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This test consists of 5 short answer questions, 10 short essay questions, and 1 (of 3) essay topics.

Short Answer Questions

1. Upon arriving in Vermont, who sold the Nearings milk?

2. How did the Nearings eat fresh from the garden?

3. What was served nearly every day for lunch at the Nearings?

4. Why did the Nearings like stone buildings?

5. In the breakdown of the Nearing's diet, how was the intake of vegetables broken down?

Short Essay Questions

1. What made the Vermont community shrink even as the Nearings lived there?

2. What was the Nearings' views of an hourly wage?

3. What was the Nearings' view of keeping animals? How far did this belief system go?

4. What were Frank Lloyd Wright's basic ideas for building that the Nearings followed?

5. How did the Nearings pick the lettuce in the winter to keep it from wilting?

6. What is a whole food? How did the Nearings describe a whole food?

7. How did the cancellation of the mail route in 1945 affect the valley? What did they do? How was this, according to the authors, a positive event for the community?

8. Why did cooperative living fail in the valley for the Nearings?

9. What, according to the Nearings, was the value of compost and mulch?

10. What was the Nearings' view about old buildings? What was their solution to old buildings?

Essay Topics

Write an essay for ONE of the following topics:

Essay Topic 1

Discuss the general workday. How did the Nearings work? How many hours were devoted to work and how many to leisure? Why did they set up their farm in this way? What were the benefits? What were the drawbacks?

Essay Topic 2

Why did the Nearing find the question "Who is your family doctor?" so strange? What did they think of doctors? How do the Chinese view doctors? How is this similar to the Nearing's attitudes toward health professionals?

Essay Topic 3

Discuss the "four-four-four" formula for life. What is the final four in this formula? Why did the Nearings wait until the end of the book to reveal this formula? Is this formula the key to life for the Nearings?

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This section contains 842 words (approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page) View a FREE sample