There was no such thing as retirement. If old folks were too infirm to work the fields, they would still care for the children, cook the meals and knit clothing.
I'm not so sure that the rural lifestyle is less stressful-- just a different kind of stress. Rather than being concerned with extracting their daily bread from their fellow men, they were concerned about extracting it from rocky soil, unpredictable rain, wild beasts who could chew down a summer corn crop, etc.
There was much more reliance on the Lord and your own efforts and less on getting your fair share from employers, workers and the like who didn't feel a sense of shared fate with you.
It is just another reason why you find conservatives to be generally happier and better adjusted than their liberal counterparts.
Probably right about that. With stress on the farm you can usually do something to remedy it. If the tractor breaks or the fences need mending, you fix them the best way you can. Stress in the city comes from things that you have no control over, like noise, crowding, crime, taxes, etc.