Description
Book SynopsisHow did Bright Flue-Cured Tobacco come to dominate the industry?In her sweeping history of the American tobacco industry, Barbara Hahn traces the emergence of the tobacco plant's many varietal types, arguing that they are products not of nature but of economic relations and continued and intense market regulation. Hahn focuses her study on the most popular of these varieties, Bright Flue-Cured Tobacco. First grown in the inland Piedmont along the VirginiaNorth Carolina border, Bright Tobacco now grows all over the world, primarily because of its uniqueand easily replicatedcultivation and curing methods. Hahn traces the evolution of technologies in a variety of regulatory and cultural environments to reconstruct how Bright Tobacco became, and remains to this day, a leading commodity in the global tobacco industry. This study asks not what effect tobacco had on the world market, but how that market shaped tobacco into types that served specific purposes and became distinguishable from on
Trade ReviewA discerning analysis of not only how a commodity—tobacco—was shaped and defined by technology, but also how technology can be influenced by a commodity . . . This interesting, thorough history will appeal to readers and researchers alike. Highly recommended.
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ChoiceThoroughly researched, engaging, and enjoyable . . . An excellent first book.
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Environmental HistoryStrongly argued and deeply researched.
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Agricultural HistoryHahn has produced an important book, thoroughly researched and persuasively argued, that deserves a wide audience among American historians.
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Journal of American HistoryHahn has written an ambitious book that examines how Americans created a commodity whose roots were densely—perhaps inextricably—tangled with those of the growing nation. Her work deserves a broad readership among students of southern agriculture, economic history, and the history of science and technology.
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Journal of Southern HistoryAn impressive book, one that rewrites conventional understandings of tobacco as a crop, a commodity, and a symbol. From Jamestown to contemporary southern fields, Hahn tells an old story in an entirely fresh way.
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Technology and CultureTable of ContentsAcknowledgments
Introduction
Prologue
Part I
1. Making Tobacco Virginian
2. Growing the Business
3. Death and Taxes
Part II
4. Ripeness Is All
5. Inventing Tradition
6. Stabilization
Appendix
Notes
Essay on Sources
Index
