In 1900, America had 5.7 million farms with an average size of 147 acres. Farmers made up 38% of the labor force. By 1990, farmers were only 2.6% of the American labor force. There were 2.1 million farms, 461 acres average per farm (Information from http://www.agclassroom.org/gan/timeline/farmers_land.htm). Nostalgia for home has always been a popular song theme, but nostalgia for home on the farm is a 20th century phenomenon. Take my word for it: it's hard to be nostalgic about farming if you're living on one.

One of the earliest farm nostalgia songs is Homestead on the Farm, performed here by The Carter Family, vocal with guitar and autoharp accompaniment. Sara Carter, lead vocal, with Maybelle Carter and A.P. Carter vocal on chorus. Recorded November, 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia by Victor Company. It was re-released on a Rounder Records CD1065, My Clinch Mountain Home, which is unfortunately out of print. If you can't find that one for sale, you could splurge on the Bear Family 12-CD set, In The Shadow Of Clinch Mountain, which will give you over 300 Carter Family recordings (available at http://www.cdwolf.com). This song, usually called I Wonder How the Old Folks Are at Home, was composed by Lambert and Vandersloot in 1909. I assume the Carters learned it from sheet music.

It only briefly mentions farming, but one of my favorites in the genre is West Virginia, My Home, composed and sung by Hazel Dickens, with harmony by John Baker. Originally released on Rounder LP 0126, re-released in 1995 on a 2-CD set, Hand Picked: 25 Years of Bluegrass on Rounder Records AN 22/23. I recommend it: it's a bargain. Jim Nelson of the IL-MO Boys points out that The Rounder LP Hazel Dickens & Alice Gerrard has a fine earlier recording of this song re-released as Rounder CDRoun0054, available at http://www.rounder.com/index.php?id=album.php&musicalGroupId=485&catalog_id=6742. That whole album is fine, actually.

An example of nostalgia so pure you know that the composer never got swiped across the face by a manure-laden cow's tail is Who Will Watch the Home Place, performed by Laurie Lewis, vocal & fiddle, with vocal and instrumental backup by Tom Rozum, mandolin; Peter McLaughlin, guitar; and Cary Black, acoustic bass. From Laurie Lewis CD, True Stories, released 1993 as Rounder CD 0300.  The song was composed by Kate Long. This rendition won the 1994 IBMA Song of the Year award. Psychiatrists talk about free-floating anxiety -- I think this is a case of free-floating nostalgia.

Moving on from pure longing to longing spiced with guilt: The Old Home Place, performed by J.D. Crowe and The New South. Lead vocal by Tony Rice, with harmony by J.D. Crowe and Ricky Skaggs. Released 1975 on Rounder LP 0044, re-released on the same CD set as the Hazel Dickens piece listed above. Jim Nelson sent me an e-mail with more info on the song: it was written by Mitch Jayne and Dean Webb, and was first recorded by The Dillards on their 1963 LP Back Porch Bluegrass, reissued as ELEK-CD73562. There's also a fine later version, done by John Hartford with Mike Seeger and David Grisman, on their Retrograss album.

The guilt becomes overwhelming when The Fields Have Turned Brown, performed by Carter (lead vocal) & Ralph Stanley (tenor) and the Clinch Mountain Boys, Released as a single by Columbia circa 1950. It was reissued on the Bear Family CD The Stanley Brothers & The Clinch Mountain Boys, 1949 - 1952, available at http://www.cdwolf.com. This powerful song was written by Carter Stanley.