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THE BREADBASKET Thomas Baerwald THE BREADBASKET THE BREADBASKET Aleksei Novikov and Raymond Krishchyunas Thomas Baerwald There is hardly a person in Russia not familiar with the name Uryupinsk. Invariably, The landscapes of the flat plains in the center of the United States have always it is uttered with a contemptuous sneer and even sounds somewhat indecent in generated strong opposing judgments. Hamlin Garland, raised in South Dakota Russian. Uryupinsk became the embodiment of what Soviet Marxist ideology with in the late 19th century, expressed one view: “How poor and dull and squalid it its strong anti-peasant thrust branded as the “idiocy of rural life.” At first sight seemed! The one main street ended at the hillside at his left and stretched away Uryupinsk, a small town lost amidst the flat grain fields, is a sleepy hollow that has to the north between two rows of the usual village stores, unrelieved by a tree or a grown torpid from boredom. In summer, all is sultry and downcast in a dull feather touch of beauty.” grass steppe, once in a while crossed by a chain of low hills, much like Chekhov’s But others see different textures in the landscape. From any small knoll incentral description of the rural scene: “A kite-bird glides right over the surface, smoothly Iowa, for example, you can gaze out in all directions at rectangles of green and flapping its wings and suddenly stops in midair, as if struck with the thought of yellow. Different shades of green dominate. Taller stalks of corn undulate in the how boring life is.” Much akin to their crops, the locals seem to spend their lives breeze, while the deeper green of the soybean bushes crouch lower and are more locked into unchanging seasonal cycles. still. In contrast with the corduroy texture of the row crops, scattered fields of Yet the air of slumber is deceptive. At harvest time the place awakens to frenetic golden wheat sway in the gentle wind like a finely woven sheet. activity, as what was called in sovietspeak “the battle for the harvest” began, and To some people such a summer scene of the rural Breadbasket makes it the the national media touted the best workers in places like Uryupinsk as heroes of most boring place in America, but these landscapes have their own beauty, and bread harvesting campaigns. These annual fenzies were actually a modern twist their placidity is deceptive. As the late summer turns into autumn, the landscape on the real battles that Cossacks fought here against Russia’s nomadic neighbors. changes abruptly. Large combines strip first the wheat and then the soybean Uryupinsk once was a district headquarters of the Cossack armies and was and corn fields. Trucks of all sizes pulse along the roadways, carrying many also widely known for its vibrant district fairs. In modern times, both the unique of the kernels and beans to silver, cone topped storage bins beside the area’s militarized lifestyle of the Don River Cossacks and this lively commercial activity farmsteads. Other truckloads will unload their cargoes at the massive, cylindrical are reviving, underlining again the traditional ambiguity of a region sleeping with a concrete grain elevators that loom over every village and town in the region. Like ready eye open. the crops around whose planting and harvest the region’s economy revolves, the rhythms of the American Breadbasket are geared to the seasons. Despite long periods with little apparent activity in summer and winter, the fields of the Breadbasket provide enormous yields that help keep Americans well nourished 1 2 and supplement the diets of millions of people in other parts of the globe. 3 4 RUSSIA’S FERTILE TRIANGLE AMERICA’S FERTILE TRIANGLE The Breadbasket region is first and foremost Russia’s granary. The majority of Since the 1840s, when immigrants from eastern and southern states and from Europe people actually live in cities and work outside agriculture, but the popular and not started settling the region in large numbers, the Breadbasket has been a region focused so misleading image of the region is sharply brought into focus during harvesting on agriculture. Few parts of the world produce as much food, and while the number campaigns, when newspapers are crowded with photographs of the campaign heroes, of people who live and work on farms has steadily declined during this century, the the best harvester operators set against the backdrop of mountains of threshed grain. ebb and flow of the farm calendar still regulate the rhythms of the region, just as the Like their Egyptian counterparts, these pyramids of grain convey a somewhat sacral fortunes and failures of the agricultural economy establish the roller coaster on which image, and were part of the official myth of the happy socialist village, while the major many other establishments ride. Agriculture remains the backbone of economic activity, product of the Breadbasket, wheat, is something of a national cultural symbol. and farms dominate rural landscapes. The harsh conditions of Russian regions limited staple grains to the coarser varieties, The Breadbasket’s agricultural bounty results from the lavishness of nature. Nowhere such as rye or barley, and wheat bread became a lingering symbol of bounty and well- else in the world is there such a large region with an ideal combination of fertile black being. Honored guests are still greeted with the present of a ceremonial loaf, and soils, a sufficiently warm and moist climate, and flat terrain. When Vermont native Russians eat far more bread than any western nation. Russian language abounds with Robert Frost saw the prairie soils, he reportedly remarked that they could be eaten sayings like “Bread is master of everything,” and to the extent that such sayings are true, without the bother of conversion into plants. Because of the region’s interior location, the Breadbasket is the master of the country. the temperatures are continental, with daily averages differing by more than 70 degrees F (40 degrees C) between winter and summer. Annual average precipitation is quite In most of Russia, climate makes agriculture akin to Russian roulette, rather than an adequate (from 20 to 40 inches), but often streaky. Periods of drought or heavy rains orderly activity with predictable outcomes. But the Breadbasket was and is a region often last for months or even years. Droughts rarely extend throughout the region, with a stable output of surplus grain and other products, which makes it vitally however. The large area of the Breadbasket relative to the fluctuating pressure systems important for feeding the mostly urban nation. The region became Russia’s cornucopia and jet streams ensures that abundant yields in some parts more than offset diminished thanks to its black soils, the chernozems, named for the thickness of the black organic harvests in others. The region therefore is always a major exporter of food products. layer that accounts for their proverbial fertility. According to a common saying, it is enough to stick a broomstick into the soil for something good to grow out of it. During The triangular shape of the modern Breadbasket is remarkably similar to the area east the Paris International Fair of 1900 a sample of Russian chernozem was dubbed as the of the 100th meridian that two centuries ago was dominated by grasses. The region’s world standard of soil fertility. eastern point thrusts into central Indiana and the Heartland region. In his sweeping study of the places and characteristics associated with the term “the Middle West,” geographer James R. Shortridge observed that all Midwestern states historically were 5 6 The natural vegetation of the Breadbasket is that of the steppe, the Russian grasslands. associated with the pastoral image. But as manufacturing became preeminent in the Over milennia, the decaying stems and massive roots of tall grasses enriched the organic urban centers of the eastern Middle West, that region emerged as a not-so-bucolic content of the soil, while the flatness of the steppes allowed for orderly landscapes industrial Heartland. In terms of culture, the Breadbasket is part of Midwest and a of huge rectangular fields. On this flat and monotonous plain, the boundaries of continuation of Heartland, but differs in its agricultural profile. The Breadbasket’s the region (which fittingly enough resembles a ploughshare in outline) are a classic western boundary is similarly defined by the growing importance to the west of non- expression of the relationship between human activity and a precarious physical agricultural activities and landuse. As Joel Garreau stated, the boundary follows the environment. Farming is a risky business in the steppe belt, where average yearly rains line “where carbohydrates become more important than hydrocarbons.” The “middle” from 12 to 20 inches are not generous. The harvest can be scuttled not so much by a in the name Middle West when applied to the Breadbasket today designates not only a dry year but by the unpredictability of the climate itself. Despite these ups and downs, geographic position but also a symbolic median between the industrialized East and the the Breadbasket performed a crucial food supply function, located between the better- more natural West. watered farmland of the South and a region where soils become too dry to support farming without irrigation. The Breadbasket provided a wedge between cultures as well, From Buffalo Range to the Granary since this drier land on its southeast flank was home to populations of Asiatic ancestry. Today the landscapes of the Breadbasket are as tame as those found in any American Today the Breadbasket is a bucolic landscape of European-style farming, but in the region. Yet only 150 years ago these lands were a nomadic range.
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