Soil Exhaustion as a Factor in the Agricultural History of Virginia and Maryland, 1606-1860 by Avery Odelle Craven

“The newer understanding of fertility and exhaustion, placing greater emphasis upon the factors which are to a degree under the control of the cultivator, adds importance to the second problem in depletion, i.e., why men employ methods which permit of ruin. And here we face not only the individual but also social conditions of which the individual is often the victim. The crops produced and the methods employed, as has been said, are seldom matters of intelligent choosing on the part of the planter. Men may, because of ignorance or habit, ruin their soils, but more often economic or social conditions, entirely outside their control, lead or force them to a treatment of their lands that can end only in ruin.”

-Avery Odelle Craven, 1925