![]() “I read somewhere that Walsh was the broom corn capital of Baca county and someone said Pritchett was. I have several local recollections of the broomcorn era that I will compile and share, but for the remainder of this post we will shall compare some of the claims that have been made to the title of “Broomcorn Capital of the World”. The Broomcorn era in Baca County began in 1887 and ended in 1978. In honor of that request we will begin sharing a few more Broomcorn stories we’ve collected about a significant period of Baca County History. ![]() Our Baca County friend Cotton Huffman suggested awhile back in a social media post that we collectively talk about some of the good times in Baca County and not just focus on the the dust bowl. Most of the domestic needs for broomcorn are now satisfied via imports from Mexico. The USDA quit tracking domestic Broomcorn production in the 1970s as lower demand for the crop and its vast labor requirements, particularly for harvesting, ended its viability as a modern agriculture crop in the United States. For the next 100 years or so US production was focused in Illinois, Kansas, Oklahoma Texas, Colorado and New Mexico. Broom making in the US began in 1797 when a Massachusetts man planted a half acre of it and began to make and then peddle crude brooms.Ĭultivation of the crop shifted westward with large scale production beginning in Illinois in the 1860’s. Other reports tell us that this single plant grown by Franklin grew into a tall corn- like plant with a flowering brush of stiff fibers bearing seeds and was the first of many broomcorn plants grown in Philadelphia. Initially, broomcorn was grown only as a garden crop for use in the home. Benjamin Franklin is credited with introducing broomcorn to the United States in the 1700s. The broomcorn plant was first described in Italy in the late 1500s. Broomcorn may have evolved as a result of repeated selection of seed from heads that had the longest panicle branches. ![]() Production of this crop then spread to the Mediterranean, where people used long-branched sorghum panicles for making brooms in the Dark Ages. long.Īlthough the origin of broomcorn is obscure, sorghum apparently originated in central Africa. It differs from other sorghums in that it produces heads with fibrous seed branches that may be as much as 36 in. technicum) is a type of sorghum that is used for making brooms and whiskbrooms. I want to show this picture as it offers not only some perspective on the varying heights of the individual plants, but also as a bonus (that is correct no extra charge) because Lon was my Little League baseball coach.īroomcorn (Sorghum vulgare var. The picture below shows Lon Kerr standing in his broomcorn field in the late 1950’s or early 1960’s. Anytime the topic of broomcorn has come up with someone not from Baca County there is inevitably the question “What’s that?” Therefore, if any of you reading this are not from Baca County or one of the other areas discussed in this post, here is some basic information: I have had several conversations about recording local history as we are doing with.
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