British Agriculture and US

I think one big difference between the UK and the USA is land tenure.  Oversimplifying, to get people to work the land the USA mostly offered ownership, though in the South we used slavery.  In the UK they always had enough people for the land and technology which were available, so they've always had tenants without ownership.  Of course these days the US has lots of renters, but typically outside the South the renter has some owned land, and has expanded her operation by renting from the heirs of deceased owners.  (I don't know how many errors I've written so far.)

To me this difference is shown in the Duke of Westminster, who just died.  The pieces on his death noted he was one of the biggest landowners in the UK, including some 300 acres worth of London.  I don't believe we would see similar stories in the US.  Yes, we've some big owners, like Ted Turner, but their lifestory isn't centered around landowning.

Another big: the Tenant Farmers Association, a UK organization:

  The TFA is the only organisation dedicated to the agricultural tenanted sector and is the authentic voice on behalf of tenant farmers.  The TFA lobbies at all levels of Government and gives professional advice to its members.

The TFA seeks to support and enhance the landlord-tenant system.  It represents and advises members on all aspects of agricultural tenancy and ancillary matters.  It also aims to improve the professional and technical knowledge of its members, to increase the flow of new tenancies onto the market and to help the farming industry best apply existing agricultural tenancy legislation.

The Virtues of Rural Life

 I suspect my blogging has reflected my aversion to rural life, having left the rural area where I grew up as soon as I got a permanent job.  Yet I'm ambivalent, as I often am, so I'll link to this piece in the Post, written by the guy who moved his family to Red Lake County, MN after describing it as the worst place in America to live, based on ratings of various criteria.  A paragraph:

Nor, as far as I can tell, have we come up with a good way to quantify nostalgia. Red Lake Falls feels like the kind of town your grandparents would live in, and I mean that in the best possible way. The town's 1,400 residents keep tidy homes on tidy lawns with sprawling vegetable gardens out back. To an adult living here for the first time, it feels like the kind of place you remember visiting during summers in childhood, where memories are built on indolent afternoons spent in broad sunny lawns while the adults relaxed on a screened-in porch with cocktails in their hands.

The author has children, BTW, and I don't, which might explain much.

Threats to USDA

Some USDA offices have been threatened and closed.  This was in an e-mail to employees, but nothing on USDA's social networks I can find as of now.  (My suggestion: having a twitter feed is a nod to the conventions of the present, but isn't yet incorporated in to the habits of the bureaucracy.

Changes in History: Political and Gaming

John Fea at the Way of Improvement blogs about an op-ed claiming that political historians are a dwindling breed.  Supposedly the rise of social and cultural history and the study of minorities and women has risen, while politics has declined.  I've no opinion about that, but I was gob-smacked today to learn a relative, just beginning university at a good school, is taking the "history of gaming" in his first term.

So Long, Russians

I see by my blog statistics I'm no longer getting Russian visitors to the blogs.  That's good, not that I have anything against Russian visitors, just hackers.

Amish Healthcare

Megan McArdle wrote a while back on healthcare problems and solutions.  This past article
describes how the Amish handle their health care.  While they accept modern medicine, they're exempt from Obamacare and the community self-insures, apparently effectively.

Farewell to the Barbershop?

An article here at Jstor on the changing culture for men's hair:

The last two paragraphs:

They’re not signs of a disintegrating bygone culture of manhood. Rather, they signify a transformation of white, well-to-do masculinity. In the past, the barbershop was a place for these men. Today, while the old model may thrive in black or up-and-coming neighborhoods, white professional men are seeking a pampered experience elsewhere.
And they’re creating intimate relationships in these new men’s salons. But instead of immersing themselves in single-sex communities of men, they’re often building one-on-one confidential relationships with women hair stylists. Stylists often explained this intimacy as part of their jobs. For white men with financial means, though, the men’s salon becomes an important place where they can purchase the sense of connection they may otherwise be missing in their lives.

For a while in my younger years I cut my own hair, but then I migrated back to a barbershop, finding a shop which was reminiscent of my boyhood shop in Greene, NY: patrons and barbers who knew each other and would talk about things like hunting and cars.  My Herndon shop was bigger, not a two-man operation, and it had trophy heads and military memorabilia on the walls. Still it seemed the patrons and barbers mostly knew each other, or at least made small talk (not my forte). Over the years it's downsized and become less of a conversation center.

I don't know what's happened to barbershops in small towns in rural areas--probably closed if the area has lost population. 

Vilsack Undermining Rural Values

This has gotten a lot of attention from the right, including giving Rush Limbaugh a lot of laughs (and showing he doesn't understand rural life very well).

Our neighborhood store was run by two middle-aged women, who lived behind the store (until it burned).  What was the nature of their relationship?  Who knew, certainly not I. Nor did we care.  I remember being astonished when a co-worker at my summer job (who'd had surgery for ulcers which didn't improve his disposition any) commented on them with a sneer.

Do You Buy From Amazon?

I do, so I found this bit amusing:

"“People will buy it,” Treibel said. “Amazon customers generally are affluent and irrational and they just want it quick.”

It's from an Atlantic piece on how someone is exploiting the Trump and Sanders campaigns.

An Early Lost and Found Service

Who knew that town criers ran a lost and found service?
John Fea at the Way of Improvement links to another blog on a preRevolution town crier:

 They would make public announcements, but also served as a sort of lost and found,