colonial+america

hurleyushistoryihurleyhistoryi colnialamerica

Products from the southern colonies were very important in colonial trade. Still, the region remained rural, with economies based on agriculture. Unlike the northern colonies, only a few cities formed in the South.  The southern colonies produced valuable **cash crops**—agricultural products grown to be sold. One was tobacco, America’s most valuable export. Indigo, a plant used to make a blue dye, and rice were also grown in the South. Southerners also produced naval stores—products such as rope, tar, and turpentine that were used to **maintain** wooden ships. There was great demand in England for these crops—and great profit to be made from them.    As tobacco became an increasingly important crop, a way of life known as the plantation system developed in Virginia and Maryland. A plantation is a large farm, usually in a warm climate, with an unskilled labor force that grows one cash crop, such as sugar or tobacco. The plantation system soon became widespread through much of the South. Eventually, a wealthy and influential class of planters emerged. These planters dominated southern society and politics. Plantations needed workers, and this need encouraged the growth of slavery. A few huge plantations had hundreds of workers, either indentured servants or slaves. Most farms were smaller and had a work force of fewer than 30. The bulk of these workers labored in the fields, although men and women on large plantations performed other necessary tasks such as shoemaking, weaving, and carpentry.   While tobacco was king in Virginia, rice and indigo were the dominant crops in South Carolina. The low-lying coastline and marshes of South Carolina proved ideal for growing rice. Some historians think that enslaved West Africans brought the knowledge of rice growing to America. ||
 * ||  ||   || **Southern Colonial Economies**
 * ||  ||   || **Southern Colonial Economies**
 * ||  ||   || **Southern Colonial Economies**
 * The plantation system**
 * Rice and indigo**



main idea : Indigo and cotten made for money. main idea: crops made more money than fish.


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 * **Tasks on a Rice Plantation** ||


 * **1.** || **Planting** Slaves planted rice by hand in the spring. ||
 * **2.** || **Watering** Rice is grown in flooded fields, so rice plantations were built near natural water sources. ||
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