Depopulation of the Great Plains

File:Map of Great Plains2.jpg

Definitions vary as to what land comprises the Great Plains. The entire states of Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, and North Dakota are often considered part of the Great Plains. The Great Plains extend to parts of six additional states: Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana. The eastern boundary is about 97 degrees W longitude and the Plains extend westward to the Rocky Mountains and southward from the border with Canada to the approximate latitude of Austin, Texas.Wishart, David. 2004. "The Great Plains Region", In: Encyclopedia of the Great Plains, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, pp. xiii-xviii. {{ISBN|0-8032-4787-7}} A somewhat more restrictive definition by the U.S. Census Bureau gives a total area of the Great Plains in the United States as {{convert|533,100|sqmi}}, 18 percent of the area of the entire United States.Wilson, S.G., [https://www.census.gov/prod/2009pubs/p25-1137.pdf "Population Dynamics of the Great Plains, 1950-2007"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220119145108/http://www.census.gov/prod/2009pubs/p25-1137.pdf |date=2022-01-19 }}, accessed 7 May 2013

The Great Plains are distinguished by generally flat land and a natural vegetation cover consisting mostly of expansive grasslands. The eastern part of the Great Plains is dominated by agriculture, with wheat being the most common and important crop. The western part is more arid and is primarily used for grazing cattle and irrigated agriculture.

Large-scale settlement of the Great Plains by farmers and ranchers began with the end of the Civil War in 1865. By the late 1870s the Plains Indians had been defeated militarily and were largely confined to reservations. Drawn by the free land made available by the Homestead Act, pioneer families quickly settled the region such that nearly all of the arable land was privately owned or on Indian reservations by 1900.

File:County population 2000 - 2010.jpg

The initial rush to settle the Great Plains by hundreds of thousands of farmers and ranchers has been reversed because of several factors. Perhaps the most significant reasons have been economic. Over the course of the 20th century, farm economies saw dramatic shifts from small-scale family subsistence farming to larger commercial farms utilizing more equipment and less labor.{{cite book|last=Cronon|first=William|title=Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West| url=https://archive.org/details/naturesmetropoli00cron_0|url-access=registration| publisher=Norton| location=New York|year=1991}} Many family farms proved to be too small to survive. Farmers also used farming techniques which were unsuited to the dry, windy climate and the frequent droughts of the Great Plains. This became manifest during the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s, in which rural flight from the Great Plains accelerated, although the decline in population of some counties had begun as early as 1900.{{cite book| last=Cooper| first=Michael L. |title=Dust to eat: drought and depression in the 1930s| url=https://archive.org/details/dusttoeatdrought00coop|url-access=registration| publisher=Clarion| location=New York| year=2004}} Better roads and the automobile permitted many farmers to live in larger towns and cities rather than on the farm itself. While urban areas on the Great Plains more than doubled in population, thousands of small towns and communities disappeared. Two-thirds of counties lost some part of their population between the early 1900s and the 2010 census, and, as the table below demonstrates, many rural counties lost more than 60 percent of their population. A few counties lost more than 80 percent of their population. Population density of some Great Plains counties dipped below two persons per square mile.[http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/03/30/91343/free-land-in-kansas-towns-fails.html#.UeliOWQae0w/free-land-in-kansas-t "Free land fails to draw new homesteaders to Kansas towns"] {{Webarchive| url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131128152721/http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2010/03/30/91343/free-land-in-kansas-towns-fails.html#.UeliOWQae0w/free-land-in-kansas-t |date=2013-11-28 }}, McClatchy, March 15, 2013, accessed 6 May 2013{{Cite web | url=http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/03/20/207725/population-flight-from-growing-desert-of-central-texas/ | title=Population flight from growing desert of central Texas | website=ThinkProgress | access-date=2013-07-19 | archive-date=2013-09-28 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130928010044/http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/03/20/207725/population-flight-from-growing-desert-of-central-texas/ | url-status=live }}{{Cite magazine|last=Samuels|first=David|date=March–April 2011|title=Where the Buffalo Roam|url=https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2011/02/buffalo-commons-american-prairie-foundation/|access-date=2020-09-25|magazine=Mother Jones|language=en-US|archive-date=2020-09-19|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200919134855/https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2011/02/buffalo-commons-american-prairie-foundation/|url-status=live}}

Governments have tried a variety of methods to stem the outflow of population from rural areas in the Great Plains. Some towns have offered free building lots to prospective residents, but the program has met with only limited success. The fundamental problem appears to be the few employment opportunities available in these small and isolated communities.[https://web.archive.org/web/20120401064554/http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/01/us-land-free-idUSBRE83001N20120401 accessed 6 May 2013]

The population decline has led to proposals to return the land to its natural state and under public ownership. The Buffalo Commons proposal calls for large portions of the drier regions of the Great Plains to be returned to their original condition as pasture land for American bison and other plains animals.Deborah Epstein Popper and Frank J. Popper, [http://www.lacusveris.com/The%20Hi-Line%20and%20the%20Yellowstone%20Trail/The%20Buffalo%20Commons/From%20Dust%20to%20Dust.shtml "Great Plains: From Dust to Dust"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130429075224/http://www.lacusveris.com/The%20Hi-Line%20and%20the%20Yellowstone%20Trail/The%20Buffalo%20Commons/From%20Dust%20to%20Dust.shtml |date=2013-04-29 }}, Planning, December 1987

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The following Great Plains counties lost more than 60 percent of their population from the census year when they attained their highest population until 2020.

Sources: [https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/PST120222], accessed 10 June 2024; [https://web.archive.org/web/20030218135141/http://www.census.gov/population/www/censusdata/cencounts.html]. accessed 24 May 2022

• Prairie madness

{{reflist}}

Category:Great Plains

Category:Dust Bowl

Category:Demographics of Colorado

Category:Demographics of New Mexico

Category:Demographics of Oklahoma

Category:Demographics of South Dakota

Category:Demographics of Texas

Category:American diaspora in North America

Category:Demographic history of the United States

Category:Internal migrations in the United States