The growth of agriculture and railroads in Texas and in the United States helped form our economy today. Railroads today pass through a lot of Texas, and even in big cities like Houston or Dallas. Since there are so many farms and open farmland (especially in south and west Texas), railroads can carry the produce and livestock to their destination. James Watt invented the first steam engine in about 1769, and from then on, railroads were a must for transportation, since cars had yet to be invented. Railroads began to be built before the Civil War. It originally took about 6 months to get from the west of the US to the east, but now it only took 7 days. With railroads expanding all across the country, agriculture was affected in a mostly positive …show more content…
Austin brought the “Old 300” to Texas, they got about 4,338 acres for grazing, and 177 acres for farmland and labor. This is where the first slave-based cotton plantation came into being. The Texas’ farms were starting to be a commercial business. Small family farms were becoming more frequent, and the livestock business became popular, all between 1836 and the Civil War in 1861. Cotton production generated most of the state’s agriculture production and sales. 58,000 bales were produced in 1850, but in 1860, there were 431,000! The number of slaves grew to more than triple as well, from about 58,200 to about 182,500. The whole population of Texas tripled too. It was kind of like a ‘Texas Cotton Rush’! There were many immigrants who settled in Texas. Some of those towns are still here today, such as New Braunfels, Brenham, and Boerne. Those are German towns. Also, immigrants from the Czech Republic settled heavily in Fayette and Brazos. People from many other foreign countries settled in Texas as well. There were so many, more than half the settlers were foreign-born …show more content…
With the remaining 20 – 60 acres, about 75% of it would be dedicated to growing cotton (since that’s where the cash would flow). Other crops could be corn, sugarcane, a cash crop like tobacco, or even herbs like rosemary or oregano. Large animals like oxen or mules would plow the land, but if the farmer had some money, he could import some high-tech (at the time) equipment. Despite the difficulty of the farm life (like having to cough up two-thirds of your profits to the landlord, having a drought, plant or animals having disease, etc.), in 1900, there were about 289,000 more farms than in 1870. One of the reasons the business of picked up so much, was because of the glorious invention of the railroad. Farming and ranching grew quickly as emphasis on commercial production and marketing expanded greatly. Wheat, sorghum, rice, hay, and dairy became important as the 19th century was nearing its end, but cotton and livestock were still the dominant in farming and
Click here to unlock this and over one million essays
Show MoreOn June 23, 1845, the Republic of Texas was annexed to the U.S. as a slave state. Foley notes "the annexation of Texas as a slave state…became the great white hope of northern expansionists anxious to emancipate the nation from blacks, who, it was hoped, would find a home among the kindred population of 'colored races' in Mexico."(20) But rather than uniting as kindred races, discord between poor whites, African Americans and Mexicans resulted from competition for farmland as either tenant farmers or sharecroppers.
Alabama: A Documentary History to 1900 states “it is a truism that the Civil War altered the economic life of the south” (Griffith, Alabama: A Documentary History to 1900). Before the Civil War Alabama’s economy many depended on agriculture and a work force of slaves. A new south had been created that brought “free labor and greater diversification” (Griffith, Alabama: A Documentary History to 1900). This is in part due to the boom in the iron industry. Mills and mines had existed before the war, although not as influential as they became after the war. Even though cotton was still the dominant export of Alabama, coal iron and steel were becoming an increasing source of income (Griffith, Alabama: A Documentary History to 1900).
Austin was chosen to be the capital of the Republic of Texas because after the independence of Mexico, Texas became an independent state. During 1839, the Texas Congress was looking for a place to name the capital in honor of Stephen F. Austin. The president Lamar, suggested investigating the site called Waterloo, which had nice hills, big and beautiful surroundings with the companion of waterways. The place was very convenient with its crossroads and route the led to the North of Mexico, Galveston Bay, Red River and Santa Fé.
Secondly, the demand for cotton grew tremendously as cotton became an important raw material for the then developing cotton industries in the North and Britain. The growing of cotton revived the Southern economy and the plantations spread across the south, and by 1850 the southern U.S produced more than 80% of cotton all over the world. As this cotton based economy of the south grew so did the slave labor to work in these large scale plantations since they were more labor-intensive...
By 1875 the need to rewrite the Texas Constitution had become very evident, and a Convention was held to rewrite the Constitution. The constitution written then was the fifth that the state has been ruled under, and is the one still in place today. At that point in Texas history, the state was primarily agricultural,
Several steps preceded Texas Independence. In 1821 the Treaty of Cordoba was signed releasing Mexico from 300 years of Spanish control. Within the same year the first Anglo settlers migrated to Texas under Stephen F. Austin’s leadership. (Winders) The following year Andrew Robinson opened a ferry at the “La Bahia Crossing on the Brazos.”
The Texas Revolution is one of the biggest events that contributed to the founding of this country. Texas’s fight for independence from the Mexican government was very beneficial to the young and growing United States. The effects of this war play a crucial role in how this country came to be
The start of this whole period of time began as the territory of Texas came a float. This area of land rose above sea level calm and flat. “A handful of minor volcanoes spread lava across the landscape, but for the most part the emergence involved little more than a gentle titling of the sea floor, with the northwest rising slightly more than the southwest” (Brands 3). Texas was filled with small rivers unlike most states. Texas started with immigrants mostly from Tennessee.
With the economic system, the south had a very hard time producing their main source “cotton and tobacco”. “Cotton became commercially significant in the 1790’s after the invention of a new cotton gin by Eli Whitney. (PG 314)” Let alone, if they had a hard time producing goods, the gains would be extremely unprofitable. While in the North, “In 1837, John Deere patented a strong, smooth steel plow that sliced through prairie soil so cleanly that farmers called it the “singing plow.” (PG 281).” Deere’s company became the leading source to saving time and energy for farming as it breaks much more ground to plant more crops. As well as mechanical reapers, which then could harvest twelve acres a day can double the corn and wheat. The North was becoming more advanced by the second. Many moved in the cities where they would work in factories, which contributed to the nation’s economic growth because factory workers actually produced twice as much of labor as agricultural workers. Steam engines would be a source of energy and while coal was cutting prices in half actually created more factories, railroads for transportation, and ships which also gave a rise in agricultural productivity.
For more than 100 years, Texas was part of the Spanish Empire in America. When Mexico gained its independence from Spain in 1821, Texas was for a while joined to Mexico. The section from San Antonio southward retains the flavor of the Hispano-Mexican period in its architecture, foods, and festivals.
As the Indians used slash and burn to make room for crops when the Americans came to Alabama they learned this type of agriculture and started growing cotton. This led to several events that dramatically affected Alabama's early agricultural development. The Industrial Revolution in Great Britain created a greedy appetite for cotton fiber, and in 1794 Eli Whitney patented a new type of cotton gin in the United States, which lowered the cost of processing fiber. “By the time Alabama became a state in 1819, the interior of the state was easily accessed via the Tombigbee, Warrior, Alabama, and Chattahoochee rivers. Crops could also be transported to European and New England markets via the ports of Mobile and Apalachicola, Florida. Settlers poured into the new state with one objective to grow cotton. As time passed there was almost four million acres of cotton growing in Alabama” (Mitchell, 2007). As time progressed people thought of a new type of agriculture.
Farmers began to cultivate vast areas of needed crops such as wheat, cotton, and even corn. Document D shows a picture of The Wheat Harvest in 1880, with men on earlier tractors and over 20-30 horses pulling the tractor along the long and wide fields of wheat. As farmers started to accumilate their goods, they needed to be able to transfer the goods across states, maybe from Illinios to Kansas, or Cheyenne to Ohmaha. Some farmers chose to use cattle trails to transport their goods. Document B demonstrates a good mapping of the major railroads in 1870 and 1890. Although cattle trails weren't used in 1890, this document shows the existent of several cattle trails leading into Chyenne, San Antonio, Kansas City and other towns nearby the named ones in 1870. So, farmers began to transport their goods by railroads, which were publically used in Germany by 1550 and migrated to the United States with the help of Colonel John Stevens in 1826. In 1890, railroads expanded not only from California, Nebraska, Utah, Wyoming and Nevada, but up along to Washington, Montana, Michigan, down to New Mexico and Arizona as well. Eastern States such as New Jersey, Tennesse, Virginia and many others were filled with existing railroads prior to 1870, as Colonel John Stevens started out his railroad revolutionzing movement in New Jersey in 1815.
Texas was never a big empty space. The Spaniards and later the French who came here discovered cultures that were centuries old. But history, and the museum itself, begins with European colonization. The history of Texas, one of the signs says, was shaped by the way the different groups of people who came to Texas responded to the land and to each other. So land, and interaction between different groups of people, would be used a lot in the telling of this story of Texas, I assumed.
Transportation was a key factor to the growth of the economy. While farmers were moving westward and gaining more land for crops, they needed to have a way to transport their products back east for sale and distribution. This came in the fashion of canals, then steamboats, then railroads. Canals allowed shipment of goods into the great lakes providing mass amounts of goods to be shipped. Later, steamboats allowed transportation times to decrease. For example, the trip from New Orleans to Louisville took only 8 days by steamboat. While railroads primarily began appearing as connecters to canals, they soon became a preferred method of travel because they were twice as fast as steamboats, had direct routes to destination locations, and could operate all year. These advances in transportation helped pave the way for advances in communication too.
Texas is the second largest and second most populated state in America. On top of that, it is known for the major oil discoveries dating back to the early 1900s – but also the current presence of more Fortune 500 companies than any other state. That makes Texas a leader in energy, electronics, electronics, aerospace, biomedical science as well as agriculture. And yes –