[Author’s Name]
[Institution’s Name]
Essay on Farmers and Agricultural Way of The 1800s
There was a wave of Finnish immigration to America in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Most of the men worked in tough jobs such as mining and the timber industry, and the women usually were servants and maids. In the 1860s and 1870s North America had a workforce shortage and needed immigrants to fill jobs. The first Finns to hear of this were the ones living in northern Norway, but the word spread quickly, and in the end, the Ostrobothnians (central western Finland) were the most eager people to explore new opportunities. Every migrant had his or her own reason for leaving. Some were just adventurous, others wanted to evade joining the Tsar's army before Finland was independent. But the most common reason was the economic situation.
In the 1800s, strong population growth created economic pressure and industrialization in the farming industry shrank the need for workers. The Soviet threat and fear of communism were also factors. Much of the history of the American nation revolves around man's lust for land, the acquisition of unconquered territories, and the eventual harnessing of its productive capabilities. Perhaps as important as this desire for land was the American attitude toward that land. It was not a scarce resource to be guarded and nurtured for the future. Land was promiscuous in its abundance; even Thomas Jefferson envisioned sufficient land for thousands of generations to come.
Consequently, Americans treated land as a "free gift" to be exploited as fully and as quickly as possible; conservation and love of the soil was not a characteristic of the early generations of Indiana settlers. Nevertheless, these settlers harnessed the productivity of their soil and established a strong agricultural economy, based upon grains and livestock, which sustained the state of Indiana from its formative years well into the twentieth century......
