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History: The Great Depression and World War II. One of the hardest hit segments of the New Mexico economy during the depression was farming. In 1931, the state’s most important crops were worth only about half of their 1929 value. Dry farmers were especially devastated as they suffered from both continually high operating costs and a prolonged drought that dried up portions of New Mexico so badly that they became part of the Dust Bowl. From Oklahoma to eastern New Mexico, winds picked up the dry topsoil, forming great clouds of dust so thick that it filled the air. On May 28, 1937, one dust cloud, or “black roller,” measuring fifteen hundred feet high and a mile across, descended upon the farming and ranching community of Clayton, New Mexico. The dust blew for hours and was so thick that electric lights could not be seen across the street. Everywhere they hit, the dust storms killed livestock and destroyed crops. In the Estancia Valley entire crops of pinto beans were killed, and that once productive area was transformed into what author John L. Sinclair has called “the valley of broken hearts.”
In all parts of New Mexico, farmland dropped in value until it bottomed out at an average of $4.95 an acre, the lowest value per acre of land in the United States. Many New Mexico farmers had few or no crops to sell and eventually, they were forced to sell their land contributing in the process to the overall decline in farmland values.The depression also hurt New Mexico’s cattle ranchers, for they suffered from both drought and a shrinking marketplace. As grasslands dried up, they raised fewer cattle; and as the demand for beef declined, so did the value of the cattle on New Mexico’s rangelands. Like the farmers, many ranchers fell behind in their taxes and were forced to sell their land, which was bought by large ranchers.Agriculture’s ailing economic condition had a particularly harsh effect on New Mexico, for the state was still primarily rural during the 1930’s, with most of its people employed in raising crops and livestock. Yet farmers and ranchers were not the only ones to appear on the list of those devastated by depressed economic conditions. Indeed, high on the list were the miners, who watched their industry continue the downward slide that had begun in the 1920’s.
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