Wheat and Corn Production in Dollars

Slaveholders outperformed nonslaveholders in the value of corn and wheat production in Augusta, even though they did not necessarily monopolize the best soil. On the best soil Franklin wheat farmers outproduced their counterparts in Augusta, but on lesser soils Augusta's wheat farmers were just as productive. In corn production Augusta farmers were more productive across the range of soil types.

In Augusta the farms in the highest quintile of farm value produced a crop value twice that of the next lowest quintile in both wheat and corn production. This leap was not evident at any other farm value in Augusta or Franklin.

The data are based on the GIS of Augusta and Franklin households--maps are derived from a D. H. Davison map of Franklin County, published in 1858, and a Jedediah Hotchkiss map of Augusta County, published in 1870, and based on surveys completed "during the war." The maps have been georeferenced at the Virginia Center for Digital History, using ESRI Arc Info to produce a Geographic Information Systems map and database of households based on U.S. census data from the population, agricultural, and slaveowners' schedules.

Edward L. Ayers and William G. Thomas, III
Wheat and Corn Production in Dollars
2001.

"On a per capita basis, Franklin farmers grew far less corn and more wheat than their counterparts in Augusta, and their commitment to wheat was seen by many as both the symbol of the North's wealth and the evidence of its superior labor system."

"The richest farm households in Augusta, however, had a high correlation with relatively high wheat production and low corn production, and slavery enabled even greater success on these farms."

"The visible differences that slavery made in the arrangement of the landscape were apparent to many observers, but Northerners and Southerners interpreted them differently. Northerners focused on land value per acre and Southerners on the dollar value of their crops."