Migration in the 1930s

Beyond the Dust Bowl

Bibliographic Data

ID11204337
AuthorsMyron P Gutmann (0000-0002-6808-3573, corresponding author), David G Brown (0000-0001-6023-5950, Michigan Department of Natural Resources), Daniel Brown (0000-0001-6773-8489), Angela R Cunningham (0000-0001-7379-5383, University of Colorado Boulder), James Dykes, James E Dykes (University of Colorado Boulder), Susan Hautaniemi Leonard, Susan Leonard (0000-0003-2732-1341, University of Michigan), Jani Little (University of Colorado Boulder), Jeremy Mikecz (0009-0002-2874-9956), Paul W Rhode (University of Michigan), Seth E Spielman (0000-0002-5089-7632), Seth Spielman, Kenneth M Sylvester (0000-0003-3390-6637, University of Michigan–Flint)
Year2016
Volume40
Issue4
Pages707-740
Publication date2016-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Science History (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0145-5532 • E-ISSN: 1527-8034
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1017/ssh.2016.28
PMID29118460
OpenAlexW2548654267
LanguageEN
Citations received11
References cited35

This paper analyzes in detail the role of environmental and economic shocks in the migration of the 1930s. The 1940 US Census of Population asked every inhabitant where they lived five years earlier, a unique source for understanding migration flows and networks. Earlier research documented migrant origins and destinations, but we will show how short-term and annual weather conditions at sending locations in the 1930s explain those flows, and how they operated through agricultural success. Beyond demographic data, we use data about temperature and precipitation, plus data about agricultural production from the agricultural census. The widely known migration literature for the 1930s describes an era of relatively low migration, with much of the migration that did occur radiating outward from the Dust Bowl region and the cotton South. Our work about the complete United States will provide a fuller examination of migration in this socially and economically important era

Agricultural productivity · Agriculture · Archaeology · Census · Destinations · Economic geography · Geography · Immigration · Internal migration · Mass migration · Meteorology · Population · Precipitation · Sociology · Work (physics · Climate Change, Adaptation, Migration · Demography · Engineering · Migration and Labor Dynamics · Urban, Neighborhood, and Segregation Studies

Tools

Open DOI