Chapter 4 Section 1
Page100
Life in the Colonies
Objectives
• Students will define the
triangular trade and
explain how it affected
American society.
• Understand how the
regions in the colonies
differed from each other.
• Understand why the use
of enslaved workers
increased in the colonies.
Key Terms
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Subsistence farming
Triangular trade
Cash crop
Diversity
Tidewater
Backcountry
Overseer
An American Story
• 1760 Andy Burnaby
didn’t think the
colonies could ever
live in harmony.
I. New England Colonies
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Population in 1700---250,000
Population in 1770---2,500,000
African Americans 28,000---- 500,000
New England towns had a meeting house that faced a
green, piece of land for the cows to graze and the
citizen army to train.
Most people were subsistence farmers, just enough
to feed their family.
Families worked spinning yarn, canning food, milking
cows, building fences, sowing and harvesting grain.
The colonies population grew in great numbers.
Women married young and had 7 plus kids.
Commerce in New England
A. Large towns attracted a lot people.
B. Ship building became an important
industry.
C. They used the timber from the New
England area for ships.
D. Fishing was important.
Colonial Trade
A. Traded along the Atlantic Coast From
Main to the West Indies, to England, and
Africa.
B. Trade included fruit, fur, fish, rice,
tobacco, indigo, molasses, cloth, rum,
iron tools, slaves, weapons, gold,
pepper, store goods.
I.
Triangular Trade
1. Items were shipped from England to
Africa, to the West Indies, to America
which made a triangle shape.
The Middle Passage
A. The inhumane part of the trading was
shipping slaves from Africa.
B. Became known as the Middle Passage.
II.
The Middle Colonies
Monday Sept, 25
The Middle colonies had fertile soil and
milder climate.
New York and Penn. Grew wheat and other
cash crops that went to the shipping ports
in NYC and Philadelphia.
Industries of the Middle Colonies
Some were home-based like carpentry and
flour making.
Some industries were large like the timber
and mining companies and iron with many
workers.
German Immigrants
Germans were successful farmers in Penn.
That lived there in large numbers and
were Protestant. They along with the
Dutch and Swedish population gave the
Colonies Cultural Diversity.
III. The Southern Colonies
A. The soil was rich and suited for large
cash crop farming.
B. They didn’t need the commerce and
industry like the North factories.
Tobacco and Rice
• Cash crops needed labor.
• They first used indentured servants to
work the fields.
• Then they used slaves from Africa.
• The main cash crop in Carolinas was Rice
and the Northern States grew Tobacco.
Tidewater and Backcountry
• Low flat land on the coastal areas that
held the plantation farms. This was called
Tidewater land.
• Plantations were self-contained
communities. The Plantation planter’s wife
cared for the running of the main house
and slaves.
• Backcountry was all the land toward the
Appalachian mountains that the poorer
people live on to farm.
IV. Slavery
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Slave Codes Slaves couldn’t be taught to read.
Couldn’t leave the Plantation.
Punishment minor offenses Whips
Punishment major offenses Burned or Hanging
Family could be split up for sale
• People that didn’t like slavery.
• Mennonites, Quakers, Puritans
Criticism of Slavery
Homework
• Page 106-107 Write a short summary of
slavery section. 40 words Due Monday.
• African Traditions
• Criticism of slavery
Chapter 4 Section 1
Page100
Life in the Colonies