06 - History of the United States, Vol. I by Charles Austin Beard, Mary Ritter Beard

Charles Austin Beard stands as one of the most pivotal American historians of the early 20th century, having penned hundreds of influential monographs, textbooks, and interpretive studies in history and political science. A proud graduate of DePauw University in 1898, he met and later married Mary Ritter Beard, a trailblazer in womens rights and one of the founders of Kappa Alpha Theta. Many of their works were collaborative efforts, reflecting their shared passions for feminism and labor movements, as seen in her notable book, *Woman as a Force in History* (1946). In 1921, the Beards released their groundbreaking *History of the United States*, which was praised for its innovative approach, treating topics thematically rather than chronologically. This method allowed for an exploration of movements, background contexts, and the interconnectedness of social, economic, and political forces. Their goal was to empower students to grasp the essence of American society and its place within global civilization. The books clarity and engaging style have established it as a top-tier resource for both students and the general public.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in
the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
visit LibriVox dot org. History of the United States by
Charles A. Beard and Mary Ridderbeard, Part one, Part five.
Industrial and commercial development. Though the labor of the colonists

(00:24):
was mainly spent in farming, there was a steady growth
in industrial and commercial pursuits. Most of the staple industries
of today, not omitting iron and textiles, have their beginnings
in colonial times. Manufacturing and trade soon gave rise to
towns which enjoyed in importance all out of proportion to
their numbers. The great centers of commerce and finance on

(00:48):
the sea board originated in the days when the King
of England was lord of these dominions. Illustration domestic industry
dipping tallow candles, Textile manufacturing as a domestic industry. Colonial women,
in addition to sharing every hardship of pioneering, often the

(01:09):
heavy labor of the open field, developed in the course
of time a national industry which was almost exclusively their own.
Wool and flax were raised in abundance in the North
and the South. Every farmhouse says comyn the Economic Historian
was a workshop where the women spun and wove the Surges,

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Curseys and Lindsey woolseies, which served for the Common War.
By the close of the seventeenth century, New England manufactured
cloth in sufficient quantities to export it to the southern
colonies and to the West Indies. As the industry developed,
mills were erected for the more difficult process of dyeing,
weaving and fulling, but carding and spinning continued to be

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done in the home. The Dutch of New Netherland, the
Swedes of Delaware, and the Scotch Irish of the interior
not one whit behind their Yankee neighbors. The importance of
this enterprise to British economic life can hardly be overestimated.
For many a century the English had employed their fine

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woolen cloth as the chief staple in a lucrative foreign trade,
and the government had come to look upon it as
an object of special interest and protection. When the colonies
were established, both merchants and statesmen naturally expected to maintain
a monopoly of increasing value. But before long the Americans,
instead of buying cloth, especially of the course of varieties,

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were making it to sell in the place of customers.
Here were rivals in the place of helpless reliance upon
English markets. Here was the germ of economic independence. If
British merchants had not discovered it in the ordinary course
of trade, observant officers in the provinces would have conveyed
the news to them. Even in the early years of

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the eighteenth century, the Royal Governor of New York wrote
of the industrious Americans to his home governs, the consequence
will be that if they can clothe themselves once, not
only comfortably, but handsomely too, without the help of England,
they who already are not fond of submitting to government,
will soon think of putting in execution designs they have

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long harbored in their breasts. This will not seem strange
when you consider what sort of people this country is
inhabited by the iron industry. Almost equally widespread was the
art of iron working, one of the earliest and most
picturesque of colonial industries. Lynn, Massachusetts had a forge and

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skilled artisans within fifteen years after the founding of Boston.
The smelting of iron began at New London and New
Haven about sixteen fifty eight in Lichfield County, Connecticut, a
few years later at Great Barrington, Massachusetts in seventeen thirty one,
and nearby at Lenox some thirty years after that. New
Jersey had iron works at Shrewsbury. Within ten years after

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the founding of the colony in sixteen sixty five, iron
forges appeared in the valleys of the Delaware and the
Susquehanna early in the following century, and iron masters then
laid the foundations of fortunes in a region destined to
become one of the great iron centers of the world.
Virginia began iron working in the year that saw the
introduction of slavery. Although the industry soon elapsed, it was

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renewed and flourished in the eighteenth century. Governor Spotswood was
called the tubal Cane of the Old Dominion because he
placed the industry on a firm foundation. Indeed, it seems
that every colony except Georgia had its iron foundry. Nails, wire,
metallic ware, chains, anchors, bar and pig iron were made
in large quantities, and Great Britain, by an act in

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seventeen fifty, encouraged the colonists to export rough iron to
the British Isles shipbuilding. Of all the specialized industries in
the colonies, shipbuilding was the most important. The abundance of
fur for mass, oak for timbers and boards, pitch for
tar and turpentine, and hemp for rope made the way

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of the shipbuilder easy. Early in the seventeenth century, a
ship was built at New Amsterdam, and by the middle
of that century shipyards were scattered along the New England
coasts at Newburyport, Salem, New Bedford, Newport Providence, New London,
and New Haven. Yards at Albany and Poughkeepsie in New
York built ships for the trade of that colony with

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England and the Indies. Wilmington and Philadelphia soon entered the
race in out distance New York, though unable to equal
the pace set by New England. While Maryland, Virginia and
South Carolina also built ships, Southern interest was mainly confined
to the lucrative business of producing ship materials, fur, cedar,
hemp and tar fishing. The greatest single economic resource of

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New England outside of agriculture, was the fisheries. This industry
started by hardy sailors from Europe long before the landing
of the pilgrims flourished under the indomitable seamanship of the Puritans,
who labored with the net and harpoon in almost every
quarter of the Atlantic. Look exclaimed Edmund Burke in the
House of Commons, at the manner in which the people

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of New England have of late carried on in the
whale fishery. Whilst we follow them among the tumbling mountains
of ice, and behold them penetrating into the deepest frozen
recesses of Hudson's Bay and Davis's Straits. While we are
looking for them beneath the Arctic Circle, we hear that
they have pierced into the opposite region of polar cold.
That they are at the Antipodes and engaged under the

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frozen serpent of the South. Nor is the equinoctial heat
more discouraging to them than the accumulated winner of both poles.
We know that whilst some of them draw the line
and strike the harpoon on the coast of Africa, others
run the longitude and pursue their gigantic game along the
coast to Brazil. No see but what is vexed by

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their fisheries, No climate that is not witness to their toils.
Neither the perseverance of Holland, nor the activity of France,
nor the dexterous and firm sagacity of English enterprise ever
carried this most perilous mode of hard industry to the
extent to which it has been pushed by this recent people.
The influence of the business was widespread. A large and

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lucrative European trade was built upon it. The better quality
of the fish caught for food was sold in the
markets of Spain, Portugal and Italy, or exchanged for salt,
lemons and raisins for the American market. The lower grades
of fish were carried to the West Indies for slave consumption,
and in part traded for sugar and molasses, which furnished

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the raw materials for the thriving rum industry of New England.
These activities in turn stimulated shipbuilding, steadily enlarging the demand
for fishing and merchant craft of every kind, and thus
keeping the shipwrights, calkers, rope makers and other artisans of
the seaport towns rushed with work. They also increased trade
with the mother country. Four out of the cash collected

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in the fish markets of Europe and the West Indies.
The colonists paid for English manufactures, so an ever widening
circle of American enterprise centered around this single industry, the
nursery of seamanship and the maritime spirit, oceanic commerce and
American merchants. All through the eighteenth century, the commerce of

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the American colonies spread in every direction, until it rivaled
in the number of people employed, the capital engaged, and
the profits gleaned the commerce of European nations. A modern
historian has said, the enterprising merchants of New England developed
a network of trade routes that covered well nigh half
the world. This commerce, destined to be of such significance

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in the conflict with the mother country, presented broadly speaking
two aspects. On the one hand, it evolved the export
of raw materials and agricultural produce. The Southern colonies produced
for shipping tobacco, rice, tar, pitch and pine. The Middle
colonies grain, flag, furs, lumber and salt, pork. New England

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fish flour, rum, furs, shoes, and small articles of manufacture.
The variety of products was in fact astounding. A sarcastic writer,
while sneering at the idea of an American union once
remarked of colonial trade, what sort of dish will you make?
New England will throw in fish and onions, the Middle
States flax seed and flour, Maryland and Virginia will add tobacco,

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North Carolina pitch tar and turpentine. South Carolina rice and indigo.
And Georgia will sprinkle the whole composition with sawdust. Such
an absurd jumble will you make if you attempt to
form a union among such discordant materials as the thirteen
British provinces. On the other side, American commerce involved the
import trade, consisting principally of English and Continental manufactures, tea

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and India goods, sugar and molasses brought from the West
Indies supplied the flourishing distilleries of Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut.
The carriage of slag from Africa to the southern colonies
engaged hundreds of New England sailors and thousands of pounds
of her capital. The disposition of imported goods in the colonies,
though in part controlled by English factors located in America,

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employed also a large and important body of American merchants,
like the Willings and Morrises of Philadelphia, the Amories, Hancocks
and Fanuels of Boston, and the Livingstones and Lows of
New York. In their zeal And enterprise, they were worthy
rivals of their English competitors, so celebrated for worldwide commercial operations.

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Though fully aware of the advantages they enjoyed in British
markets and under the protection of the British Navy, the
American merchants were high spirited and meddlesome, ready to contend
with royal officers in order to shield American interests against
outside interference. Illustration the Dutch West India Warehouse in New Amsterdam,
New York City, measured against the immense business of modern times,

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colonial commerce seems perhaps trivial. That, however, is not the
test of its significance. It must be considered in relation
to the growth of English colonial trade in its entirety,
a relation which can be shown by a few startling figures.
The whole export trade of England, including that to the colonies,
was in seventeen o four six million, five hundred nine

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thousand pounds sterling on the eve of the American Revolution. Namely,
in seventeen seventy two, English exports to the American colonies
alone amounted to six million, twenty four thousand pounds sterling,
in other words, almost as much as the whole foreign
business of England two generations before. At the first date,

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colonial trade was but one twelfth of the English export business.
At the second date, it was considerably more than one third.
In seventeen o four, Pennsylvania bought in English markets goods
to the value of eleven thousand, four hundred and fifty
nine pounds sterir. In seventeen seventy two, the purchases of
the same colony amounted to five hundred and seven thousand,

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nine hundred and nine pounds sterling. In short, Pennsylvania imports
increased fifty times within sixty eight years, a mounting in
seventeen seventy two to almost the entire export trade of
England to the colonies of the opening of the century.
The American colonies were indeed a great source of wealth
to English merchants intercolonial commerce. Although the bad roads of

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colonial times made overland transportation difficult and costly, the many
rivers and harbors along the coast favored a lively waterborne
trade among the colonies. The Connecticut Hudson, Delaware and Susquehanna
rivers in the north, and the many smaller rivers in
the south made it possible for goods to be brought
from and carried to the interior regions in little sailing

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vessels with comparative ease. Sloops laden with manufacturers domestic and foreign,
collected at some city like Providence, New York or Philadelphia,
skirted the coasts, visited space small ports, and sailed up
the navigable rivers to trade with local merchants who had
for exchange the raw materials which they had gathered in
from neighbouring farms. Larger ships carried the grain, livestock, cloth,

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and hardware of New England to the southern colonies, where
they were traded for tobacco, leather, tar, and ship timber
from the harbours along the Connecticut shores. There were frequent
sailings down through Long Island Sound in Maryland, Virginia, and
the distant Carolinas. Growth of towns in connection with this
thriving trade and industry there grew up along the coast

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a number of prosperous commercial centers, which were soon reckoned.
Among the first commercial towns of the whole British Empire,
comparing favorably in numbers and wealth with such ports as
Liverpool and Bristol. The statistical records of that time are
mainly guesses, but we know that Philadelphia stood first in
size among these towns, serving as the port of entry

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for Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Western Jersey. It had drawn within
its borders just before Revolution about twenty five thousand inhabitants.
Boston was second in rank, with somewhat more than twenty
thousand people. New York, the commercial capital of Connecticut and
Old East Jersey, was slightly smaller than Boston, but growing

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at a steady rate. The fourth town in size was Charleston,
South Carolina, with about ten thousand inhabitants. Newport in Rhode Island,
a center of rum manufacture and shipping, stood fifth with
a population of about seven thousand. Baltimore and Norfolk were
counted as considerable towns. In the interior. Hartford and Connecticut,

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Lancaster and York and Pennsylvania, and Albany and New York,
with growing populations and increasing trade, gave prophecy of an
urban America away from the sea board. The other towns
were straggling villages. Williamsburg, Virginia, for example, had about two
hundred houses in which dealt a dozen families of the
gentry and a few score of tradesmen. Inland, county seats

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often consisted of nothing more than a log court house,
a prison, and one wretched in to house judges, lawyers
and litigants during the cessions of the court. The leading
towns exercised an influence on colonial opinion all out of
proportion to their population. They were the centers of wealth,
for one thing, of the press and political activity for another.

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Merchants and artisans could readily take concerted action on public
questions arising from their commercial operations. The towns were also
centers for news, gossip, religious controversy, and political discussion. In
the market places, the farmers from the countryside learned of
British policies and laws, and so mingling with the townsmen
were drawn into the main currents of opinion which set

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in toward colonial nationalism and independence. References Jay Bishop, History
of American Manufacturers, two volumes. E. L. Bogert Economic History
of the United States. P. A. Bruce Economic History of Virginia,
two volumes, Ease Simple American history and its geographical conditions. W.

(16:08):
Whedon Economic and Social History of New England two volumes questions.
Number one, is land in your community parceled out into
small farms? Contrast the system in your community with the
feudal system of land tenure. Number two are any things
owned and used in common in your community? Why did

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common tillage fail in colonial times? Number three? Describe the
elements akin to feudalism which were introduced in the colonies.
Number four explain the success of freehold tillage. Number five.
Compare the life of the planner with that of the farmer?
Number six? How far had the Western frontier advanced by
seventeen seventy six? Number seven? What colonial industry was mainly

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developed by women? Why was it very important to both
the Americans and to the English? Number eight? What were
the centers for iron working? Shipbuilding? Number nine explained how
the fisheries affected many branches of trade and industry. Number
ten show how American trade formed a vital part of
English business. Number eleven. How was interstate commerce mainly carried on?

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Number twelve? What were the leading towns did they compare
in importance with British towns? Of the same period. Research
topics Land Tenure Coman Industrial History Revised Edition, pages thirty
two through thirty eight. Special reference Bruce Economic History of Virginia,
Volume one, Chapter eight, Tobacco Planting in Virginia Calendar. Economic

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History of the United States, pages twenty two through twenty eight.
Colonial Agriculture Coman, pages forty eight through sixty three. Calendar
pages sixty nine through seventy four. Reference j. R. H.
Moore Industrial History of the American People, pages one thirty
one through one sixty two. Colonial Manufacturers Commen, pages sixty

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three through seventy three. Calendar pages twenty nine through forty four.
Special reference Wheden Economic and Social History of New England.
Colonial Commerce Coman, pages seventy three through eighty five. Calendar
pages fifty one through sixty three, seventy eight through eighty four,
more pages one sixty three to two. O eight Lodge

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Short History of the English Colonies, pages four oh nine
to four twelve, two, twenty nine to two thirty one,
three twelve to three fourteen. End of section five