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Show United States average. Alabama............. Georgia.............. Kentucky............ Mississippi............ North Carolina........ Tennessee............ Virginia.............. Valley States average. 1940 Rural Farm 43.5 69.8 65.6 70.2 78.1 72.7 64.7 64.7 69.4 22.9 47.3 43.7 44.2 64.1 46.4 43.6 36.7 46.0 1930 Rural Farm 43.8 71.9 69.2 69.4 83.1 74.5 65.7 67.6 71.3 24.6 50.4 48.6 44.9 67.7 50.4 46.4 39.2 49.2 Source: U. S. Department of Agriculture. Farms in the valley were relatively small. A study based on the 1930 census showed that over 90 percent of the farms were less than 175 acres; three-fourths were less than 100 acres; and more than half were less than 50 acres.8 In this respect, the farms generally are comparable to those else- where in the Southeast. The average acreage of the farms of Tennessee was 73.3; of Mississippi, 55.4; of North Carolina, 64.5; and of Alabama, 68.2. Only four other States in 1930 averaged less than 75 acres per farm. Farm values also were among the lowest in the Nation. Each of the seven States was in the lowest quartile in average value of farm property, as well as in average value of land and buildings per tenant farm. Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi ranked forty-sixth, forty-seventh, and forty-eighth, respec- tively, in value per farm; Tennessee ranked forty- first. In the 10 years from 1920 to 1930, average an- nual cash farm income was lower in Mississippi, Alabama, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Georgia than any of the other 48 States. The area was predominantly a producer of raw materials. The percentage of gainfully employed persons dependent on raw materials production was higher in the Southeast in 1930 than in any other region, and was higher in the Tennessee Val- ley than for the Southeast as a whole. This is 5 Odum, H. W., Southern Regions, 1936, pp. 164-166. shown in the following summary of employment in extractive industries in the Tennessee Valley, the Southeastern States, and the United States as a whole in 1930. Tennessee Valley» Southeastern States United States Number gainfully employed as percent of total population .................... 34.2 37.9 39.8 Number employed in agriculture as percent of total gainfully employed...... Number employed in lumbering and fishing as percent of total gainfully employed ................. Number employed in mining, as percent of total gainfully employed....... 47.5 .7 3.2 43.4 .9 1.7 21.5 .6 2.4 Number employed in production of raw materials (agriculture, lumbering, fishing, and mining) as percent of total gainfully employed..... 51.4 46.0 24.5 1 Figures in this column are a composite for the 122 coun- ties wholly or partially in the Tennessee Basin. Source: U. S. Congress. Joint Committee on the In- vestigation of the Tennessee Valley Authority, 76th Cong., 1st sess., Report (1939), vol. 2, pp. 277-286. As a result per capita spendable income was low compared with the rest of the country. The 1934 figure for the valley was $211 as compared with $265 for the entire southeastern region and $486 for the United States as a whole. In 1930 the proportion of people gainfully em- ployed in manufacturing, construction, transporta- tion, and communications (railroad, trucking, bus, telephone, telegraph, and radio employees) in the Tennessee Valley was slightly less than for the Southeastern States, and considerably less than for the United States as indicated in the following tabulation: 707 |
