Between the coasts there are towns, counties, and communities that built this country — and were systematically stripped of the resources, industries, and futures that made them viable. Nobody covered it. Nobody was held accountable. We will.
Flyover America is a permanent, ongoing series documenting the communities in interior America that have been exploited, abandoned, or destroyed by decisions made far away by people who will never live with the consequences. Each entry is fully sourced. Each one names names.
In the 1970s, water developers paid struggling Colorado farmers $300–$400 per acre for their water rights and sold them to Denver, Colorado Springs, and Aurora. Over 50,000 irrigated acres went to dust. The communities that remained turned to prisons to survive. Those same water rights now sell for $25,000 apiece. Nobody went to jail.
A century of coal extraction funded the industrial economy of the eastern United States. The communities that mined it were left with black lung, poisoned water, and collapsed economies. The companies that profited are still operating.
When economists modeled the effects of NAFTA, the job losses were a line item. In Youngstown, Flint, and a hundred towns nobody remembers, they were everything. A documented account of who made the decision and what it cost.
The DEA tracked every pill. The distributors knew the volumes were impossible. The communities that were flooded had no idea what was coming. A county-by-county account of the supply chain and the people who ran it.
From 1970 to today, the number of farms in America dropped by half while the average size doubled. The policy decisions that made it happen were deliberate. The communities that died as a result were collateral.
Flyover America grows one documented entry at a time. If you know of a community — a county, a town, a region — that has been systematically exploited or abandoned and you have leads on the documentation, we want to hear about it.
Every entry on this series is sourced from official records, investigative reporting, and primary documents. Tips are welcome. Speculation is not published.