Land Use and the Family Cycle in the U.S. Great Plains

Myron P. Gutmann, University of Michigan
Sara Pullum-Piñon, University of Texas at Austin
Geoff Cunfer, Southwest State University

In agricultural settings, population, production, and environment are linked through family mechanisms, especially where agricultural settlement and colonization are underway. This paper explores the process of settlement and its relationship to land use trajectories through the lens of family structures in the Great Plains of the U.S., during the period (1870 to 1940) when this region turned from open rangeland to a developed mix of land uses. The theoretical perspective in this paper draws on studies of family, settlement, and environment in the Americas, which show that land use processes simultaneously reflect the mechanism of settlement and each settler family’s life cycle stage. Our research uses both qualitative and quantitative data sources. Family formation and cropland development went hand-in-hand, but there are differences in the process of family formation in different ecological sub-regions. The causal process is intertwined with ethnic differences and fertility decline in the U.S.