The factory jobs are long gone. The factory closed 15 years ago. The question for the community is whether they will support young people doing creative and innovative things to make a living. And likewise, whether newcomers (immigrants or otherwise) will be welcomed to do the same. Or whether young people will have to leave the area to do anything other than run a commercial dairy farm like their grandfathers did. I guess if the community thinks like you then it will be the latter. The fact that the population of the county is shrinking and down to where it was around 1970 suggests it is the latter.Josh wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 9:00 pmReplacing strong manufacturing jobs for a blue-collar middle class with low wage service jobs being waiters to rich people is not what I consider “progress”.Ken wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 6:46 pmSo it wasn't the closing of the New Holland plant that hollowed out and destroyed Belleville. It was this place? https://brookmerewine.com/Josh wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 6:09 pm
We regularly hold weddings at our church there (and presumably all the other plain people do, too).
What I objected to was creating playgrounds for rich people to host expensive weddings, which would (obviously) be serving out-of-towners. That kind of thing hollows out and destroys a community.
I'm not trying to pick on Belleville. I spent a lot of time there growing up. Pretty much every summer. And I have very fond memories of life there. We also swing back through every few years to see family and for reunions. Last summer it was just me and my youngest daughter and I got to see the place through her eyes. Which were different. Tattered Trump flags still flying all over the place. Boarded up storefronts in Belleville and the surrounding small towns. Essentially nothing a 17 year old girl would find interesting in the slightest. Not even a place to get coffee. We drove over to State College just to have something to do and to see the campus (didn't make her top 10 list). I guess that is the way that the older folks like it. And I'm in that age category now too. But seeing the place through my daughters eyes brought home to me why young people don't stick around unless they are inheriting a farm. There was a specific farm there that I once wanted to buy when I was young in my 20s. Looking back I'm glad I didn't, even if I had the money (which I didn't).
I want to see rural America turn things around. I don't think it is healthy for all the prosperity to be concentrated in the cities and suburban areas. But it is going to take change and innovation to make that happen. And also new blood which means immigrants. All things that the majority of people who live in such places seem to oppose. It is no different out here in the Pacific Northwest. The small towns that are creative and open to new ideas and change are the ones that are thriving. The ones that aren't. Not so much. And just like the subject of this thread, which is promoting young people to try agriculture. That means being open to young people trying new things on the land as well. Such as wineries, artisanal cheesemaking, farm-to-market organic vegetables, and different ethnic foods for immigrant markets like meat goats, chiles, and so forth. And yes, even wedding venues.