Farmerettes?

Farmerettes? - An Ag-related history lesson

Image from the Smithsonian Institute

During WWI, from 1917-1919, women’s organizations, such as YWCA, established the Woman’s Land Army of America in order to support the war effort. The Woman’s Land Army, based on a similar British war effort by the “Land Lassies,” recruited about 20,000 women to take over farm jobs from men who had left for war. The women who worked on farms were called “farmerettes.”

An article for Smithsonian describes some of the women who worked in California to produce fruits like peaches and grapes.  

“While California fruit growers held lucrative contracts with the U.S. military to supply troops with dried and canned fruit, the extreme wartime farm labor shortage enabled the California Woman’s Land Army to demand extraordinary employment terms: a guaranteed contract, equal pay to what local male farm laborers could command, an eight hour day, and overtime pay. The employers also agreed to worker protections--comfortable living quarters, designated rest periods, lifting limits, and workers’ compensation insurance—considered radical for the time.”