| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 36.3

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| Book Review | The Western Historical Quarterly, 36.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Beasts of the Field: A Narrative History of California Farmworkers, 1769–1913. By Richard Steven Street. (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004. xxv + 904 pp. Illustrations, notes, index. $75.00, cloth; $29.95, paper.)

Each day I drive to campus I pass agricultural fields, vineyards, and orchards. Before 8 am farmworkers, largely Mexican, stop for a few minutes to eat their breakfast. It is not unusual to witness pesticide spraying tractors and helicopters combing the fields short distances from people cultivating crops. As the title of Richard Steven Street's illuminating book suggests, historically these "beasts of the field" have been exploited, mistreated, and, ultimately, discarded. This history of farmworkers in California, from the first Spanish expeditions in the Alta region to the early years of the twentieth century, however, highlights the dogged agency of people who have provided food for our nation's tables.

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