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Family picking tomatoes in the San Fernando Valley, ca. 1937 | Herman J. Schultheis Collection, Los Angeles Public Library.
Large Scale agribusiness was exploding in the southwestern territories in the U.S. Silver and copper mines expanded all across Arizona, California, and New Mexico. With cheap labor coming in from Mexico, America businesses had labor to work their fields and in their mines. Men generally performed work in the mines while the Mexican women (and often times their children) worked alongside the men in the fields. Mexican field laborers tended to migrate from job to job, following th planting and harvesting of different crops.