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Nice looking country Dave, but it is odd seeing the patchwork for different crops, etc. My part of the U.S. it's rare to find a difficult to find a 40 acre or bigger field. But the ownership isn't as broken up -- a typical family dairy farm might own 200 acres, a mix of woods and fields. And today pretty much anyone still in business rents more land. Link Your area reminds me of Hatfield, MA -- Hatfield's one of the oldest towns in New England (founded 1670), and if you look on the south end of the town you see hundreds of long, narrow properties: >Link Those>Link are in rich river bottom lands -- knowing how towns were established back then, settlers originally would get a homestead in the village center (Maple & Main Streets on the map -- the "center" being the best place near good farm land), and later on the "Proprietors" would divide the common lands further. That division usually involved a formula that those with the most resources (wealthiest) got the most land since they could work it, but also the land was evaluated as to how productive it was. Say Farmer A and Farmer B where both to get 10 acres of typical land, Farmer A might get 10 acres of typical land, but Farmer B might get 12 acres of land that was judged not quite as nice as what was given to Farmer A. Later on as they moved away from the village centers it became common just to sell large parcels -- often thousands of acres -- at once to a wealthy purchaser. That purchaser would then sub-divide and sell parcels of several hundred acres to settlers.
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