From Crops to Cloth: Industries That Made a Nation

At The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, home to the world’s largest U.S. history museum, tradespeople practice over 20 historic trades, working with the tools and methods of the 18th century. Studying these trades expands our understanding of 18th-century life in Williamsburg, Virginia's colonial capital.

For example, the historic farming trade grows 18th-century crops, like tobacco and flax. The spinning, weaving, and dyeing trade makes and dyes textiles. What connects the history of these seemingly unrelated trades, and what can they teach us about the American Revolution?

Under Britain’s economic system, colonies were expected to provide raw materials in exchange for manufactured goods. The mid-18th century saw a "consumer revolution," during which even the “middling sorts” could afford luxury imported goods. Textiles accounted for over half of all imports.

Virginia’s main export, and the source of its great wealth, was tobacco. Introduced to Europe by the Spanish centuries earlier, Virginians began growing it in the early 17th century and turned it into a cash crop.

Growing tobacco was one of the most laborious jobs in the colonies. The average adult (between ages 18 and 45) could grow between 8,000 and 10,000 plants a year. Getting the best possible product required constant work, including inspecting the plants for disease and pests.

In the 18th century, this work was mostly performed by enslaved people. Colonists had initially relied on white indentured servants, who labored for a set period of time to grow tobacco. By the early 18th century, enslaved Africans and African Americans, kept in lifelong bondage, were becoming the primary labor source in the colony.

The process went beyond growing the plant. Once the leaves matured, the plant was cut and left to wilt in the fields before going to a tobacco house to cure. Once curing began, tobacco had to be handled when the air was humid. The leaves became brittle and could crumble if it was too dry.

The final step was the “prizing.” This process required a massive press to compress as much tobacco into a single hogshead barrel as possible. This multi-week process allowed planters to fit up to 1,200 pounds of tobacco into a single barrel.

Once the physical labor was complete, the time came for the tobacco to be shipped overseas for sale. After being brought to a warehouse, the tobacco was checked for quality before being loaded onto a ship and sent to England, where it was processed and sold across the globe.

As proof they made good quality tobacco, a planter would be issued a tobacco note. Since coins and paper money were rare in the colonies, this note could be sold to a merchant to open a line of credit with them. This credit could buy daily needs and luxuries alike, such as...

...tobacco! While grown plentifully in Virginia, it was illegal to process it in the colonies and was first sent abroad. While smoking and chewing were both prevalent, colonists also used a now uncommon product called snuff. This fine powder was snorted up the nose and carried in a pouch or box.

The thirteen colonies relied heavily on textile imports from Britain, where specialization and a deeper labor pool made production much cheaper. Millions of yards of textiles crossed the Atlantic annually, making it one of colonial America's biggest imports.

As conflict between Britain and its North American colonists grew, what colonists purchased, or abstained from purchasing, from Britain began to signal not just their wealth and fashion sense, but their politics as well.

Producing more goods in the colonies became a form of political protest against Britain. Some Virginians proved their patriotism by importing wool-producing sheep, which had been made illegal in 1699 to protect Britain's textile industry.

Colonists quickly discovered just how much labor went into producing the everyday goods they imported from Britain. Domestic production was expensive and labor intensive. Flax, shown being prepared here, goes through countless processing hours just to be turned into usable fiber.

America still relied on British imports during the Revolution, but every bit of production bolstered the war effort. Domestic production, from Williamsburg to the plantations, by revolutionaries or enslaved people, helped realize independence.