You're right, I'd probably go further and say my definition coincides with the later end of the industrial revolution.

I'd call modern farming anything that uses fossil fuels or mech, and hand tools or actual horsepower traditional.

I don't think farmers as a whole were ever really environmentalists. Sure, environmentalists will typically be either a biologist or a farmer, but there are huge amounts that never were that aware or caring towards environmentalist concerns. Don't forget, most farmers 60 years ago were happy to spray down their fields with little-understood industrial chemicals. Hardly the act of an environmentalist.

The reason you don't see climate change denial from old farmers is

A) Climate change wasn't an issue in their career (they'd be 80+ if they were farming 60 years ago)

B) They're old enough to remember the way the climate was back then, and see that it's different now. I just barely remember when my region would be snowed in mid november, not to lift until march. Now, it's regular for it to fluctuate around freezing most of the year, with constant snowing and melting.