Page 243 - American Stories, A History of the United States

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9.2

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thE canal BooM Illustration of a lock on the Erie canal at Lockport, New York, 1838. The canal facilitated
trade by linking the Great Lakes regions to the eastern seaports.

late 1830s and early 1840s forced retrenchment. Moreover, railroads were competing for
Quick Check the same traffic, and a new phase in the transportation revolution was beginning. How-
How did water transportation ever, canals, while they failed to turn a profit for most investors, provided a vital service
influence expansion westward?
to those who used them and contributed to the new nation’s economic development.

Emergence of a Market Economy
The desire to reduce the cost and increase the speed of shipping heavy freight over great
distances laid the groundwork for a new economic system. Canals made it less expensive
and more profitable for western farmers to ship wheat and flour to New York and Philadel-
phia and also gave manufacturers in the East ready access to an interior market. Steamboats
reduced shipping costs on the Ohio and Mississippi and put farmers in the enviable posi-
tion of receiving more for their crops and paying less for the goods they needed to import.
Hence improved transport increased farm income and stimulated commercial agriculture.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, the typical farming household consumed
most of what it produced and sold only a small surplus in nearby markets. Most manu-
factured articles were produced at home. Easier and cheaper access to distant markets
decisively changed this pattern. Between 1800 and 1840, agricultural output increased at
an annual rate of approximately 3 percent, and a rapidly growing portion of this produc-
tion consisted of commodities grown for sale rather than for home consumption. The rise
in productivity was partly due to technological advances. Iron or steel plows proved better
than wooden ones; the grain cradle displaced the scythe for harvesting; and better varieties
or strains of crops, grasses, and livestock were introduced. But the availability of good land
and the revolution in marketing were the most important spurs to profitable commercial
farming. Good land made for high yields, at least for a time, and when excessive planting
wore out the soil, a farmer could migrate to more fertile lands farther west. Transportation
facilities made distant markets available and plugged farmers into a commercial network
that provided credit and relieved them of the need to do their own selling.
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