At The Farm Gate
By Joanie Stiers
June 2008

Illinois: one big farm, through the eyes of a child

“That’s papa’s tractor!” my 2-year-old exclaimed with her outdoor voice through chocolate-coated lips. I stopped scrubbing cookie dough from the mixing bowl at the kitchen sink to correct her. Had she noted the tractor’s red color, she would have realized it didn’t belong to the grandpa she referenced, who drives only green equipment. She argued, insisting Grandpa owned it. She did the same the other day, certain the earth had more than one moon as she occasionally looked at the sky from her seat in the minivan.
My daughter thinks one of her grandpas owns every tractor she spots and every man driving one is an uncle. Unbeknownst to him, Uncle Grant even appears daily on the noon news. She exclaims with pride at the sighting, merely the silhouette of a man in a tractor. The image decorates the screen behind the current prices of corn and cattle.
Her argument at the kitchen counter reminded me of the time when my in-laws hosted an out-of-town guest, who thought some farmer named Dekalb farmed a lot of land. The field-side signs he spotted for more than 30 miles were noting the brand of corn planted on those acres, not the farmer’s name. Still, the advertising dollars worked for name recognition.
My daughter will understand that more than her relatives farm in our western Illinois county when she can learn to count well into triple digits. Statewide, about 72,500 farms exist, with one or more people operating them. That may seem a bountiful crop of food and fuel producers, but about 12.8 million people live in Illinois. Statistically speaking, a single Illinois farm feeds 177 of the state’s residents.
The farm population has been declining for years, but the assumption that fewer people farm than even statistics show seems understandable. Rural Illinois looks like one big farm, not 72,500 of them. About three-fourths of the state’s land area supports livestock or grows crops with few fences to outline field boundaries. The landscape appears a monotonous pattern of corn, soybeans, hogs and cattle. Except for the occasional wind farm or sheep herd, a trip the length of Illinois proves boring to most travelers.
My dad, however, will observe the conditions of corn and soybeans that thousands of fellow farmers own while on any trip through Illinois. If I’m traveling alone, I offer a crop progress report upon my return. The report also includes field activity. In other words, how many uncles were out driving grandpa’s tractors that day.