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The rapid growth of population and the expansion of the frontier opened up large numbers of new farms, and clearing the land was a major preoccupation of farmers. After 1800, cotton became the chief crop in southern plantations, and the chief American export.
- Mary Bellis
- Agricultural Advances in the United States, 1775–1889.
- 1776–1800. During the latter part of the 18th century, farmers relied on oxen and horses to power crude wooden plows. All sowing was accomplished using a hand-held hoe, reaping of hay and grain with a sickle, and threshing with a flail.
- 1800–1830. Inventions during the early decades of the 19th century were aimed at automation and preservation. 1800–1830—The era of turnpike building (toll roads) improved communication and commerce between settlements.
- The 1830s. By the 1830s, about 250-300 labor-hours were required to produce 100 bushels (5 acres) of wheat using a walking plow, brush harrow, hand broadcast of seed, sickle, and flail.
Colonial farmers’ roles varied across North America. New Englanders built their economy around whaling, commercial cod fishing, and shipbuilding. 12 With a shorter growing season, small farmers produced crops for local consumption. In the Middle Colonies, larger commercial farms, although still family ventures, fed the region, but also ...
After 1800, the primary market for agricultural products shifted from overseas ports to cities in the United States. Growing urban populations created an ever-increasing demand, not only for standard products like breadstuffs and meat, but for new ones like pears and brooms.
History. Cotton farming on a Southern plantation in 1921. Corn, turkeys, tomatoes, potatoes, peanuts, and sunflower seeds constitute some of the major holdovers from the agricultural endowment of the Americas. Colonists had more access to land in the colonial United States than they did in Europe.
Let’s review population growth in the United States, paying close attention to American farmers. In the first U.S. Census of 1790, the new nation’s population was about four million people, almost all of them living in the countryside or in small towns and villages, and 90 percent of them listing their occupation as farmers.
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The United States began as a largely rural nation, with most people living on farms or in small towns and villages. While the rural population continued to grow in the late 1800s, the urban population was growing much more rapidly. Still, a majority of Americans lived in rural areas in 1900.
