I trace the roots of my radicalization back to my childhood when I first came into contact with the ugly face of capitalism via real-estate speculators. Neither the system nor the people who benefit from it have changed very much over the last fifty years!
My mother's father owned a bar and general store, but he was not what could be called rich. My mother had to quit school after the eighth grade and go to work in a factory. My father's father was a landless farmer. My father was a manual laborer and part-time farmer with an eighth grade education. Around 1920 he married a woman named Delsie Farmer. Her parents owned a four acre farm. In 1930, Delsie Snedeker died from a vaginal hemorrhage. In 1936, my father whose name is also George, married my mother whose name is Nettie. My father and mother lived on the four acre farm with the Farmer family until they died. When Mother Farmer and Father Farmer, as they were called, died they left the farm to my father and mother. I don't know how my mother felt about living with the mother and father of my father's first wife's family. She was poor so she probably thought of the farm as a stroke of good luck! By the end of World War II, the farm was mostly used to grow food that we ate. My father's wages were low in the various jobs he held so growing food helped us live without going hungry. Prior to World War II, my mother ran a chicken and egg business, but with the rise of the grocery store this business ended. We kept a few chickens for eggs, but we no longer sold eggs to neighbors. In 1955, real-estate agents from the Pennsylvania Railroad coerced my parents into selling their four acre farm by telling them they were buying up the whole area to build an industrial park. My parents were told that if they did not sell the farm, they would be surrounded by factories. This is probably the same story they told everyone in the area to get them to sell. These real-estate speculators were only interested in the land so people could take their houses with them if they liked. Some people moved their houses. If they did not take the houses, they were demolished. The land remained baron for 45 years. No industrial park was ever built on it. However around 2000, a development which includes townhouses, houses and condos and is called "Renaissance" began to be built on the land where my parents farm use to be located. These events tell the story of the transition from industrial to finance capitalism and my personal relationship to this process. This is one of the writing projects that I work on when I can find the time. The other major writing project is a satire on college life. I think of both of these projects as books that I hope to publish some day. George Snedeker ________________________________________________ YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. Send list submissions to: Marxism@lists.econ.utah.edu Set your options at: http://lists.econ.utah.edu/mailman/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
