Monday, September 13, 2010

California Farms of the 1920's

After writing the blog about the Marques family, immigrant farmers from Portugal.   I realized that they are five generations from little Bradly Hunt. Augusta was Eleanor's grand mother, and Eleanor is Sherina's grandmother.  So that makes Augusta Bradley's,  great, great, great grandmother.
When I think of immigrant farm labor of the 1920's in California, I think of the great John Steinbeck novel, "The Grapes of Wrath".  Man's inhumanity to his fellow man. Steinbeck consistently and woefully pointed to the fact that the migrants’ great suffering was caused not by bad weather or mere misfortune but by their fellow human beings.  Living in Sacramento myself, I know a little bit about the history of the cannery.  Over 100,000 migrant men and women workers were employed packing cans of fruit and sugar beats.  In sociology classes I took at The University of California at Davis, we were taught about Chavez and the Mexican Migrant.  Steinbeck wrote about the displaced farm belt families of Oklahoma.  Researching the Marques family was the first I had read about all the immigrants from Portugal.
Have we come very far in the past ninety years?  If you didn't read my blog, check it out under the Ginn pages.