Well hey there and welcome back to Heimler’s
History. We’ve been going through Unit 4 of the AP U.S. history curriculum and in this
video and the next we’re fixing to talk about the Market Revolution. Mmm, so tasty. So
if you’re ready, I’m ready, let’s get to it. So like I said, we’re going to cover the
Market Revolution in two videos. In this one we’re going to focus on the changes in
technology, agriculture, and commerce during the first half of the 19th century. In the next
video we’ll consider how it changed society. So let’s begin with a definition. What
is the Market Revolution? Essentially, it was the linking of northern industries
with western and southern farms which was created by advances in agriculture, industry,
and transportation. And what you really need to take from that definition is that this
revolution coordinated industry in the United States. All the different regional sectors of
the economy really knitted themselves together into a singular economic entity. And this
was a seriously big deal because it marked America’s transition from mainly an agrarian
society into a firmly capitalist society. Now, as I said this all occurred because of
innovations in transportation, industry, and agriculture, and I’m in the mood to look at each
of those in turn. So let’s start with innovations in transportation. Now if the whole dang nation
was going to be relying on each of its parts to manufacture goods for sale, that meant there had
to be reliable and efficient means to transport raw materials and goods for sale. This problem was
first solved by the construction of the National Road, otherwise known as the Cumberland Road. It
connected Maryland on the east coast to Illinois in the heartland, stretching for a thousand miles,
all paved. Now that doesn’t sound like a big deal to us who are used to traveling on interstate
highways as the regular, but in those days it was a huge deal because states often rejected
the idea of being responsible for a federal road that passed beyond their borders, very few of
those proposed, actually made it into reality. Also important in the transportation category was
the building of canals. Canals, in case you don’t know, are basically human constructed rivers.
Because sometimes a river just doesn’t go where you need it to go in order to trade and get that
boom boom. The most significant of these canals was the Erie Canal constructed in New York
in 1825. This canal lined western farms with Eastern manufacturing and created the occasion for
a flurry of canal building throughout the states. Now if you’re going to be shipping
goods and raw materials on water, then you need a reliable vehicle.
Enter the steamboat. Previously, if you wanted to ship manufactured goods down
a river then it was basically a one way trip, and that trip was dictated by the direction
of the current. But with the advent of steam power in boats, goods could be delivered down
stream, raw materials could then be loaded on it, and it could power its way right back upstream.
And this increased efficiency of trade immensely. And finally, maybe the most significant
innovation in transportation technology was the railroad. By the 1820s to 1830s
railroads had largely replaced canals as the main technology linking regions for trade and
manufacture. And from there they expanded like mad. And local and state governments helped
this expansion by granting special loans and tax breaks to railroad companies, and in
some cases, they granted them land as well. So that’s how all the regions of the nation got
linked together through transportation, now let’s turn the corner and talk about innovations in
industrial technology. New patent laws that protected the rights to people’s inventions made
the environment ripe for new technology. One of the most significant of these innovators was Eli
Whitney whose new technology of interchangeable parts revolutionized the industrial sector. He
first applied this technology to the manufacture of guns. Now think about this for a second. Prior
to interchangeable parts, if you wanted a gun, or dang near anything manufactured for that
matter, then an artisan would make the whole item from beginning to end. It was a long process
that required skilled labor, and if your trigger got messed up, well, you had to get a whole new
gun. But Whitney figured out that if you machined each piece of a weapon with precision and in bulk,
then you could assemble all the pieces, and if any of the pieces failed, you could just change it out
with another that fit the exact specifications. When this innovation was applied to industry,
it took off. In the 1820s the factory system was born in America. The revolution here
was related to interchangeable parts. Factories could mass produce the discreet
parts of any given item with precision and then workers could assemble them to be shipped
to regional and more distant markets. Now, all of the sudden, manufactured goods could
be mass-produced by unskilled laborers, and Americans were flooded with crap to buy that
they never even knew they wanted. Thanks America. Another significant innovation in
the Market Revolution happened in the agricultural industry (innovation). Now the
first innovation I’ll mention could belong in the previous category of industry, but it was
a major player for agriculture as well. Prior to his work in interchangeable parts, Eli
Whitney had invented the cotton gin which significantly sped up the process of separating
cotton seeds from cotton fibers which was then thrown into a spinning machine which turned
raw cotton into yarn. And these inventions transformed southern agriculture which could ship
way more cotton than was previously possible. Also on the agriculture front a significant
change was occurring. In the early 1800s and for generations before it, subsistence farming
was the main goal of agriculture. This just meant that people farmed in order to feed themselves
and maybe have a little extra to sell locally. But in our time period commercial farming rapidly
began to replace subsistence farming as the norm. This kind of farming focused on growing cash crops
like cotton or tobacco. These crops weren’t grown for a family’s survival, because you can’t
exactly eat cotton or tobacco. These crops were grown exclusively to be traded at local
and at this point increasing distant markets. And maybe cotton was the most important,
especially for Southern farmers. And because southern cotton was in high
demand from British textile factories, this new boom in cash crops began
linking not only American farms to American industry, but also American
farms to international industry. So the thing you really need to take
away from all of this is as follows. Because of the increasing innovation in
technology, transportation, and industry, the different regions of America were growing
increasingly interconnected economically, AND increasing economic ties
internationally. That’s it. Okay don’t click away just yet. If you
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