Cotton factor
 Cotton factors and others go about their business inA Cotton Office in New Orleansby French painterEdgar Degas,1873 | |
| Occupation | |
|---|---|
Occupation type | Employment |
Activity sectors | Agribusiness |
| Description | |
Related jobs | Factor |
In theantebellumandReconstruction eraSouth,mostcottonplantersrelied oncotton factors(also known ascotton brokers) to sell their crops for them.
Description
[edit]The cotton factor was usually located in an urban center of commerce, such asCharleston,Mobile,New Orleans,orSavannah(harborcities; there was not yet a network ofrailroads), where they could most efficiently tend to business matters for their rural clients. Prior to theAmerican Civil War,the states ofAlabama,Georgia,Louisiana,andMississippiwere producing more than half of the world's cotton, butArkansas,Tennessee,andTexasproduced large amounts also.[1]At the same time, theportof New Orleans exported the most cotton, followed by the port of Mobile.[2]Cotton factors also frequently purchased goods for their clients, and even handled shipment of those goods to the clients, among other services.
As one source notes,
The factor was a versatile man of business in an agrarian society who performed many different services for the planter in addition to selling his crops. He purchased or soldslavesfor his client, arranged for the hiring of slaves or the placing of the planter's children in distant schools, gave advice concerning the condition of the market or the advisability of selling or withholding his crop, and bought for his client a large proportion of theplantationsupplies.[3]
Not all factors in the antebellum and Reconstruction era South were cotton factors; some were factors of othercommodities.In 1858, for example, New Orleans boasted 63sugarandmolassesfactors.Louisianaproduced large amounts ofsugar cane,but it probably had an even greater number of cotton factors.[4]
References
[edit]- ^Knut Oyangen."American Agricultural History Primer: The Cotton Economy Of The Old South".Center for Agricultural History and Rural Studies.Iowa State University. Archived fromthe originalon 25 November 2012.Retrieved16 January2011.
- ^"Mobile as a Cotton City 1820-1860".Alabama Moments in American History.Alabama Department of Archives and History. Archived fromthe originalon 28 September 2011.Retrieved16 January2011.
- ^Clement Eaton,A History of the Old South(Prospect Heights, Ill.: Waveland Press, 1975), p. 230.
- ^Clement Eaton,The Mind of the Old South(Baton Rouge, La.: Louisiana State University Press, 1964), pp. 46-47.
