J. Bishop, _History of American Manufactures_ (2 vols.).
E.L. Bogart, _Economic History of the United States_.
P.A. Bruce, _Economic History of Virginia_ (2 vols.).
E. Semple, _American History and Its Geographical Conditions_.
W. Weeden, _Economic and Social History of New England_. (2 vols.).
1. Is land in your community parceled out into small farms? Contrast the system in your community with the feudal system of land tenure.
2. Are any things owned and used in common in your community? Why did common tillage fail in colonial times?
3. Describe the elements akin to feudalism which were introduced in the colonies.
4. Explain the success of freehold tillage.
5. Compare the life of the planter with that of the farmer.
6. How far had the western frontier advanced by 1776?
7. What colonial industry was mainly developed by women? Why was it very important both to the Americans and to the English?
8. What were the centers for iron working? Ship building?
9. Explain how the fisheries affected many branches of trade and industry.
10. Show how American trade formed a vital part of English business.
11. How was interstate commerce mainly carried on?
12. What were the leading towns? Did they compare in importance with British towns of the same period?
=Land Tenure.=--Coman, _Industrial History_ (rev. ed.), pp. 32-38. Special reference: Bruce, _Economic History of Virginia_, Vol. I, Chap. VIII.
=Tobacco Planting in Virginia.=--Callender, _Economic History of the United States_, pp. 22-28.
=Colonial Agriculture.=--Coman, pp. 48-63. Callender, pp. 69-74. Reference: J.R.H. Moore, _Industrial History of the American People_, pp. 131-162.
=Colonial Manufactures.=--Coman, pp. 63-73. Callender, pp. 29-44. Special reference: Weeden, _Economic and Social History of New England_.
=Colonial Commerce.=--Coman, pp. 73-85. Callender, pp. 51-63, 78-84. Moore, pp. 163-208. Lodge, _Short History of the English Colonies_, pp. 409-412, 229-231, 312-314.
Colonial life, crowded as it was with hard and unremitting toil, left scant leisure for the cultivation of the arts and sciences. There was little money in private purses or public treasuries to be dedicated to schools, libraries, and museums. Few there were with time to read long and widely, and fewer still who could devote their lives to things that delight the eye and the mind. And yet, poor and meager as the intellectual life of the colonists may seem by way of comparison, heroic efforts were made in every community to lift the people above the plane of mere existence. After the first clearings were opened in the forests those efforts were redoubled, and with lengthening years told upon the thought and spirit of the land. The appearance, during the struggle with England, of an extraordinary group of leaders familiar with history, political philosophy, and the arts of war, government, and diplomacy itself bore eloquent testimony to the high quality of the American intellect. No one, not even the most critical, can run through the writings of distinguished Americans scattered from Massachusetts to Georgia--the Adamses, Ellsworth, the Morrises, the Livingstons, Hamilton, Franklin, Washington, Madison, Marshall, Henry, the Randolphs, and the Pinckneys--without coming to the conclusion that there was something in American colonial life which fostered minds of depth and power. Women surmounted even greater difficulties than the men in the process of self-education, and their keen interest in public issues is evident in many a record like the _Letters_ of Mrs. John Adams to her husband during the Revolution; the writings of Mrs. Mercy Otis Warren, the sister of James Otis, who measured her pen with the British propagandists; and the patriot newspapers founded and managed by women.