The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry

The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry PDF Author: Richard R. Beeman
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 081220087X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Get Book

Book Description
The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry is the story of an expanding frontier. Richard Beeman offers a lively and well-written account of the creation of bonds of community among the farmers who settled Lunenburg Country, far to the south and west of Virginia's center of political and economic activity. Beeman's view of the nature of community provides an important dynamic model of the transmission of culture from older, more settled regions of Virginia to the southern frontier. He describes how the southern frontier was influenced by those staples of American historical development: opportunity, mobility, democracy, and ethnic pluralism; and he shows how the county evolved socially, culturally, and economically to become distinctly southern.

The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry

The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry PDF Author: Richard R. Beeman
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 081220087X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Get Book

Book Description
The Evolution of the Southern Backcountry is the story of an expanding frontier. Richard Beeman offers a lively and well-written account of the creation of bonds of community among the farmers who settled Lunenburg Country, far to the south and west of Virginia's center of political and economic activity. Beeman's view of the nature of community provides an important dynamic model of the transmission of culture from older, more settled regions of Virginia to the southern frontier. He describes how the southern frontier was influenced by those staples of American historical development: opportunity, mobility, democracy, and ethnic pluralism; and he shows how the county evolved socially, culturally, and economically to become distinctly southern.

The Southern Colonial Backcountry

The Southern Colonial Backcountry PDF Author: David Colin Crass
Publisher: Univ. of Tennessee Press
ISBN: 9781572330191
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 292

Get Book

Book Description
This book brings a variety of fresh perspectives to bear on the diverse people and settlements of the eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century southern backcountry. Reflecting the growth of interdisciplinary studies in addressing the backcountry, the volume specifically points to the use of history, archaeology, geography, and material culture studies in examining communities on the southern frontier. Through a series of case studies and overviews, the contributors use cross-disciplinary analysis to look at community formation and maintenance in the backcountry areas of Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee. These essays demonstrate how various combinations of research strategies, conceptual frameworks, and data can afford a new look at a geographical area and its settlement. The contributors offer views on the evolution of backcountry communities by addressing such topics as migration, kinship, public institutions, transportation and communications networks, land markets and real estate claims, and the role of agricultural development in the emergence of a regional economy. In their discussions of individuals in the backcountry, they also explore the multiracial and multiethnic character of southern frontier society. Yielding new insights unlikely to emerge under a single disciplinary analysis, The Southern Colonial Backcountry is a unique volume that highlights the need for interdisciplinary approaches to the backcountry while identifying common research problems in the field. The Editors: David Colin Crass is the archaeological services unit manager at the Historic Preservation Division, Georgia Department of Natural Resources. Steven D. Smith is the head of the Cultural Resources Consulting Division of the South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Antrhopology. Martha A. Zierden is curator of historical archaeology at The Charleston Museum. Richard D. Brooks is the administrative manager of the Savannah River Archeological Research Program, South Carolina Institute of Archaeology and Antrhopology. The Contributors: Monica L. Beck, Edward Cashin, Charles H. Faulkner, Elizabeth Arnett Fields, Warren R. Hofstra, David C. Hsiung, Kenneth E. Lewis, Donald W. Linebaugh, Turk McCleskey, Robert D. Mitchell, Michael J. Puglisi, Daniel B. Thorp.

Artisans in the North Carolina Backcountry

Artisans in the North Carolina Backcountry PDF Author: Johanna Miller Lewis
Publisher: University Press of Kentucky
ISBN: 0813161614
Category : Art
Languages : en
Pages : 224

Get Book

Book Description
During the quarter of a century before the thirteen colonies became a nation, the northwest quadrant of North Carolina had just begun to attract permanent settlers. This seemingly primitive area may not appear to be a likely source for attractive pottery and ornate silverware and furniture, much less for an audience to appreciate these refinements. Yet such crafts were not confined to urban centers, and artisans, like other colonists, were striving to create better lives for themselves as well as to practice their trades. As Johanna Miller Lewis shows in this pivotal study of colonial history and material culture, the growing population of Rowan County required not only blacksmiths, saddlers, and tanners but also a great variety of skilled craftsmen to help raise the standard of living. Rowan County's rapid expansion was in part the result of the planned settlements of the Moravian Church. Because the Moravians maintained careful records, historians have previously credited church artisans with greater skill and more economic awareness than non-church craftsmen. Through meticulous attention to court and private records, deeds, wills, and other sources, Lewis reveals the Moravian failure to keep up with the pace of development occurring elsewhere in the county. Challenging the traditional belief that southern backcountry life was primitive, Lewis shows that many artisans held public office and wielded power in the public sphere. She also examines women weavers and spinsters as an integral part of the population. All artisans -- Moravian and non-Moravian, male and female -- helped the local market economy expand to include coastal and trans-Atlantic trade. Lewis's book contributes meaningfully to the debate over self-sufficiency and capitalism in rural America.

At the Edge of Empire

At the Edge of Empire PDF Author: Eric Hinderaker
Publisher: JHU Press
ISBN: 9780801871375
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 226

Get Book

Book Description
During the 17th century, the Western border region of North America which existed just beyond the British imperial reach became an area of opportunity, intrigue and conflict for the diverse peoples - Europeans and Indians alike - who lived there. This book examines the complex society there.

Evangelizing the South

Evangelizing the South PDF Author: Monica Najar
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0195309006
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 265

Get Book

Book Description
Although many refer to the American South as the 'Bible Belt', the region was not always characterized by a powerful religious culture. In the 17th & early 18th centuries, religion was virtually absent from southern culture. The late 18th & early 19th centuries, however, witnessed an astonishing change.

The Frontier in the Colonial South

The Frontier in the Colonial South PDF Author: George L. Johnson
Publisher: Praeger
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 250

Get Book

Book Description
Using the New Social History method and examining nearly every document produced over the years covered, this study examines the growth of communities in the Upper Pee Dee region of the South Carolina backcountry in the 18th century. The study considers the emergence of a landed elite, slavery, and a mobile population, plus the disestablishment of the Anglican Church. Inhabitants of the Cheraws District had access to a river that flowed to the coast, allowing them to transport their agricultural produce to the market at Georgetown. This ease of transportation enabled the district to become more developed than other regions of the South Carolina backcountry. In the 1770s, local inhabitants built a courthouse and a jail, and members of the rising planter class formed St. David's Society to educate parish youth. Records from two of the oldest Baptist churches in the South provide clues to communal cohesion and ethnicity. These accounts, combined with land and probate records, provide information concerning settlement, wealth, and slaveholding patterns in the region.

From Empire to Revolution

From Empire to Revolution PDF Author: Greg Brooking
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820365955
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 448

Get Book

Book Description
From Empire to Revolution is the first biography devoted to an in-depth examination of the life and conflicted career of Sir James Wright (1716–1785). Greg Brooking uses Wright’s life as a means to better understand the complex struggle for power in both colonial Georgia and the larger British Empire. James Wright lived a transatlantic life, taking advantage of every imperial opportunity afforded him. He earned numerous important government posts and amassed an incredible fortune, totaling over £100,000 sterling. An England-born grandson of Sir Robert Wright, James Wright was raised in Charleston, South Carolina, following his father’s appointment as the chief justice of that colony. Young James served South Carolina in a number of capacities, public and ecclesiastical, prior to his admittance to London’s famed Gray’s Inn to study law. Most notably, he was appointed South Carolina’s attorney general and colonial agent to London prior to becoming the governor of Georgia in 1761. Wright’s long imperial career delicately balanced dual loyalties to Crown and colony and offers a new perspective on loyalism and the American Revolution. Through this lens, Greg Brooking connects several important contexts in recent early American and British scholarship, including imperial and Atlantic history, Indigenous borderlands, race and slavery, and popular politics.

The Varieties of Political Experience in Eighteenth-Century America

The Varieties of Political Experience in Eighteenth-Century America PDF Author: Richard R. Beeman
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 0812201213
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 377

Get Book

Book Description
On the eve of the American Revolution there existed throughout the British-American colonial world a variety of contradictory expectations about the political process. Not only was there disagreement over the responsibilities of voters and candidates, confusion extended beyond elections to the relationship between elected officials and the populations they served. So varied were people's expectations that it is impossible to talk about a single American political culture in this period. In The Varieties of Political Experience in Eighteenth-Century America, Richard R. Beeman offers an ambitious overview of political life in pre-Revolutionary America. Ranging from Virginia, Massachusetts, New York, South Carolina, and Pennsylvania to the backcountry regions of the South, the Mid-Atlantic, and northern New England, Beeman uncovers an extraordinary diversity of political belief and practice. In so doing, he closes the gap between eighteenth-century political rhetoric and reality. Political life in eighteenth-century America, Beeman demonstrates, was diffuse and fragmented, with America's British subjects and their leaders often speaking different political dialects altogether. Although the majority of people living in America before the Revolution would not have used the term "democracy," important changes were underway that made it increasingly difficult for political leaders to ignore "popular pressures." As the author shows in a final chapter on the Revolution, those popular pressures, once unleashed, were difficult to contain and drove the colonies slowly and unevenly toward a democratic form of government. Synthesizing a wide range of primary and secondary sources, Beeman offers a coherent account of the way politics actually worked in this formative time for American political culture.

Carry Me Back

Carry Me Back PDF Author: Steven Deyle
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190294965
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 416

Get Book

Book Description
Originating with the birth of the nation itself, in many respects, the story of the domestic slave trade is also the story of the early United States. While an external traffic in slaves had always been present, following the American Revolution this was replaced by a far more vibrant internal trade. Most importantly, an interregional commerce in slaves developed that turned human property into one of the most valuable forms of investment in the country, second only to land. In fact, this form of property became so valuable that when threatened with its ultimate extinction in 1860, southern slave owners believed they had little alternative but to leave the Union. Therefore, while the interregional trade produced great wealth for many people, and the nation, it also helped to tear the country apart. The domestic slave trade likewise played a fundamental role in antebellum American society. Led by professional traders, who greatly resembled northern entrepreneurs, this traffic was a central component in the market revolution of the early nineteenth century. In addition, the development of an extensive local trade meant that the domestic trade, in all its configurations, was a prominent feature in southern life. Yet, this indispensable part of the slave system also raised many troubling questions. For those outside the South, it affected their impression of both the region and the new nation. For slaveholders, it proved to be the most difficult part of their institution to defend. And for those who found themselves commodities in this trade, it was something that needed to be resisted at all costs. Carry Me Back restores the domestic slave trade to the prominent place that it deserves in early American history, exposing the many complexities of southern slavery and antebellum American life.

Citizens of Zion

Citizens of Zion PDF Author: Ellen Eslinger
Publisher: Univ. of Tennessee Press
ISBN: 9781572332560
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 332

Get Book

Book Description
One of America's most enduring forms of public worship, the camp meeting had its beginnings at the dawn of the nineteenth century during the "Great Revival" that swept the newly settled regions of the young republic. The culmination of this phenonenon came in 1801 at Cane Ridge Presbyterian meetinghouse in Kentucky, where more than ten thousand people gathered for a week of worship and fellowship.