Spaces & Flows: Ninth International Conference on Urban and ExtraUrban Studies

Abstract

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries California developed single-crop agricultural production which required the ability to control massive output and relied on cheap labor. The US Department of Agriculture agronomist, Wofford Camp, was tasked with manipulating cotton production as a model crop for California’s growing corporate farming. Camp’s efforts, and position as a conservative businessman, helped initiate the first agribusiness association, named the Associated Farmers. Since the early thirties California has grown as an agricultural powerhouse while relying on cheap immigrant labor and water consolidation. Our work examines the efforts and impact of the first ever campaign management firm, Campaigns Inc. –founded in 1933 and hired by Associated Farmers– on modernizing agribusiness through public relations and political campaigning. We make a contemporary connection through a study of the Resnick family, owners of the Wonderful Company, the second largest agribusiness in the United States and the largest user of water in California.