Factories in the Field: The Story of Migratory Farm Labor in California

by Carey McWilliams, Douglas Cazaux Sackman (Foreword)

This book was the first broad exposé of the social and environmental damage inflicted by the growth of corporate agriculture in California. Factories in the Field ―together with the work of Dorothea Lange, Paul Taylor, and John Steinbeck―dramatizes the misery of the dust bowl migrants hoping to find work in California agriculture. McWilliams starts with the scandals of the Spanish land grant purchases, and continues on to examine the experience of the various ethnic groups that have provided labor for California's agricultural industry―Chinese, Japanese, Mexicans, Filipinos, Armenians―the strikes, and the efforts to organize labor unions

Genres: History, Labor, Nonfiction, Agriculture, American History, Food, Class

366 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

Father of Wilson Carey McWilliams/Carey McWilliams Jr.

Reviews

[Stephen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very comprehensive and illusory look at the agricultural industry in California—how it effectively transferred feudal land ownership patterns into the hands of large growers, who used the land ineffectively and subjected workers to various methods of exploitation. It was written nearly a century ago, yet it reads very modern (not only stylistically, but also how familiar the patterns of industrialized capitalism operate).

[David Groves · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a masterwork of its time. While researching this time period around the subject of my poor Mexican forebears, I kept running across Carey McWilliams' left-leaning (that is, fact-based) history of California agriculture. At first, I wasn't eager to read it. Once I dug into it, though, I kept up a good rhythm.

The writing is solid, straddling the line between old and modern. The prose isn't convoluted, the way some writing of its time tends to be, because McWilliams' mind isn't convoluted; it's straight and honest. Perhaps that is the primary characteristic of this book: unflinchingly honest.

McWilliams looks at the history of land acquisition in California, including the land grab of 1848 - 1870, by which time all the best land was snatched up, he says. He looks at the history of the migrants, from the first Chinese (before the racists made it illegal for Chinese to emigrate here) to the Japanese to the Filipinos to the Armenians (who fled here during the genocide of 1915 - 1923) to the Mexicans (who fled here during the Revolution of 1910 - 1920). He looks at the way that the growers played one racial group against another in order to drive wages down. He looks at the way that the growers mistreated their workers in so many ways that it makes your head spin. He looks at the 1913 Wheatland Riot, which is so full of blood, death, and treachery that it will turn your stomach. He looks at the migration of the Okies summarized so eloquently in Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath. He looks at the 1930s strikes and strikebreakers.

I was particularly focused on the plight of the Mexican from 1915 to 1922, so I was doing a lot of reading so that I could mine a small vein of gold. But I mined it, and it wasn't foolsgold. This book makes me want to educate myself about the rest of McWilliams' career. He is so articulate, bold, and idealistic that I wonder why I don't know more about him. Everybody should. He's a giant.

[Jeanette Beaulieu · Rating 5 out of 5]

A brilliant historical overview of migrant workers in our country. A must read for California historians. Overview of the exploitation and abuses our government has perpetrated on migrant workers. The book ends I believe with Cesar Chavez but it's been awhile since I've read it so I'd have to double check.

[Brandon Istenes · Rating 4 out of 5]

As a Californian reading this, I got similar feelings to when I read John Steinbeck. They're complimentary readings. This is a great book, well-executed, and made me amazed how little I knew about the history of my state. The history of agriculture in California is the history of (post-colonization) California, so much is tied up in it.

[Connie · Rating 2 out of 5]

I'm sure this is a great book for lovers of historical non-fic, but for me it was a pain to get through. Had it not been assigned to me, I would have never picked it up. I definitely am slightly more knowledgeable in farm labor in California.

[J. · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review forthcoming on jimbotimes.com!

[Alassane Sow · Rating 5 out of 5]

READ ME

[Dan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in the same year as John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath, a book entitled Factories in the Field: The Story of Migratory Farm Labor in California, was released to the public. Written and published in 1938, Carey McWilliams extensively analyzes the tenuous and straining lives of an array of different ethnic groups in the fields of California. With the context of California's crisis at the time of publication; white migratory labor entering the state en mass from the desert states, working for sub-poverty level wages with miserable health conditions, and being shuffled from county to county by officials; Carey uses the previous ninety years to call out the ruling and the owning class in an expose on their suppression of laborer's human dignities. Describing how early monopolization of California land has set the stage for events to follow, he explains the impact that industrialized agriculture has had on (1) crops: the introduction of new cash crops and the mechanization of them and linking it to (2) the changing landscape of the labor force; and (3) the inaccessibility of landownership.

[Doug · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obviously dated, but still an excellent historical account about the conditions of migrant farm labor working for factory farms in the last 20 years of the 19th and first 40 of the 20th century. The anti-union and racist character of the interaction between the organized factory farmers and the workers was the central point of the book that was the sociological and historical companion to The Grapes of Wrath.

[Tina · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really well-written classic work about migrant farm workers in California. It traces the roots back to the Spanish and Mexican land grants, continuing down to the late 1930s. Good if you like California history/labor history.

[Dale · Rating 4 out of 5]

Who decides who grows our food in California?

[Tyler · Rating 4 out of 5]

A brilliant piece of radical, campaigning journalism.