Economics and Slavery in Oldham County
Teacher Background Information Sheet

One of the significant developing differences between the North and South in the years before the Civil War was their economies.  The South was very dependent on cotton.  Cotton, which could be processes in greater quantities after the invention of the cotton gin, depended on slavery.

In the North, where slavery was illegal, workers had to be paid.  Though conditions were often quite poor for the working class in the North, the flourishing factory system held great promise for many: employment, the possibility of advancement, and cheaper goods.

Northerners depended on the federal government to build the infrastructure-such as roads and railroads- necessary for its developing industries.  In a time before income taxes, this infrastructure could be built only with tax money raised largely through tariffs on imported goods the South needed, while the North was developing factories for producing such goods on its own.

By 1860, both the North and the South were moving toward systems of mass production.  In the North, factories were springing up.  In the South, plantations had developed.  In surprising ways, these systems resembled each other in their attempt at mass production.  The similarities helped workers realize the country needed to improve the treatment of its workforce.  The differences must have made Southerners feel it would be quite difficult to abandon a system on which their entire economy depended.

Of course, Oldham County’s economy was more secure than other southern states because it had a wider range of crops that were produced.  After the Civil War, in 1870, the following is listed as annual crop yield for the county from the Statistics of Kentucky record books:
189,800 lbs tobacco
6,000 lbs hemp
2,914 horses
464 mules
3,571 cattle
5,517hogs
12,651 tons of hay
380,520 bushels of corn
37,310 bushels of wheat
1,950 bushels of barley

In 1860, prior to the Civil War, Oldham County the population census count was:  4,815 whites, 37 free colored, 2,431 slaves.
Source: Oldham County History Center