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In 1619, the first African slaves were brought to Virginia from Angola in West Central Africa.By 1700, slaves were displacing southern indentured servants. -
In March 1765, British Parliament passed the Stamp Act, the first direct tax on the American colonies, which included taxation on printed documents, newspapers, dice, and playing cards. -
The Declaration of Independence resulted partly from British controls on farm exports, restrictions on land titles, and limitations on western settlement. -
Shay's Rebellion, a farmers' revolt against high taxes and deflation in western Massachusetts, demonstrated the general resentment from the economic crisis that followed the American Revolution. -
In 1790, the total U.S. population was 3,929,214; farmers made up 90% of the labor force. -
The Whiskey Rebellion, a farmers' revolt against taxes on grain in whiskey, began in 1791 when the federal government authorized its first tax on a domestic product in order to reduce the national debt. -
The Public Land Act authorized federal land sales to the public in minimum 640-acre plots at $2 per acre in an attempt to encourage the settlement of western lands. -
By the 1800s the Northern states began to industrialize and export manufactured goods. As the Northern states industrialized they attracted new immigrants while the South’s population stagnated. -
President Thomas Jefferson acquired the Louisiana Territory by purchasing it from France in 1803 for $15 million dollars, an average of four cents per acre. With this purchase, the geographical size of the United States doubled and opened the west for expansion. -
Farmers began to use horsepower to pull newly invented farm implements like the broadcast seeder and the mechanized grain reaper. These implements improved working conditions for farmers and provided more cash so that they could enjoy a better standard of living. -
Northern farmers produced a variety of crops and livestock, sometimes supplemented by craftwork. Southern plantation agriculture concentrated on export crops. For the South the war was a struggle to preserve their economy and way of life; for the North it was a struggle to preserve the Union, grow the economies of one nation, and end slavery. Before the war sixty percent of Americans farmed, but when the war began large numbers of farmers left to fight so their land went untended. -
The Homestead Act offered 160 acres of free land to settlers who would farm it for five years, making the Great Plains a land of opportunity. Homesteaders rushed to fill the open lands.