The Growing Colonies

Reasons to Live in the Colonies

• Religious freedom• Healthy living conditions• Land to farm • Room to raise a large family

Subsistence Farming

• Farming in which only enough food to feed one’s family is produced

• Leaves little to sell or trade

Triangular Trade

• A trade route that exchanged goods between the West Indies, the American colonies, and West Africa

Triangular Traded Goods and Destinations

• West Indies to American Colonies: sugar, molasses, slaves

• American Colonies to Britain: sugar, tobacco, cotton, rice, furs, indigo

• Britain to West Africa: iron, cloth, weapons• West Africa to West Indies: slaves, gold and

pepper

African Slaves

• West African kingdoms enslaved the people they defeated in war

• Some were sold to Arab (Middle East) slave traders

• Some were forced to work in gold mines or work on farms

• Some were shipped to America in exchange for goods

Middle Passage

• The inhumane part of the triangular trade route in which slaves from West Africa journeyed across the Atlantic Ocean from the West Coast of Africa to the Caribbean

Cash Crops

• Farm crop raised to be sold for money because it is easy to sell in markets in the colonies and overseas

Diversity

• Variety or difference

Tobacco

• Main cash crop of Maryland and Virginia• Large amounts of tobacco grown eventually

caused the price and profits to lower

Rice

• Main cash crop in South Carolina and Georgia• Price of rice continually grew, making Georgia

and South Carolina the fastest growing economies in the colonies

Tidewater

• A region of flat, low lying plains along the seacoast

• Most large Southern plantations were located in these areas

Southern Plantations

• Controlled the political and economic life of the region

• Self contained communities

Overseer

• Person who supervises a large operation or its workers, such as slaves on a plantation

Backcountry

• A region of hills and forests west of the Tidewater

• Worked mainly by families– Occasionally with one or two slaves

• Outnumbered plantation owners, but had less say in regional economy and politics

Slave Codes

• Strict rules governing the behavior and punishment of enslaved Africans

New England Colonies

• Began with the Plymouth Colony• People came to have a better way of life• Rocky soil and short growing season• Each colony had a governor and assembly• Economy based on fishing, whaling, trading

and various industries• Puritan religion was very important

Middle Colonies

• Began with Dutch settlements• People came to have a better way of life• Each colony had a governor and assembly• Economy based on farming especially grain• Many different religions were important

Southern Colonies

• Began with the Jamestown settlement• People came to have a better way of life• Area became dependent on slave labor• Long growing season and rich soil• Each colony had a governor and assembly• Relied on slave labor and didn’t develop

industry• Religion did not play a big role

Glorious Revolution

• When Parliament replaced the king with his daughter Mary and her husband William

• Known as the Glorious Revolution because it was done without bloodshed

• Led to an English Bill of Rights

English Bill of Rights

• Guaranteed basic rights to citizens• Inspired the American Bill of Rights

Mercantilism

• Theory that a country should sell more goods to other countries than it buys

Export

• To sell goods to foreign markets

Import

• To buy goods from foreign markets

Smuggling

• Trading illegally with other nations

Charter Colony

• A colony established by a group of settlers who had been given a formal document allowing them to settle

Proprietary Colony

• A colony in which the owner owned all the land and controlled the government

Royal Colony

• A colony run by a governor or council appointed by the king or queen

Great Awakening

• Religious revival that swept through the colonies from the 1720’s through the 1740’s

Apprentice

• An assistant who is assigned to learn the trade of a skilled craftsman

Literacy

• The ability to read and write

Harvard

• The first college founded in North America