One of the strongest incentives to emigrate was the hope of improved economic circumstances. Information about the wages of the Danish im
migrants is generally not available, but in the Iowa State census for 1915 each person was asked to report his total income for 1914, so that a com
parison with the wages for similar jobs in Denmark at the same time is possible. Artisans show the greatest improvement, with wages in some cases four to five times those paid for similar crafts in Denmark, but for almost every single occupation the pay was considerably better than it would have been in Denmark, representing a real gain, since the cost of living was only about 15 percent higher. However, the most important improvement for the immigrants was undoubtedly the much less rigid
structure of American society, which made it possible for people with initiative and drive to succeed, even though they did not have any special education, and for agricultural workers to become farm owners. In Den
mark it required a university degree to become a doctor or a parson, and long training to become, for example, a postmaster or a bank manager. The doctor in Kimballton in 1915 had spent a year at a homeopathic college in Chicago, but still had a higher income than his better trained colleagues in Denmark, and most vicars in America had been educated at a theological seminary in a much shorter time than was needed in Denmark, and were still almost as well paid.
The founder of the Landmands National Bank in Kimballton, Hans Mad
sen, was a harness maker who started banking in his back room in 1907.
His bank grew and was managed so well that it was the only one in the area to survive the economic depression of the 1930s and received official recog
nition as a “sound bank” with access to the Federal Reserve System.16 While the average incomes in the two towns of Elk Horn and Kimballton were almost identical, there were great differences between the farmers of the two surrounding townships of Clay and Sharon. They had all improved their incomes compared to the average income for farmers in Denmark, which was $677 a year,1' but in Sharon Township farmers made an average of $1,716, while Clay farmers had an average income of $774, less than half as much. Property valuations for 1915 show the farms in Clay Township to be worth on average about $16,000 compared to the $21,000 value of Sharon farms.
The average sizes of the farms in the two townships were similar, so the most likely explanation for the difference can probably be found in the different backgrounds of the two groups in Denmark. Most of the immi
grants in Clay Township began in the modest way described by Rasmus Hansen. Furthermore, their background in Denmark as agricultural work
ers or servants did not provide them with any great skill in farming their small acreage so that they had to learn gradually, by experience and by watching their more successful neighbors. Many of the farmers in Sharon Township came from the Danish farming classes, and had perhaps been younger sons who were not able to take over the home farm, but who might have received a sum of money as an inheritance with which to get started.
More importantly, they had participated in the running of their home farm before emigration and had in many cases spent a winter at a folk high school or an agricultural school, as was customary for farmers’ children. In this way they were well trained to manage a farm and to get the most out of the fertile Iowa soil.
The farmers in Clay Township were of course not blind to the success, especially of animal production, in Sharon, and with their growing
experi-ence and skill they were gradually able to move into this field; the number of farm animals increased rapidly in Clay Township after about 1910.
American agriculture experienced a very long stretch of improved condi
tions after the severe recession of the 1890s, and when the U.S.A, entered the World War in 1917, market conditions for farmers improved even further, so that there seemed to be no limit to the amount that could be sold at very good prices. This encouraged all farmers to mechanize and expand their holdings as much as possible to take advantage of this golden oppor
tunity. In most cases it was necessary to take out extra mortgages on the farms. Property values grew to unprecedented heights and mortgages were easy to obtain.
The very large demand for foodstuffs continued for the first few years after the end of the war, but in 1920 agriculture in most European countries started to function again, and there was a general shortage of money to import food from overseas. Furthermore, the harvest of 1920 was excep
tionally good everywhere, and suddenly the bubble burst - it was no longer possible to sell the huge American agricultural production.
More than a quarter of the farmers in Clay Township had mortgaged their farms to such a degree that the equity in 1925 was negative, and many others were only just solvent. In Sharon the farmers had been able to finance the increase in production without excessive loans, so here the crash was not so crippling. A comparison of the property valuations per acre for the two areas before, during and after the boom reveals the extent of the disaster for the Clay farmers. In 1915 the value per acre of the Danish Clay farms was $103, while it was $154 in Sharon Township. During the boom, in 1920, the average in the area was around $300 (no separate figures exist for the two townships), but in 1925 the level had dropped right back to
$106 in Clay Township, while it was $172 in Sharon, a substantial drop, but still significantly higher than it had been in 1915. A study of the percentage of the average value of the farms covered by loans reveals an even more alarming picture. In Sharon Township, the farmers increased their loans from about 27 percent of the property value in 1915 to 33 percent in 1925, while the Clay farmers gambled so hard on improving and mechanizing their farms during the boom that their loans rose from 21 to 59 percent.1 R
The census material is not yet available for the period after 1925, so it is not known exactly how the Clay farmers recovered after this economic crisis. But recover they did, and both Clay and Sharon townships are today populated by farmers who share in the general patterns of prosperity and recession that befall American agriculture.