Ecological Transformation
of the South
Earth, Wind, and Fire
The Southern ecosystem
European impressions: “Eden”
The Southern ecosystem
¡ Old
soils
The Southern ecosystem
¡ Warm,
moist climate
The Southern ecosystem
¡ Great
biodiversity
The Southern ecosystem
¡ Rich
bottomland soils
The Southern ecosystem
¡ Upland
soils quickly exhausted
The Southern ecosystem
¡ Perfect
climate for disease, especially African
¡
Malaria
¡
Yellow fever
¡
Hookworm
Virginia Company, 1607
¡ Business
venture
¡ Climate
confusion
¡ Hybridization
of tobacco
Southern farms and
plantations
¡ Tobacco
& corn
¡ Pigs
and cattle
¡ Clear,
plant, exhaust, abandon
¡ Shallow
plowing + heavy rains = erosion
South Carolina: Rice colony
¡ Conversion
of marshlands into rice fields
¡ Mosquito
problem
¡
Malaria and yellow fever
¡ Effect
on labor supply
¡
Importation of Africans
¡
Black majority in South Carolina
¡ Separation
of the races
¡
Whites in uplands or summer in Charleston
The “Cotton Rush,” 1815-1840
¡ Driven
by industrialization & invention
¡
Rise of textile mills
¡
Cotton gin
¡ Late
removal of Indians
¡ Plantations
on rich lands
¡ Exhaust
land, move west
¡ Eastern
states’ poor condition
The Land of Cotton
Reforming Southern
agriculture
¡ Mainly
prominent planters
¡
Thomas Jefferson: scientific soil conservation
¡
Edmund Ruffin: soil & slavery
¡
Guano craze, 1850s
¡ Failure
of reform
¡
Continuous opening up of new, rich, cheap land
¡
Profit concerns: labor spent on conservation taken away from
cotton
¡ Plantations:
America’s first agribusiness
Post-slavery
¡ Breakup of the
plantation complex
¡ Tenantry and
sharecropping
Aftermath
¡ Overproduction
and poverty
¡ Boll
weevil dethrones King Cotton at last in 20th century
Widespread erosion by 20th
century
Roots of Southern
Environmental Indifference
¡ Society
based on commodity agriculture
¡
Scattered, rural population, without a civic culture
¡
Wealth based on exploitation of land and labor
¡
Individualistic and competitive
¡
Frontier conditions slow to disappear: Violence, illiteracy
¡ Slaveowners
wanted no government interference and low taxes
¡
Goal: Protect power and profits
¡
Dominate government, churches, institutions to protect their
interests
Environmental legacies
¡ Clearcutting
hardwood, longleaf pine, cypress
Environmental legacies
¡ Oil
and gas damage to land, coastline, Gulf of Mexico
Environmental legacies
¡ Urban
sprawl and loose zoning laws
Environmental legacies
¡ Louisiana’s
“Chemical Corridor” (a.k.a. “Cancer Alley”)
Environmental legacies
¡ Development
in the South of Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations
¡
Feedlots for cattle; huge hog farms; chicken and turkey
¡
Animal misery
¡
The problem of antibiotics
¡
Environmental issue: massive amounts of animal waste
Environmental legacies
¡ Mountaintop
removal
Environmental legacies
¡ Weak
environmental movement
¡ Weak
environmental regulations
Small government, low taxes
¡ Greatest
gap between rich and poor
¡ Conservative
and least innovative
¡ Most
violent
¡ Worst
human rights record
¡ Least
education (and most illiteracy)
¡ Weak
social services
¡ Fewest
public amenities
¡
Parks, libraries, etc.