The Mechanization Curve: Fewer Farms, Bigger Tractors, 1920 to 2022

Row 5 · County series, in two parts

Lead: Part one — the rise. In 1920 Indiana counted 205,126 farms and was just entering the tractor age (Row 4); the mid-century censuses are where the county's horsepower peaked in numbers of machines, and the shape is visible even in the state frame of the one county machinery table this section read in full: by the 2017 census Indiana still carried 121,150 tractors (2012: 123,402) — but the distribution had already inverted the early century's logic. Of Indiana's 2017 tractors, 26,711 were under 40 PTO horsepower, 46,939 were 40 to 99 horsepower, and 47,500 — the largest single class — were 100 horsepower or more. The tractor stopped being a small farm's one machine and became a large operation's fleet unit: fewer, bigger, dearer. The same table prices the shift: Indiana's machinery and equipment averaged $163,136 per reporting farm in 2017, against the $621 average of 1920 — a different economy of iron entirely.

Part two — the long thinning, at the county's own grain. St. Joseph County's farm count falls across every reached point of the modern series: 629 farms in 2017, on 149,981 acres at an average of 238 acres, and 547 farms in 2022, on 153,034 acres at an average of 280 acres — thirteen per cent fewer farms in five years, on slightly more land, which is consolidation in a single pair of lines. The county that remains is a serious farm county still: $162,244,000 of products sold in 2022, 71,437 acres of corn for grain and 57,228 of soybeans, 24,052 irrigated acres. But the direction of a century is set by the two ends this section could read cleanly — a county of small horse-worked farms entering mechanization in 1920, and a county of 547 larger, heavily capitalized operations in 2022.

Sources:

1. USDA NASS, 2022 Census of Agriculture, County Profile, St. Joseph County, Indiana: 547 farms, 153,034 acres, average 280 acres; products sold $162,244,000; corn 71,437 acres, soybeans 57,228 acres, irrigated 24,052 acres.
2. USDA NASS, 2017 Census of Agriculture, County Profile, St. Joseph County: 629 farms, 149,981 acres, average 238 acres.
3. USDA NASS, 2017 Census of Agriculture, Indiana County Data, Table 39 (Machinery and Equipment): Indiana tractors 121,150 (2017) and 123,402 (2012); by PTO class 2017 — under 40 hp 26,711, 40–99 hp 46,939, 100 hp or more 47,500; average machinery value $163,136 per farm (2017).
4. Census of Agriculture county volumes for 1950 (Indiana part) and 1954 (Part 4, Indiana) — located, named as settler for the unextracted mid-century county tractor counts.