In the early history of the southern United States cotton ruled supreme as the most important single crop in the South's agricultural economy. Even though the South's economy changed through the years and cotton is no longer King, it is still the South's Crown Prince.
Cotton is a soft fiber that is usually spun into thread that is used to make a soft, breathable textile. The plant grows best in tropical and sub-tropical areas, and the southern states of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and Arkansas offered ideal conditions. Cotton is also grown in other countries such as Mexico, Egypt, India, and South America.
Georgia was the first American colony to produce cotton commercially, and it was planted first near Savannah in 1734. This early cotton was a long, strong fiber brought in from the West Indies, and it thrived near the coast with its ample water supply and long growing season. In the 1830's, as settlers moved inward and opened up rich, flat, productive farmland, the production of cotton spread also.
The cotton market grew throughout the 19th century. New England industrialists recognized the potential and began developing textile mills. Cotton growing became immensely profitable for thousands of Southern farmers. Many of these farmers were actually lawyers, doctors, insurance men, and other professionals living in large antebellum mansions in cities, such as Atlanta, Savannah, Birmingham, and Montgomery, while owning large cotton plantations in the country.
After the American Civil War and Reconstruction, economists urged Southern farmers to diversify their crops, but no one would listen. Cotton was too valuable! As a result Georgia's cotton economy peaked just before the onset of World War I. Four years later the good times were over. The South's economy was destroyed-not by a falling stock market or a war, but by a bug. The boll weevil was cotton's greatest enemy, and it reduced Georgia's cotton yields by 29 % from 1918 to 1924. The other cotton-producing states suffered the same fate. Also, worldwide cotton prices began to fall with the increase in synthetic fibers.
In the 21st century, thanks to the eradication of the boll weevil, the increase in mechanization, federal funded programs, and a move to corporate farming, cotton has returned-but not as King. (Hopefully we have learned our lesson never again to base our entire economy on one product.) Our consumption of domestic cotton is increasing along with exports of yarns, denim, and other cotton products.
The Cotton Plant
The entire cotton plant can be used. After harvest the seeds are removed from the fiber; then the seeds are crushed to separate the oil, meal, and hulls. The oil is used in shortening, margarine, cooking oil, and salad dressing. Some parts of the seed are even used as a high-protein concentrate for food products. The meal and hulls are used to make food for livestock, poultry, and fish. The cotton lint, or fiber, is used in textile products, ice cream, paper currency, fishnets, coffee filters, photography papers, and plastics, to name a few. The stalks and leaves are plowed under to enrich the soil.
Georgia ranks third nationally in cotton production and acres planted. Most of Georgia's crop, however, is exported because the variety planted is short fiber. Therefore, it is not as desirable as the longer fiber to American markets.
The Cotton Gin
Eli Whitney once worked on a Georgia plantation as a private tutor, and while he was there he observed the farmers' difficulty in making their cotton crops profitable. In an attempt to aid the farmers with their problem, he designed and created the first cotton gin, a machine that separated the cotton fiber from the seeds. His machine could produce up to 50 lbs. of cleaned cotton per day, thus making southern short fiber cotton a profitable crop.
In more modern times devices have been created and added to the gin for removing trash, drying, moisturizing, fractioning fiber, sorting, cleaning, and baling. By using electric power and air-blast or suction techniques, highly automated gins can produce 15 tons of cleaned cotton an hour.
The Cotton Gin Festival
Every year on the first Saturday of November, you can step through the “archway” (from Star Trek) back into the past. This time travel will take you to Bostwick, Georgia, during the early part of the 20th century. Bostwick, like so many other old southern communities, was once a busy agricultural town with a mercantile business, a hotel, a cotton oil mill, a railroad line, and a bank.
Now this sleepy little village comes alive on the first weekend of every November. The occasion is the Cotton Gin Festival hosted by the “Save the Hotel” Committee. Bostwick has one of the few still-working cotton gins in this part of Georgia, and farmers from all over the area bring their cotton here to be ginned and baled. The Cotton Gin Festival celebrates the continuation of the “old way of life.”
