ABSTRACT
Our criticism of the notion of agricultural “depression” in the 1920’s has focused primarily on the statistical artifacts that scholars use to depict economic conditions in American farming after World War I. In any event, the kinds of quantitative data used by agricultural historians and economists make it almost impossible to picture what actually happened on American farms after World War I. An important feature of twentieth century American agriculture is that production of most commodities is concentrated in specific regions. The significance of the marked shifts in the composition of agricultural output during the twenties is no less important than changes in the pattern of inputs used to produce this output. The most noticeable change in the composition of the value of net farm output between 1899 and 1929 is the shift in importance from crops to animal products.
