How a small farming community kept its town from 'fading'

Aledo's renovated Carnegie Library is now a 
co-working tech hub. (Landmark Illinois photo)

The Great Recession left little Aledo, Illinois, hollowed out, but that's not the end of its story. The farming town with roughly 3,600 residents has made a surprising comeback with help from returning residents, a historical designation, the pandemic and a community that wouldn't allow its town to "fade," reports Rhonda Brooks of Farm Journal.

W. J. Albertson grew up in Aledo, which he recalled as a charming town with a bustling downtown. When Albertson and his wife returned to Aledo to help their aging parents in 2016-2017, the changes in the town were dramatic. He told Brooks, "We saw Aledo in a state that, you know, it hurt."

Location of Aledo, Ill.
(Wikipedia map)

After seeing his hometown's downturn, Albertson decided he wanted to help reverse Aledo's fortunes. Sometimes leading and sometimes following, Albertson became part of "a methodical effort … backed by city hall, nonprofit organizations, various companies and other local individuals — to make this little town 30 minutes south of the Quad Cities a vibrant community once again," Brooks explains.

Aledo's luck began to change in 2016 when its downtown was added to the National Park Service’s list of historic districts. Brooks reports, "About 80 buildings fell under the new designation, opening the door to federal and state rehabilitation tax credits."

When the town's historic Carnegie Library came up for auction, "Albertson and his partners moved quickly to acquire the building and lined it up as a tax-credit project," Brooks writes. "The plan was to show, in one visible example, that historic status and incentives could finance a modern use."

The Aledo Opera House has become the town's
'cultural anchor.' (Aledo Opera House photo) 

Once the pandemic hit, the community had fiber access installed in the renovated library, which helped the site evolve into a "job center and co-working hub, while providing a new reason to be downtown," Brooks reports.

As time has gone on, the community has renovated historic and non-historic buildings into apartment housing, quasi-bed-and-breakfast rooms and meeting venues. The Aledo Opera House was also renovated and reopened. Brooks adds, "The facility featured space for a stage, movie showings, and other community activities."

Albertson encourages small-town Americans to get involved in their communities. "He sums up Aledo’s guiding philosophy in a short formula that blends civic pride and faith," Brooks reports. He told her, "We kind of like to say, metaphorically, with our faith, broken things plus love equals restoration."

Opinion: On the West Texas High Plains, a farm recession from closing cotton gins eats away at rural economies

Part of a ginning business stands out on High Plains
of West Texas. (Floydada Co-op Gin photo)

A farm recession doesn't look like a Wall Street crash. It's quieter, deeper and far more difficult for an agriculturally-based community to recover from, writes Tony St. James in his opinion for RED TV. When a region's farms go under, their disappearance is followed by the loss of "the businesses that once processed, serviced, and supported the crop."

West Texas cotton gins that once flourished and pumped millions of dollars into the state's economy are struggling to survive drought and market volatility. "In 2022, extreme drought forced producers to abandon nearly 74% of planted acres, driving production to the lowest levels seen in decades," St. James explains. While production rebounded in 2023, the farm losses of 2022 were nearly impossible to balance.

After 2022, some farmers had to sell or close their gins. Their consolidation into another gin or complete closings cascaded down to all the equipment dealers, irrigation companies and trucking firms that depended on that gin for work and profits.

Location of Parmer County, Texas,
population 9,870 (Wikipedia map)

"In Parmer County, one cooperative gin has sold, another is unlikely to reopen, and only one large facility remains," St. James writes. "The cotton did not disappear. The infrastructure did. . . . This is what a farm recession looks like on Main Street."

From a state or national perspective, the loss and absorption of gins may not signal any crisis, but for towns centered on cotton, the loss of one or two gins can kill their rural economy.

"Cotton remains central to the Texas economy. . . . But rural infrastructure tends to thin faster than it rebuilds," St. James adds. To survive, some West Texas counties are faced with "rebuilding the backbone of the local economy."

In the 'Trump economy,' this dairy farmer and his family still struggle to make ends meet

Dairy farmer Derek Orth owns Jersey cows. (Dairy Star photo)

Since President Donald Trump took office in early 2025, some Americans have thrived, while others have been pushed to downsize or put off purchases to pay for the basics. The Wall Street Journal interviewed six Americans, including rural dairy farmer Derek Orth from Lancaster, Wisconsin, to see how they are doing in the "Trump economy," reports Jeanne Whalen of The Wall Street Journal.

Smaller dairy farmers in Wisconsin have been struggling to compete with bigger, more consolidated operations since around 2004. "Orth says he hasn’t had a good financial year in a decade. But higher costs are making things even more challenging these days," Whalen writes.

"We have a $100,000 tractor that hasn’t moved in three or four months because we don’t know if we can afford to fix it,” Orth told the Journal.

He has also been hit by incremental increases in his farm insurance premiums. Whalen reports, "But the accumulation of big increases that snowballed from 2022 to 2024 nearly quadrupled his bill over 15 years, to about $41,000."

Orth, his wife, Charisse, and their four children live rent-free in the farmhouse that Orth's parents own. The couple uses Charisse's income to cover most expenses. Orth told Whalen, "A lot of the income I make goes back into the farm, and what my wife makes is what we use for family living."

Over the past several years, the couple hasn't been able to sock anything away for retirement. Whalen reports, "He said he hopes the Trump administration’s recent efforts to promote dairy products could boost his business, and he appreciates that gas prices are 'fairly reasonable.'"

Read all six interview's by the Journal here.