’d)

• Non-Hispanic Whites: 64.7%

• Hispanics: 16.0%• African Americans:

12.9%• Asian Americans: 4.6%

(U.S. Census)0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

Ethnicity

WhiteHispanicAfr AmerAsian

Conclusion

An Illusion…?

• “There is no despair so deep as the despair of a homeless man or woman. To roam the roads of the country or the streets of the city, to feel there is no rood of ground on which the feet can rest, to halt weary and hungry outside lighted windows and hear laughter and song within,—these are the hungers and rebellions that drive men to crime and women to shame” (496).– Sounds like Utopia by Sir Thomas More

Another Allusion…?

• “…pushing the wolf of want a little farther from his door.” (496)– First published in 1899

• The Three Little Pigs– Story from 1933

Questions?