Farmhands

Some farmers say unskilled labor will undoubtedly help, but they caution that untried farmhands take much longer to do the work and can often damage crops and produce.

Salinas is the heart of Steinbeck country — and the fertile ground for some of his best-known classics, like East of Eden and The Grapes of Wrath. The economic depression faced by the hard-working farmhands and fruit pickers he wrote about ended in the 1930's… but the now predominantly-Latino town of 150-thousand remains a struggling agricultural community. On a small side street, one of the town's three libraries bears Steinbeck's name. Outside the building, a statue of the Nobel Prize-winning author has a piece of rain-soaked cardboard dangling from its neck. It reads, 'Please do not close my library.'