The Bankhead–Jones Farm Tenant Act of 1937 (P.L. 75-210) was passed on July 22, 1937,
[ ] and authorized acquisition by the federal government of damaged lands to rehabilitate and use them for various purposes. Most importantly, however, the law authorized a modest credit program to assist
tenant farmer
A tenant farmer is a farmer or farmworker who resides and works on land owned by a landlord, while tenant farming is an agricultural production system in which landowners contribute their land and often a measure of operating capital and ma ...
s to purchase land,
and it was the culmination of a long effort to secure legislation for their benefit.
Management of Bankhead–Jones lands
Both the
U.S. Forest Service and the
Bureau of Land Management
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands, U.S. federal lands. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the BLM oversees more than of land, or one ...
manage some Bankhead–Jones lands. Some Forest Service Bankhead-Jones lands are
National Grasslands.
National park
In 1937, the federal government purchased distressed farmland for the
Laura S. Walker National Park under a Federal
Land Utilization Program authorized by the Bankhead–Jones Farm Tenant Act.
The park was named for
Waycross, Georgia
Waycross is the county seat of and only incorporated city in Ware County in the U.S. state of Georgia. The population was 13,942 in the 2020 census.
Waycross gets its name from the city's location at key railroad junctions; lines from six di ...
,
conservationist Laura S. Walker, in recognition of her work promoting forestry and other civic activities. Work on the park was undertaken by the
Works Progress Administration
The Works Progress Administration (WPA; from 1935 to 1939, then known as the Work Projects Administration from 1939 to 1943) was an American New Deal agency that employed millions of jobseekers (mostly men who were not formally educated) to car ...
and the
Civilian Conservation Corps
The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a voluntary government unemployment, work relief program that ran from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men ages 18–25 and eventually expanded to ages 17–28. The CCC was ...
. In 1941, the national park was deeded over to
Georgia
Georgia most commonly refers to:
* Georgia (country), a country in the South Caucasus
* Georgia (U.S. state), a state in the southeastern United States
Georgia may also refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Georgia (name), a list of pe ...
, becoming the State's 13th state park.
First tenant farmer loan repayment
In February 1943, Roddie and Lucile Pridgett of
Rankin County, Mississippi, "became the first Negro farm family in the United States to repay their 36-year farm purchase loan to the
Farm Security Administration which they obtained under the provisions of the Bankhead–Jones Tenant Purchase Act." They repaid their loan of $1,495 in only five years.
Notes
References
* Banfield, Edward C. "Ten Years of the Farm Tenant Purchase Program." Journal of Farm Economics 31 (1949): pp. 469–486.
* Bankhead–Jones Farm Tenant Act. U.S. Statutes at Large, 50, Part 1(1937): 522-33.
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Bankhead-Jones Farm Tenant Act Of 1937
United States federal agriculture legislation