THE COTTON GIN

Search "cotton gin" on the internet and explore several of the results, taking notes

Then we'll talk...

Some numbers...

The cotton gin was patented in  1794.

U.S. cotton production by year

• 1790 = 1,500,000 lbs.
• 1800 = 35,000,000 lbs.
• 1830 = 331,000,000 lbs.
• 1860 = 2,275,000,000 lbs.

The cotton gin processed
what enslaved people picked.

Some more numbers...

The U.S. quit participating in
the international slave trade in 1808.

• Before 1808, 388,000 Africans transported to U.S.
• In 1808, 3.9 million African-descended slaves in the U.S.
• Between 1787 & 1961, 1 million were relocated from the Upper South to the Deep South, mostly through the domestic slave trade
• Of the 3.2 million enslaved people across 15 slave states in 1850,
  1.8 million worked in cotton

Even more numbers...

$500
avg. price per slave in New Orleans in 1800

$1,800

avg. price per slave in New Orleans in 1850

That's like a price going from
$9,500 to $55,000 today!

What effects did all of this
economic demand have on
the lives of those in bondage?