Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
repeatedly emphasize the importance of careful planning for successful
machine thinning.
Spreckels also attempted to portray hand labor as ineffi cient and scarce
while at the same time promoting the rationality of a mechanized approach.
For instance,
Bulletin
articles continually referred to farmworkers as scarce
and of “uniformly poor quality,” calling to mind growers' problems with
high labor turnover and stereotypes of the inherent laziness of farmworkers
(Spreckels 1965, 88). One 1951 issue of the
Bulletin
challenged California
beet growers to replace bracero labor with machine thinning, and an
accompanying article used a combination of pride and fear to prod growers
in this direction:
California traditionally boasts about her leadership in mechanical harvest, yet she
is at the bottom of the list in spring mechanization. . . . Why have California growers
ignored these trends [toward machine thinning]? The answer, voiced in unison by
most growers, would be that there was always an abundant labor supply at beet
thinning time....The traditional spring labor pool is now drying up. No longer
can the beet grower count on abundant thinning and hoeing labor. With this
warning, the beet grower can be expected to mechanize his spring work with
the same determination and resourcefulness that marked his mechanization of the
harvest. (Armer 1951, 11)
Another article, published three years later, used a “grower's own story of
complete mechanical thinning” for further incentive:
“Why did you decide to use mechanical thinning on 41 acres, Rob, when you knew
there might be some sacrifi ce in quality and when thinning labor is generally avail-
able?” I asked.
Rob answered, “You are wrong on both counts. Last January I saw that thinning
labor might be hard to get—at least I didn't dare count on getting together as many
men as I would need for my 150 acres. In the second place, now that I have thinned
41 acres by machine, I can't say that the results are the least bit worse than hand
thinning.”
33
With its persistent crusade to fully mechanize beet production in
California, Spreckels framed labor as a problematic part of sugar beet
farming, which, as I have noted, was not a novel idea in California farm
history. The discourses Spreckels used in this push, however, blended dif-
ferent ways of framing the labor problem that had not been combined
before. Like the critics who challenged California growers' exploitative use
of farm labor, Spreckels tried to portray dependence on hand labor as
irrational and risky. By asking questions such as “Can you replace this
