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17. Iowa: The 1980s and 1990s
- University of Iowa Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
Iowa: The 1980sand 1990s y the mid-1990s Iowans could reflect on dramatic changes within their state during the previous decade and a half. Beginning in the early eighties, the statewould experiencea devastating farm crisis that would speed along the trend toward fewer and fewer farms, as well as the further decline of many mediumand small-town economies. By the 1990s, partly as a result of previous agricultural distress, attention often focused on the economic future of Iowa's smallercommunities.Various public and private officialspredicted that small towns would find it increasinglydifficult to survive. Other significant changes also took place in the eighties and early nineties. During these two decades many Iowans began to concentrate on Open-countryIowa showing conservationmeasures where plowingfollows the contour ojthe land. Photo courtesyof the State Historical Society of Iowa, Iowa City. 316 111. THE RECENTYEARS environmental concerns in agriculture,with the result that more and more farm familiesbegan using sustainablefarming practices. Iowa's socialclimate also underwent change as Iowans zealously moved to embrace various forms of gambling. In the 1980s and early 1990s-in a state where bingo had been illegal until 1970ÑIowan would initiate a state lottery, followed by the construction of numerous gambling casinos. In general, however, Iowa continued to move toward a more balanced economy, whereby rural and urban issues were mutually visible and equitably represented in state government. Although Iowa was still viewed as a rural state by outsiders, for Iowans the designation "rural" had become questionable . The decadeof the eightiesin Iowa can be characterizedin two words: farm crisis. While state officials began to experience reduced revenues in 1980,most Iowans seemed slow to realize that the farm sector was heading toward real trouble. During the 1970s the value of farmland had increased dramatically. Between 1970and 1981, an acre of farmland in the United States, on average, had increased from three hundred to seventeen hundred dollars. During the prosperous days of the seventies, farmers often expanded their land base, purchased new machinery, and generally spent more money. These actionsled to debt that could be maintainedonly if farm prices remained high.' By 1981, however, agricultural prices began to decline and land prices fell precipitously. During the worst days of the farm crisis, the Des Moines Register ran a series entitled Riches to Rags: Iowa's Economic Upheaval. Pocahontas County was selected as the focus for the series. As the Register explained, one big problem in the eighties was the contrast with the prosperity of the previous decade: "During the 1970s,landowners [in Pocahontas County] saw their holdings increase by more than $500 million to a collective value of more than $1 billion. An acre of land ... sold for $3,500 and more." Jim Hudson, a Pocahontas lawyer, also commented on the good times of the seventies: "You wouldn't believe the way money was tossed around here. ... If a farmer wanted something, he'd just grab a blank check and write it out. A college education? Write a check. A new combine ? Write a check."* By the mid-1980s, however, all that had changed, not only in Pocahontas County but throughout the state. Underscoringthat change, on De- [3.239.15.46] Project MUSE (2024-03-29 16:33 GMT) 17. THE 1980sAND 1990s 317 cember 21, 1984,a Registerheadline proclaimed: "Iowa Farmland Values Plummet." The article reported that the value of Iowa farmland had fallen by almost 20 percent in the previous year. According to an ISU land survey , that decline marked the biggest single-year drop in farmland value since the Great Depression. By the mid-1980s the crisis had affected a large number of farmers, particularly those thirty-five years old and younger, threatening many with loss of their farms.3 Later studies would show that approximately40 percent of the state's farm families had been seriously affected by the depression. The firstline of supportfor vulnerable farm familieswas provided by groups such as the Iowa Farm Unity Coalition, formed in January 1982, and PrairieFire.The latter group provided advocacywork with Iowa farmers . In his study of the farm crisis, Mark Friedberger perceives the Iowa Farm Unity Coalition as being "alone in its monitoringof the conditionof farm families at a personal level" between 1982 and 1984.4 By 1984 the Iowa Cooperative Extension Service had started responding to the depressed farm situation with a variety of programs. In that year the extension service began to administer the ASSIST Program, which provided computerized financial management assistance for farm families; assistance in...