How does tobacco link Britain’s empire and America’s development from 1600 onwards? It was the "staple" of the Chesapeake colonies in a broader sense than any other staple the world has known. For, in the ancient province, all the processes of government society and domestic life began and ended with tobacco. [1] In 1612 John Rolfe, an Englishman sent with the Virginia Company, found that tobacco would grow well in Virginia and sell profitably in England. This was wonderful news considering that many of the Jamestown colonists had died or suffered miserably as their farming efforts had been relatively unsuccessful.
Jarrod Tasnady 9/20/14 Economics played a huge role in the establishment of European colonies in North America. From the beginning in settlements such as Jamestown and Plymouth went nearly extinct. They were saved by advancements in the economy. Due to agricultural discoveries farmers were able to produce a high demand in tobacco. This is what led to the establishment of not only Jamestown and Plymouth but as well as many other future settlements.
The search for labor in southern states eventually led the states to do something they didn’t intend on doing. With the great demand for tobacco from states like Virginia and Maryland, and the large demand for sugar cane from the West Indies, the settlers were forced to turn to slave labor. They played a small role at first in the southern states, but eventually made up a large percentage of these areas populations. Georgia and North Carolina opposed slavery, but were unable to compete with the other states crop production. English settlers in Virginia and later Maryland around the Chesapeake Bay area discovered a crop from the Indians known as tobacco.
Tobacco production not only helped the colony grow prosperous, it also created new opportunities for over 90,000 immigrants who moved to the colony as indentured servants. Similarly, the New England economy was based on trade in the fishing and timber industries because of easy access to ports and wooded areas. Like Chesapeake families, New England colonists farmed, however, New Englanders practiced subsistence farming, small family farms which produced only enough food for a single family’s use. Another similarity between the two colonies is how both colonies dealt with the Indians. In the Virginia colony, Powhatan’s brother, Opechancanough, led a surprise attack on Virginia colonists and murdered over 300 of the 1,200 men in the colony.
Western Europe’s expansion of Atlantic trade, through exploration and colonization, not only improved their own economy, but also the economy of America, through sharing new trade products and crops as well as beginning the slave trade. Western Europe began exploring other parts of the world around the mid-1400s. They first started out with primarily explorers from Portugal and Spain. Some of these people were Christopher Columbus, Francisco
They depended on slave labor for economic stability. Without the slaves many whites believed they were not able or should be doing the backbreaking labor. The plantation owners also needed the support of the slaves in all areas of their lives such as: cooks, housecleaners, nannies and chauffeurs. The possibility of life without the slaves was devastating. Slaves were the support system of their owners.
Colonists were provided with even more reason to practice their religion and continue their work in America for a better, more liberated life. England's success at colonizing, what would become the United States, was due in large part to its use of charter companies. Charter companies were groups of stockholders, usually merchants and wealthy land owners, who sought personal economic gain. While the private sector financed the companies, the King provided each project with a charter conferring economic rights as well as political authority. The colonies generally did not show quick profits.
Ironically, the _________ were the world’s greatest slave traders and later became the most aggressive suppressers of the slave trade. 18. Africans wanted European manufactured goods, so when the ___________ ended, Africans expanded their ___________ trade by developing new exports. 19. The most successful export from West Africa after abolition was _________________.
FRQ for Three World Collide (Chapter 1-3) What role did unfree labor play in colonial American society? Unfree labor systems have been around in America since the early 1600’s and can still be seen today. The first form of slavery started with the arrival of indentured servants, where people bound themselves to masters in return for passage to America, many of whom wanted to escape their turbulent homeland. Eventually, this turned into the slavery as we have come to know it- African Americans doing backbreaking work for little or no money. While many disregard this system as cruel and unfair, in reality it helped to shape America as it is today.
(Bellis.M) • It became a hit making many farmers and other industrialists millionaire. (Bellis.M) • Advance use of Cotton Gin (wikipedia) The biggest cotton plantation at that time was three times the size of Manhattan. (Bellis.M) • Cotton Plantation in America (wikipedia) Revolutionary Cotton Gin ● Eli Whitney's Cotton Gin not only revolutionized the way that cotton was produced but also transformed a weak southern economy in less than a decade and continued doing it till mid 19 th century. Many other countries adapted the same technology and benefitted heavily from