Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
seemed to defy the standard stereotypes. They were often cast as intent on
making the best use of new knowledge and techniques for farming, and it
was often implied that the advisors themselves needed to be forward-think-
ing and technically oriented just to keep up with the pace of agriculture
in the valley.
The meaning of growers' progressivism is an important theme in this
chapter. When advisors and growers describe the progressive character of
the Salinas Valley farm industry, they are typically pointing to the power
structure of the industry and the ecology of power that shapes the relation-
ships between advisors and growers. Therefore, whereas in the previous
chapter I focused on the discursive frames used by experts and Country
Life reformers to argue for the repair of U.S. agriculture, here I treat the
structural elements of the relationship between Cooperative Extension and
the farm industry in more detail. How do farm advisors and growers work
with each other, and what forces shape this interaction?
The answers are rooted in a long-term process of accommodation on the
part of Cooperative Extension, where the work of advisors in the valley
was literally remade in order to suit the research needs of the local farm
industry. These changes involved the movement toward disciplinary spe-
cializations on the part of farm advisors stationed in Monterey County.
This specialization has made advisors powerful; they are highly valued by
the farm industry and are the benefi ciaries of considerable fi nancial and
political support from the industry. Contemporary farm advisors in the
Salinas Valley do not have an identity crisis; they have solved that problem
through specialization and in the process created a kind of niche market
of their own. At the same time, however, questions remain about advisors'
focus on the production problems of the wealthiest and most infl uential
growers.
In this chapter I present a historical account of how Cooperative Exten-
sion began in Monterey County and the Salinas Valley as well as how farm
advisors moved toward a disciplinary-based system of advising starting in
the late 1950s. Most of the data come from my interviews with growers
and advisors, and highlight the political and fi nancial relationships between
Cooperative Extension and the farm industry. Although I focus on the
work of advisors in one county—Monterey County—the process of accom-
modation to local farming interests is a common theme of the history of
extension work in California and the United States. Ultimately, Coopera-
