Part 46 (2/2)

2. Why did the production of cotton so rapidly take the place of flax?

3. How did the people invest nearly all their means?

4. What can you tell of the various cotton factories?

5. Why have not our people entered more largely into this cla.s.s of industry?

6. What better future prosperity is yet to be attained by the State?

7. What other great industry is now considered?

8. What had been the production in North Carolina?

9. What is said of the tobacco peddlers?

10. What sentiment animates the people of North Carolina?

CHAPTER LXXI.

PROGRESS OF MATERIAL DEVELOPMENT.

A. D. 1876 TO 1878.

1876.

In this state of advancement as to her material interests, North Carolina again became excited in 1876 over the choice of new men for Chief-Magistrates, both of the Republic and of the State.

2. After eight years of service as President of the United States, General Grant was retired to private life, and Governor Brogden, who had succeeded Governor Caldwell upon the death of the latter in 1874, was also near the end of his service as Governor of North Carolina. No Gubernatorial election was ever more exciting to the State. It resulted in the choice of ex- Governor Z. B. Vance over Judge Thomas Settle of the Supreme Court.

1877.

3. In the complications which resulted in the seating of Governor Hayes as President of the United States, there was such a change effected that the Federal army was no longer employed to uphold the reconstructed officials in Louisiana and South Carolina, and the people of those States, at last, were left to the management of their own affairs. With this consummation, so long and devoutly wished, came that peace and contentment to all sections which had been unknown since 1861.

4. The enormous increase in the amount and quality of cotton grown in North Carolina since the late war has been dependent upon the use of various fertilizers and other appliances of a better cultivation of the soil. The old habit of educated men, in committing their plantations and slaves to the management of overseers, has been almost wholly abandoned. Many individuals of the largest culture are now devoting their time and skill to the discovery of improved methods in agriculture, and North Carolina is reaping a golden harvest thereby.

1878.

5. No employment, except agriculture, exceeds in importance that of the merchant. North Carolina is shut off from foreign commerce by the sand barriers on the coast, Only at Beaufort, on Old Topsail Inlet, can be found such an entrance to internal waters as promises safety to the mariner who would approach with his deep-laden vessel. But, while this has precluded the possibility of great commercial activity in North Carolina, there has not been a lack of men, at any period of our history, to ill.u.s.trate the dignity and importance of legitimate traffic.

Cornelius Harnett and Joseph Hewes were as conspicuous for financial success as they were for patriotism during the Revolution.

6. With the return of peace to the belligerent States, North Carolina was commercially prostrate. The merchants and the banks were almost all ruined in the general impoverishment of their debtors. The supply of cotton which remained on hand at the cessation of hostilities was about all that had been left, in the general wreck, upon which trade could be again commenced with parties at a distance.

7. Raleigh had never been recognized as a trade centre. A few stores on Fayetteville street, between the State House and where the Federal building now stands, were the representatives of their cla.s.s in the city. Cotton was very little grown in that region of the State, and no market for its sale had even existed nearer than Norfolk and Petersburg.

8. But this state of things was not to continue. Numbers of young men, combining great energy and judgment with small capital, came to the city and began the work of expanding its trade and resources. It has not, like Durham, risen up in a few years from almost nothing, but so great a change has been wrought, that the story of its growth is one of the most striking incidents in the State's history. The extension of the railway lines has opened up new custom in many counties that had never previously dealt with merchants of the place.

<script>