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[photo]
Danville Tobacco Warehouses
Photo courtesy of Virginia Main Street Program

Agriculture has played a dominant role in the Commonwealth of Virginia's development since the establishment of the first permanent English settlement at Jamestown in 1607. John Rolfe, a 17th-century colonist and husband of Pocahontas, introduced tobacco to England via the Virginia Colony in 1614. Thereafter, tobacco was king in the Tidewater area colony throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. Colonists only grew corn and wheat for use by their families. Other crops were grown, but mostly for individual consumption. As Virginia's Piedmont became more populated during the 19th century, the area became a major tobacco producer. Lynchburg, Blackstone, and Danville were tobacco centers, with Lynchburg being one of the largest in the world in the early 19th century.

[photo] An example of an early plantation gristmill is George Washington's grist mill for his Mt. Vernon plantation
Photo courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Historic American Buildings Survey, HABS,VA,30-_,5-

The Jamestown colonists introduced both wind-powered gristmills and water-powered gristmills to their settlement in the Virginia colony. These mills were necessary to grind grain into grist or meal. The meal could then be sifted into flour necessary for making bread. The early gristmills in Virginia are documented as having been built on plantations by wealthy colonial officials or by a group of neighboring estate owners. They were of two types: "plantation gristmills" for grinding the grain of the landowner (and mill owner) and that of a few neighbors, and "custom gristmills" which ground the grain for neighboring planters. A third type, "merchant mill," was a commercial mill which bought and ground grain into a grist or meal which was then sifted into flour for export.

It was not until the third quarter of the 18th century that merchant milling blossomed in Virginia as a result of wheat becoming the colony's second largest export crop. Scots-Irish and German settlers were following the Valley Road from Pennsylvania into the fertile Shenandoah Valley and began growing crops such as wheat and corn. In fact, the Shenandoah Valley was often called the "Breadbasket of the Confederacy" during the Civil War, and had strategic importance as a major food supplier for the army. Much as villages and towns sprang up around courthouses, so did they around the larger mill complexes.


[photo]
Virginia's apple industry traces its birth to Winchester to the planting of the area's first commercial orchard in 1871
. Today the area is the State's leading apple producer, and local apples and produce are often sold by main street vendors and farmers markets.
Photo courtesy of Virginia Main Street Program

Beef, pork, poultry and dairy products became major exports early in Virginia history. Peanuts began to be commercially grown here prior to the American Civil War. Southampton County, in which Franklin is located, leads the State in peanut production today. Rockingham County, of which Harrisonburg is the county seat, has been a national leader in the poultry industry. Currently, Virginia is the sixth largest producer of apples in the United States with 11 varieties grown in the Commonwealth. The development of vineyards and the wine industry in Virginia began as early as 1619 at Jamestown. Today, numerous vineyards are found throughout the Commonwealth. Currently, Orange County produces more wine grapes than any other county in Virginia.

Mining in Virginia has a long history. In 1609, colonial settlers mined bog iron ore near Jamestown. About 66 miles northwest of Jamestown, in 1619, the first ironworks in America were established on the James River. For the most part, Virginia ironworks were small enterprises, which used local sources of iron ore for raw material. During the first quarter of the 18th century, iron ore mining and related smelting operations greatly increased in Central Virginia. Iron and steel production became a significant industry in Radford and Lynchburg. Lead was the only other important metal mined in Virginia during the colonial period and was used mainly for bullets. During the 18th century, the Austinville Lead/Zinc Mine in Wythe County was a significant operation, especially during the American Revolution.

[photo] Saltpeter cave at Natural Bridge, Virginia, from c. 1900-1915
Photo courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Detroit Publishing Company Collection, LC-D4-500570 DLC

The Town of Saltville, near Marion, was significant for its salt mines. Salt was especially valued for preserving food. A variety of salt byproducts were also made in Saltville, including hydrazine which powered the Saturn rocket in the first manned moon landing in 1969. Niter or saltpeter, (from which is derived potassium nitrate), the main component of black powder, was also mined in Virginia. During the Civil War, Virginia was the leading producer of saltpeter with a total production of approximately 500,000 pounds. The saltpeter deposits were mined on a small scale at more than 100 caves in western Virginia.

During the 20th century, other materials mined included the only arsenic deposit east of the Mississippi River. The Brinton Mine extracted arsenic during its operation from 1912 to 1917. Barite production in Fauquier County continued from 1845 to the mid-1950s. Titanium ore was mined and processed from the 1940s to the early 1970s. Beginning in the late 19th century, the mining of materials used in construction including clay, dimension stone, gneiss, granite, gravel, gypsum, limestone, sand, sandstone (including Aquia sandstone from Government Island in Stafford County which was used in the construction of the Capital, the White House and other governmental buildings in Washington, D.C.), shale and others began in Virginia and continues into the 21st century. More than 50 minerals have been mined in Virginia, which has contributed vastly to the Commonwealth's economy.

During the 20th century, textiles and furniture manufacturing became major industries in the Virginia Piedmont as the tobacco industry waned. Both Danville and Martinsville experienced a shift in their economies from tobacco manufacturing to furniture and textiles.


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