The War between the States stimulated the production of foodstuffs, but from 1865 to 1900 the North Carolina farmer became steadily poorer. Cotton dropped from a dollar a pound in 1865 to 25 cents a pound in 1868. In the next three decades it dropped 12 cents, to 7 cents, and finally, in 1894, it fell below 5 cents a pound.
The farmer, buying at high prices and selling near the level of production, was forced to run on a credit basis. The merchant financed the farmer, taking a lien on the crops. In return for the risk he took, the merchant demanded a price that averaged higher than the cash price, so that the farmer paid as much as 40 percent annual interest and sometimes more. The farmer was consequently driven to plant money crops—cotton and tobacco—at the expense of food crops. He was in the hopeless position of trying to pay for his food and his food supplies out of the proceeds of his money crop.
The rise of farm tenancy, more than any other factor, forced single-crop farming in North Carolina. The War between the States had broken the existing plantations into small farms, and changed the relationship between landowners and laborers. Landowners, deprived of slave labor, had either to rent their land for cash, pay wages, or let the land to tenants on shares.
Since both the landowners and the landless Negroes and whites who furnished the labor had practically no money, sharecropping was the logical development. Under this system the landowner furnished the tenant with team, implements, and seed, and received from the tenant one-half to two-thirds of the staple crops after harvest. He also advanced provisions for the tenant family, and received payment in either cash o crops.
There was opposition to sharecropping at the outset. The Reconstructed Farmer, edited at Tarboro, believed that:
North Carolina farmers were moved by the same desperation that was driving farmers all over the country to organize. Already the Farmers’ Alliance Cooperative Union had swept the Southwest. In North Carolina the Grange had appeared in 1873, attained a membership of about 10,000 in 1875, and then declined.
In 1887 the Farmers’ Alliance was organized in the state under the leadership of Leonidas Polk. A practical farmer himself, Polk had begun publication of the Progressive Farmer at Winston in 1866, and had moved the weekly to Raleigh when he became State Commissioner of Agriculture. The Alliance spread until in 1890 local chapters had been formed in every county but one, and the total membership was more than 90,000.
The Alliance drew the farmers together for education and entertainment. There were discussions of agricultural problems, institutes to spread the knowledge of scientific farming, agricultural clubs, and fairs. The farmers actively supported the reorganization of the State Department of Agriculture, the establishment at Raleigh of the North Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts, and of the State Normal and Industrial College for Women at Greensboro.
Through a state agency set up by the Alliance, farmers were able to purchase directly from the manufacturer implements, fertilizers, and even food supplies at a saving of from 10 to 60 percent. The small capital, which was raised by selling shares to farmers, made long-time credit impossible, and most of the farmers were tied fast by the crop-lien system and could not take advantage of the saving offered them. Merchants fought the inexperienced cooperatives, until the panic of 1893 finally put an end to them.
As conditions grew steadily worse, the farmers organized as the Populist Party. Joining with the Republicans, this party succeeded in bringing about the election of a Fusionist ticket in 1896.
Since 1900 the number of farms in the state has continued to increase, partly as a result of the great improvement in roads, partly because much potential farm land remained unused. One million six hundred thousand people live on North Carolina farms, the second largest farm population of the 48 states. In 1930 there were almost twice as many persons classified as farmers as there were persons classified as urban dwellers, and of the total population 50.5 percent lived on farms. Though the average size of farms is small, the average cash return per farm in 1930 was high—almost a thousand dollars. In the value of farm products the state in 1937 ranked second to Texas among the Southern states, and fifth in the United States.
Agriculture is not limited to any particular section, although the central and southeastern portions, comprising some 22,000 square miles, are particularly favored and contain some of the richest farm land in eastern America.
In the southern part of the coastal plain, diversified farming is increasing. Remarkable success has been achieved by individuals and groups through intensive truck farming and flower growing. Of increasing importance is the strawberry crop, valued at approximately $2 million a year. Large productive farms in the region ship quantities of early truck to outside markets and also produce cotton, corn, tobacco, soybeans, and sweet and Irish potatoes.
Tobacco, cotton, and corn are the chief crops of the state, and tobacco now brings to North Carolina farmers a greater revenue than any other crop. Tobacco is raised in the central Coastal Plain, the Piedmont, along the South Carolina border, and in the mountains, where burley is the variety produced. In 1937 the crop was valued at more than $141 million. In 1919, with cotton at 35 cents a pound, the total crop of the state was valued at $130 million; in 1935, the low price of 11.5 cents per pound, the total crop value was approximately $41 million.
The Sandhill section produces millions of bushels of peaches for northern and eastern markets. Dewberries, grown in great quantities in this section, are noted for their size and flavor.
Farming is more diversified in the Piedmont, where a large urban population in the industrial centers provides a good market. The chief products are grain, fruits, vegetables, tobacco, and cotton. The Piedmont has a high percentage of farm owners and a more balanced farm program, but it, like the Coastal Plain, suffers from a deficiency in livestock and dairy products.
The Mountain Region is an area of diversified farming on a domestic scale. With the exception of potatoes, cabbage, and tobacco, products grown for sale represent only a small part of the total agricultural produce. Tobacco is the only money crop of any importance. Other crops are corn, wheat, a little buckwheat, oats, rye, sorghum, late varieties of Irish potatoes, and hay. Beef cattle and sheep are raised in considerable numbers, and the region is particularly adapted to poultry raising and dairying. Cheese making is an important industry in the northwestern counties. Fertile valleys, especially those in the thermal belt, are particularly suited to fruit growing and truck farming.
Many farm families in the Mountain Region derive an income from the cultivation and gathering of drug plants, especially ginseng and golden seal. There is some income from the sale of ornamental leaves and shrubbery, and a trend toward the cultivation of mountain shrubbery for commercial purposes.
Corn, one of the great crops of North Carolina before the coming of the white man, is produced in every county. In 1935 the value of the crop to the state was a little more than $32 million.
Although North Carolina is still deficient in livestock, in 1935 there were 684,266 head of cattle, an increase of nearly 30 percent over the previous five years. In the same year, 2.5 million pounds of dairy butter, 26 million pounds of farm butter, and 30 million gallons of fluid milk were produced. There were 362,104 horses and mules, 947,143 swine, 8,806,000 chickens, and 90,708 turkeys on North Carolina farms.
Between 1932 and 1935 the gross income of North Carolina farmers rose to slightly over $300 million, more than doubling in three years. These figures indicate, among other things, the increasing interest the farmers are taking in a balanced farm program and the conservation of soil.
One of the most serious economic and social problems with which North Carolina has to deal is farm tenancy. Almost half the farms in the state are operated by tenants who have little chance for farm ownership. Most of these tenants live on the Coastal Plain, where the large cotton and tobacco crops are produced. They frequently move from farm to farm, and are drawn to the factories by the promise of ready money.
Extensive programs in reclamation, conservation, and rehabilitation are being carried on in North Carolina by State and Federal agencies. Experimental farms and nurseries are conducted by the State in the Coastal, Piedmont, and Mountain sections and many of the counties maintain farm agents and home demonstration agents. The State College Extension Service is conducting a program to encourage balanced farming, increased livestock production, and more scientific utilization of the land. The first 4-H club was organized in 1909 in Hertford County. There are now (1939) 1,500 such clubs in the state with a total membership of 43,000.
The Farm Security Administration of the U.S. Department of Agriculture has organized subsistence homestead projects at Scuppernong Farms, on the border of Lake Phelps in Tyrrell and Washington Counties, and at Penderlea, in Pender County. Projects for demonstration in soil conservation, especially erosion control, were established in numerous sections of the state by Federal Government agencies during the 1930s.
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