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1800 Economies of the North and South
By the 1880's, Northern states had began industrializing and exporting manufactured goods. By this time half of the Americans had started living in the south. Then by 1850, one third of American population was there. The southern economy exported and produced cotton, sugar, rice, tobacco and wheat. -
1803 Louisiana Purchase
President Thomas Jefferson had taken the Louisiana Territory by purchasing it from France in 1803. The cost was $15 million dollars. This was 4 cents per acre. After the purchase the United States of America doubled in geographical size and opened up the Westward expansion. -
1830 Agricultural Exports
. The railroad era begins with Peter Cooper's railroad steam engine, the Tom Thumb, running 13 miles in 1830. By 1860, nearly 30,000 miles of railroad had been constructed. Technology on farms, better and more transportation results, and bigger growing exports on agriculture. Peter Cooper's railroad steam engine the Tomb Thumb. It runs 13 miles in the 1830's and by the 1860's nearly 30,000 miles of railroad had been constructed. -
1830 Farm Labor Comparisons
250-300 labor hours are required to produce 100 bushels which is 5 acres. You can use a walking plow, bush harrow, or scatter seeds by hand which is known to broadcast seeds or you can sickle, and flail. -
1860 Civil War
Northern farmers produced a variety of crops and livestock, sometimes supplemented by craftwork. Southern plantation agriculture concentrated on export crops. -
1860 Population and productivity
In 1860s the average total U.S. population: 31,443,321; farm population: 15,141,000 (est.); farmers 58% of labor force; Number of farms: 2,044,000; average acres: 199. -
1862 USDA
On May 15, 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed an act of Congress into law establishing at the seat of Government of the United States a Department of Agriculture. -
1865 Post-war Agriculture
The Civil War destroyed much of the South and its plantations. More dramatically, four million slaves were suddenly freed with no land, no money and little opportunity. A tenant farming system called sharecropping evolved in the South to make use of cheap labor. -
1887 Agriculture Science
Things began to change as the USDA shared its findings with the American public. Farmers returning to crops and livestock from agricultural science schools and agricultural demonstration and extension programs began experimenting with new techniques to improve production. -
1890 Scientific Discoveries Reducing the Spread of Disease
Scientists have also discovered new ways to combat animal and plant diseases. -
1899 Science Changes the Number of People Needed to Farm
The most important scientific advances of this period was the discovery that plants could be selectively propagated for disease resistance. -
1900 Industrial Technology in the New Century
By 1900, industrial technology had brought great improvements to farmers. Dams brought irrigation water to dry land, and USDA scientists introduced American farmers to new crops such as nectarines from Afghanistan, broccoli and seedless raisins from Italy, and new avocados from Chile.