The history of the colonization of great part of Sao Paulo's countryside is deeply related to the expansion of coffee bean production which began in the midnineteenth century. The bounden desire to reach fertile soil boosted millions of workers towards these new agricultural borders, which were spreading through contiguous movements toward the most hidden regions of this territory, provoking the arising of cities, many of them that grew along the Brazilian train complex that was also expanding, impelled by public and private investments interested in the capital flow generated by this intense coffee bean production. The Northwest region of Sao Paulo, inserted in this macroeconomic process became, in 1920's, one of the richest coffee bean production zones of Sao Paulo and its condition of rising pioneer fringe allows, in a particular way, the study of men and nature's interaction in the past, under the critical look of environmental history.
Northwest pioneer; coffee bean production; environmental history
