UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA Santa Barbara Bigger Than Grain: Soviet-American Agricultural Exchange, 1918-1928 A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree Doctor of Philosophy in History by Maria Fedorova Committee in charge: Professor Nelson Lichtenstein, Chair Professor Elena Aronova Professor Lisa Jacobson Professor Alice O’Connor Professor Erika Rappaport June 2019 The dissertation of Maria Fedorova is approved. ____________________________________________ Elena Aronova ____________________________________________ Lisa Jacobson _____________________________________________ Alice O’Connor _____________________________________________ Erika Rappaport ____________________________________________ Nelson Lichtenstein, Committee Chair June 2019 Bigger Than Grain: Soviet-American Agricultural Exchange, 1918-1928 Copyright © 2019 by Maria Fedorova iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This dissertation would have been impossible without the help of many people. I am indebted to my mentor, Nelson Lichtenstein, who has supported me over the course of seven years at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Once he told me that I should write about something that I was passionate about. This was the best advice any graduate student could get at the time when they were unsure about their topic; words cannot express how grateful I am for his wisdom. In addition, I have had the great fortune to work with Elena Aronova who challenged me to rethink my approach to the history of agricultural exchange by examining unusual objects as vehicles of this exchange. Lisa Jacobson, Alice O’Connor, and Erika Rappaport helped me see my dissertation through the analytical lenses of food history, world history, and policy history; and I am thankful for their ideas and support. Finally, my thanks go to all my graduate colleagues who read and criticized parts of this dissertation at multiple seminars and workshops, particularly, at the workshop organized by the Center for the Study of Work, Labor, and Democracy. Paul Warden, my husband and the smartest history Ph.D. I know, played a pivotal role in making sure that the writer’s worst enemy – doubt – does not catch up with me. This project would not have been written without his insights, literary skill, and, more importantly, his belief in me. Thank you. To my parents, Amélie, and Sasha – my eternal gratitude. iv VITA OF MARIA FEDOROVA June 2019 EDUCATION Specialist Degree in History, Russian State University for the Humanities, Moscow, Russia (2008) Master of Arts in History, Washington State University, Pullman, May 2012 Doctor of Philosophy in History, University of California, Santa Barbara, June 2019 (expected) PUBLICATIONS “The American Tractor Unit and Agricultural Reconstruction in Soviet Russia, 1922-1923,” in Anthony J. Heywood, Julia Lajus, and Scott W. Palmer, eds., Science, Technology, Environment, and Medicine in Russia’s Great War and Revolution, 1914-1922 (Bloomington: Slavica, forthcoming). Review of Grains by William Winders, Food, Culture & Society 20, no. 3 (2017): 555-556. “Bolshevism nel’zya ostanovit’ siloi, no vozmozhno ostanovit edoi’: Vliianie Oktyabr’skoi revoliutsii na amerikanskuiu prodovol’stvennuiu pomoshch Evrope (1917-1920),” in Istoricheskie dokumenty i aktual’nye problem arkheografii, istochnikovedeniia, rossiiskoi i vseobshchei istorii novogo i noveishego vremeni CLIO-2017 (Moscow: ROSSPEN, 2017). AWARDS Fulbright Award (Fulbright Graduate Student’s Program), 2010-2012 All-UC Economic History Research Grant, UC Berkeley, 2014 Humanities & Social Sciences Research Grant, UC Santa Barbara, 2015 Kenneth Mouré and Sara Norquay Graduate Study Award, UC Santa Barbara, 2015 History Department Dissertation Award, UC Santa Barbara, 2015, 2016 History Associates Graduate Award, UC Santa Barbara, 2018 PRESENTATIONS “Seeds as Technology: Scientific Soviet-American Agricultural Exchange in the 1920s,” Havighurst Center for Russian and Post-Soviet Studies, April 2019 “Experimental Ground: Harold Ware and the Russian Reconstruction Farms, 1925-1927,” Western Slavic and Eurasian Association, April 2019 “See how we do it:” American-Soviet Exchange of Agricultural Ideas from 1919 to 1955, Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations Conference, June 2018 “Russian “Americans:” Soviet Agricultural Scholars’ Visits to the United States, 1921- 1935,” Agricultural History Conference, May 2018 “Harold Ware and the Agricultural Reconstruction of Soviet Russia, 1921-1929,” Transatlantic History Conference, University of Texas, Arlington, October 2017 v “‘Bolshevism cannot be stopped by food:’ American Food Aid to Europe, 1919-1923,” 100 Years Later: The Russian Revolution and Its Consequences, UC Berkeley, October 2017 “Soviet Agricultural Economists’ Perceptions of American Agriculture in the 1920s,” Invited Lecture, Russian State University for the Humanities, April 2017 “The 1917 Revolution and American Food Aid to Europe, 1917-1920,” CLIO-2017, April 2017, RGASPI, Moscow, Russia vi ABSTRACT Bigger Than Grain: Soviet-American Agricultural Exchange, 1918-1928 by Maria Fedorova This dissertation examines the history of agricultural exchange between the United States and Soviet Russia from 1918 to 1928. It shows that Soviet and American agricultural specialists and policymakers sought solutions to the looming global farm crisis of the 1920s through visits, the organization of reconstruction projects, and seed exchange. In doing so, this work advances three arguments. First, the development of post-World War I agriculture, including concepts of large-scale farming, industrialization of agricultural, and rationalization of food production, should be understood within an international context. As the First World war reshaped patterns of agricultural production and showed the inextricable link between food and political stability, experts and policymakers from many countries began to search for solutions to the farm problem not only through national policies but also abroad. As this dissertation shows, this search would take different shapes and forms: from the use of international food aid programs to help domestic food production to the usage of another country’s space to conduct large-scale farming experiments. These experiences in agricultural exchange allowed its participants to acquire new knowledge, technologies, and expertise. Second, by examining post-WWI patterns of agricultural exchange, this dissertation reconsiders the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union with regard to vii the flow of technology and expertise. Rather than considering a one-directional movement of American technology and expertise to Soviet Russia and perceiving the latter as a passive recipient, this work portrays an active multi-directional exchange. It shows that both countries perceived each other as research laboratories that were capable of giving solutions to farm problems in their respective countries. Moreover, both American and Soviet agricultural experts believed that this exchange would benefit the reconstruction of international agriculture. Finally, this dissertation expands the definition of “agricultural exchange.” Scholars have demonstrated that, historically, agricultural exchange, including the movement of plants, seeds, and agricultural knowledge and expertise, is not a new event. The flow of people and animal species brought new plant varieties and agricultural technologies to new places, thus, changing existing environments, economic and social structures. While these transfers knew no borders, since the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they had become more institutionalized and regulated by the international community of scientists and policymakers. During this period, many national governments introduced new laws and regulations that controlled the import and export of agricultural commodities. What is often left out in this historiography is the political nature of agricultural exchange. This dissertation shows that participants of agricultural exchange used their experience and expertise that they cultivated through visits and travel to achieve more powerful positions with local and central state institutions. Yet, this experience came at a price. By the late 1920s, with the shifting political climate in the Soviet Union, the participation in agricultural exchange became one of the tools for the ostracization of these experts from powerful positions. viii TABLE OF CONTENTS I. Introduction ..........................................................................................................1 II. Chapter 1. Famine Relief: Competing Visions of American Aid to Soviet Russia .............................................................................................................................. 28 III. Chapter 2. Seeds of Scientific Soviet-American Agricultural Exchange in 1921- 26………..…………………………………………………………………..…….. 61 III. Chapter 3. Tractors and Expertise: The American Tractor Unit and the Agricultural Reconstruction of Soviet Russia, 1921-23…………………………… 93 IV. Chapter 4. Experimental Ground: Harold Ware and the Russian Reconstruction Farms, 1925-27…………………………………………………………………… 121 V. Chapter 5. Cultivating Expertise: Soviet Agrarians' Travels to the United States, 1921-1928………………………………………………………………………… 160 Epilogue…………………………………………………………………………… 192 Bibliography.................................................................................................. …. 197 ix LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1. ..............................................................................................................