¹ Pred, Allan R., Urban Growth and City-Systems in the United States, 1840–1860 (Cambridge, Mass., 1980), pp. 109–17;Google ScholarWeiher, Kenneth, “The Cotton Industry and Southern Urbanization, 1880–1930” Explorations in Economic History, 14 (04 1977), pp. 127–29;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Conzen, Michael P., “The American Urban System in the Nineteenth Century,” in Herbert, O. T. and Johnson, R. J., eds., Geography and the Urban Environment Progress in Research and Application, 4 (1981), pp.331–33.Google Scholar

² Vance, James E. Jr., The Merchant's World: The Geography of Wholesaling (Englewood Cliffs, 1970), esp. chaps. 1, 8.Google Scholar For alternative formulations of the mercantile model, see Conzen, “The American Urban System,” pp. 303–5;Google Scholar and Pred, Allan R., Urban Growth and the Circulation of Information: The United States System of Cities, 1790–1840 (Cambridge, Mass., 1973), pp. 189–202.Google Scholar

³ According to Vance, The Merchant's World, pp. 52–56, 149–50, there is a tradeoff between the geographical area served by wholesale merchants and their degree of specialization.Google Scholar See also Meyer, David Ralph, “A Dynamic Model of the Integration of Frontier Urban Places into the United States System of Cities,” Economic Geography, 56 (01 1980), p. 122.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁴ Ibid., p. 70; Meyer, “A Dynamic Model,” p. 122;Google Scholar and North, Douglass C., “Location Theory and Regional Economic Growth,” Journal of Political Economy, 63 (06 1955), pp. 248–49. The hierarchical ordering of cities and trade is implied by central place theory.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁵ Ibid., p. 149–50. Price, Jacob, “Economic Growth and the Function of American Port Towns,” Perspectives in American History, 8 (1974), p. 129, makes a similar argument.Google Scholar

⁶ Ibid., pp. 151–52; Burghardt, A. F., “A Hypothesis about Gateway Cities,” Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 61 (06 1971), p. 269;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Muller, Edward K., “Selective Urban Growth in the Middle Ohio Valley, 1800–1860,” Geographical Review, 66 (04 1976), p.183.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

⁷ See, for example, Pred, Urban Growth and the Circulation, passim., and Urban Growth and City-Systems, chap. 6; and Meyer, “A Dynamic Model,” pp. 130–31.Google Scholar

⁸ This paragraph draws heavily on Burghardt, “A Hypothesis,” pp. 271–72.Google Scholar

⁹ As Burghardt “A Hypothesis,” p. 282, notes, “[t]hey become the gathering places for the pushers, the boosters, those who wish to become rich quickly.”Google Scholar See also Heim, Carol, “External Spheres and the Theory of Capitalist Development,” Social Concept, 3 (12 1986), pp. 28–29.Google Scholar

¹⁰ According to Fishlow, Albert, American Railroads and the Transformation of the Ante-Bellum Economy (Cambridge, Mass., 1965), pp. 154–56, railroad centers attracted skilled laborers and induced the construction of foundries, rolling mills, and machine shops.Google Scholar

¹¹ North, “Location Theory,” pp.248–49; Burghardt, “A Hypothesis,” p. 273;Google ScholarMuller, “Selective Urban Growth,” pp. 190–92,Google Scholar and his “Regional Urbanization and the Selective Growth of Towns in North American Regions,” Journal of Historical Geography, 3 (01 1977), pp. 26–30.Google Scholar

¹² Meyer, “A Dynamic Model,” pp. 122, 132, 136. Thus, in explaining urban growth, Vance, The Merchant's World, pp. 149–50, emphasizes the formation of “intelligence complexes,” and Price, “Economic Growth and the Function,” pp. 129–30, the concentration of entrepreneurial activity.Google Scholar

¹³ The role of the manufacturing sector in urban growth is discussed in Muller, “Selective Growth,” pp. 173–77, and “Regional Urbanization,” pp. 31–32;Google ScholarLindstrom, Diane and Sharpless, John, “Urban Growth and Economic Structure in Antebellum America,” Research in Economic History, 3 (1978), pp. 169–85;Google Scholar and Crowther, Simeon J., “Urban Growth in the Mid-Atlantic States, 1785–1850,” this JOURNAL, 36 (09 1976), pp. 632–40.Google Scholar

¹⁴ Perloff, Harvey S. and wingo, Lowdon Jr, “Natural Resource Endowment and Regional Economic Growth,” in Spengler, Joseph J., ed., Natural Resources and Economic Growth (Washington, D.C., 1961), pp. 203–5;Google ScholarVance, The Merchant's World, pp. 101–5;Google Scholar and Meyer, David R., “Emergence of the American Manufacturing Belt: An Interpretation,” Journal of Historical Geography, 9 (04 1983), pp. 149–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar The absence of these conditions, in turn, explains the failure of antebellum cotton ports to develop into higher-order metropolises; Pred, Urban Growth and City-Systems, pp. 109–17; and Conzen, “The American Urban System,” p. 331.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Phillips, Ulrich B., A History of Transportation in the Eastern Cotton Belt to 1860 (New York, 1908), pp. 304–16;Google ScholarHeath, Milton Sydney, Constructive Liberalism: The Role of the State in Economic Development in Georgia in 1860 (Cambridge, Mass., 1954), pp. 266–73;CrossRefGoogle Scholar and Russell, James M., Atlanta, 1847–1890: City Building in the Old and New South (Baton Rouge, forthcoming), chap. 2.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Russell, James M., “Atlanta, Gate City of the South. 1847 to 1885” (Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton University, 1971), pp. 35–36;Google Scholar and Wotton, Grigsby Jr, “New City of the South: Atlanta, 1843–73” (Ph.D. dissertation, Johns Hopkins University, 1973), pp. 19–20.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Martin, Thomas H., Atlanta and Its Builders: A Comprehensive History of the Gate City (Atlanta, 1902), vol. 1, p. 27;Google Scholar and Garrett, Franklin M., Atlanta and Environs: A Chronicle of Its People and Events (New York, 1954), vol. 1, pp. 223–24.Google Scholar Estimates of the population in 1845 range from 100 in Martin, p. 37,Google Scholar to 200 in Pioneer Citizen's Society of Atlanta, Pioneer Citizen's History of Atlanta 1832–1902 (Atlanta, 1902), p. 20.Google Scholar

¹⁸ The Georgia Banking and Railroad Company, Reports of the Directors (Augusta, 1843), p. 5, lists Atlanta as an intermediate station on this road.Google Scholar

¹⁹ See Atlanta Weekly Intelligencer, vol. 3, no. 39 (02 26, 1852);Google ScholarRussell, “Atlanta, Gate City of the South,” pp. 59–60, 62–63; Wotton, “New City of the South,” p. 21; and Russell, Atlanta, 1847–1890, p. 53.Google Scholar

²⁰ Martin, , Atlanta and Its Builders, vol. 1, p. 59;Google Scholar and Citizen's, Pioneer, History of Atlanta, pp.222–23, 233.Google Scholar

²¹ Population estimates for the years 1848, 1849, and 1854 are reported in Pioneer Citizen's, History of Atlanta, p. 73;Google ScholarWhite, George, Statistics of the State of Georgia (Savannah, 1849), p. 205,Google Scholar and Historical Collections of Georgia (New York, 1854), p. 421;Google Scholar U.S. Census Office, Seventh Census, 1850, Statistical View of the United States (Washington, D.C., 1854), pp. 338–39;Google Scholar and Haygood, Green B., “Sketch of Atlanta,” in William's Atlanta Directory (Atlanta, 1859), p. 11.Google Scholar

²² White, Historical Collections, p. 421. The estimates do not include produce sold directly by farmers in the wagon trade.Google Scholar

²³ White, Historical Collections, p. 421.Google Scholar

²⁴ Between 1851 and 1854, 9 of the 11 largest wholesale merchants listed in the credit ledgers of the R. G. Dun & Co. were engaged in the cotton trade. See Georgia, vol. 13A, R. G. Dun & Company Collection, Baker Library, Harvard University Graduate School of Business Administration, pp. 93–134.Google Scholar

²⁵ Georgia, vol. 13A, R. G. Dun & Company Collection, pp. 93–134; White, Historical Collections, pp. 421–22;Google ScholarMartin, , Atlanta and Its Builders, vol. 1, pp. 45, 48–49;Google ScholarCooper, Walter G., Official History of Fulton County (Atlanta, 1934), pp. 74–80, 313–14;Google Scholarand Pioneer Citizen's, History of Atlanta, pp. 116–19.Google Scholar

²⁶ Western, and Railroad, Atlantic, Report of the Superintendent and Treasurer (Atlanta, 1853,1857).Google Scholar

²⁷ Atlanta Weekly Intelligencer, vol. 3, no. 34 (01 22, 1852);Google Scholarand Atlanta Daily Intelligencer (10 15, 1858); transcript in the Ulrich B. Phillips Collection, box 32, folder 316.Google Scholar

²⁸ In his evaluation of Atlanta's commercial prospects in 1853, the editor of the Atlanta Weekly intelligencer concluded that the city's commerce would continue to expand except “in the one article of Cotton,” vol. 3, no. 34 (Jan. 22, 1853).Google Scholar “[O]ur receipts from wagons,” he explained, “have been temporarily reduced this season, by the extension of the Atlanta and LaGrange Railroad to Newnan.” The paper provides only sporadic reports of the volume of cotton sales, but during the height of the season, they averaged only 1,000 to 1,250 bales a week; ibid., vol. 3, nos. 23–39 (Nov. 1852–Feb. 1853). Based on a comparison of cotton prices reported in the Atlanta Daily Intelligencer for the same day each week between 1852 and 1855, cotton prices in Atlanta were on average one to two cents lower per pound than in Augusta, Charleston, and Savannah. Freight rates over the same period varied from 50 to 60 cents per bale to Savannah and to 75 cents to $1 per bale to Charleston.

²⁹ Russell, Atlanta, 1847–1890, pp. 39–40, claims that Atlanta's cotton trade along the road started to recover in 1856, but presents an estimate of total cotton shipped to, not sold in, Atlanta in 1859 of only 30,000 bales. In addition, according to the Georgia Railroad and Banking Company, Report of the Directors (1856), p. 10, cotton shipped from Atlanta to Augusta along the Georgia Railroad declined by 1812 bales in 1856, the only year that shipments from Atlanta were reported separately. Cotton shipments from all other stations on the road and connecting lines increased in the same year.Google Scholar

³⁰ Atlanta Daily Intelligencer, vol. 1, no. 35 (11 4, 1854), no. 65 (Dec. 10, 1854), no. 70 (Dec. 16, 1854), no. 82 (Jan. 1, 1855), and no. 85 (Jan. 4, 1855).Google Scholar

³¹ The timing coincides with the end of the first railroad boom in the United States and, according to Fishlow, American Railroads, pp. 114–16, the onset of a major economic downturn.Google Scholar

³² Georgia, vol. 13A, R. G. Dun & Company Collection, pp. 93–134.Google Scholar

³³ As early as 1854, Atlanta was developing a reputation throughout Georgia as the “best market … for the purchase of almost all leading articles of consumption,” Atlanta Daily Intelligencer, vol. 1, no. 45 (11 16, 1854).Google Scholar Atlanta's merchants were notorious for charging lower prices than merchants in port cities and conducting their sales on a cash basis, ibid., no. 136 (Mar. 5, 1855); Russell, “Atlanta, Gate City of the South,” p. 57; and Wotton, “New City of the South,” p. 23.Google Scholar

³⁴ Reed, Walter P., History of Atlanta, Georgia (Syracuse, 1889), pp. 52, 58;Google ScholarWilliam's Atlanta Directory, p. 11 and U.S. Census, Eighth Census, 1860, vol. 1, Population of the United States in 1860 (Washington, D.C., 1864), pp. 74–76. Estimates of Atlanta's population in 1860 vary between 9,554 in the federal census to 11,500 in the state census.Google Scholar

³⁵ William's Atlanta Directory, pp. 10–11.Google Scholar

³⁶ Further evidence of the relative decline of the cotton trade after 1854 is the scarce mention of cotton operations by Atlanta's largest wholesale merchants in Georgia, vol. 13A, R. G. Dun & Company Collection, pp. 93–134.Google Scholar

³⁷ William's Atlanta Directory, pp. 25–27. See also Pioneer Citizen's, History of Atlanta, pp.137–38.Google Scholar

³⁸ Russell, “Atlanta, Gate City of the South,” p. 70. Cooper, Official History, p. 306, lists the officers and incorporators of the bank. All but two were residents.Google Scholar

³⁹ White, Historical Collections, p. 422; William's Atlanta Directory, pp. 12–13; Georgia, vol. 13A, R. G. Dun & Company Collection, pp. 102–66;Google Scholar and U.S. Census Office, Eighth Census, vol. 3, Manufacturers of the United States in 1860 (Washington, D.C., 1865), p. 68.Google Scholar See also Russell, Atlanta, 184 7–1890, pp. 58–61.Google Scholar

⁴⁰ William's Atlanta Directory, p. 12.Google Scholar

⁴¹ Equally important, they tried to move the state capitol from Millidgeville, centrally located in Georgia's Cotton Belt, to Atlanta. Although unsuccessful, they made Atlanta the seat of a new county, which was carved mostly Out of DeKaIb. See Martin, Atlanta and Its Founders, vol. 1, pp. 118–20; and Cooper, Official History, pp. 83–88.Google Scholar

⁴² Georgia, Tax Digest of Fulton County, 1854. Of the 64 individuals reported owning less 500 acres of rural land, only 5 owned land outside of northern Georgia. For 12 of the 18 largest landholders in Atlanta, lands in northern Georgia accounted for over 60 percent of their holdings.Google Scholar

⁴³ Reed, History of Atlanta, Georgia, pp. 74–75;Google ScholarMartin, , Atlanta and Its Builders, vol. 1, p. 125;Google Scholar and Russell, Atlanta, 1847–1890, pp. 65–67. For their earlier efforts, see Atlanta Weekly Intelligencer, vol. 3, no. 7 (July 17, 1852), no. 12 (Aug. 21, 1852), no. 13 (Aug. 28, 1853).Google Scholar

⁴⁴ Atlanta Daily Intelligencer, vol. 1, no. 131 (02 27, 1855), no. 133 (Mar. 1, 1855), no. 148 (mar. 19, 1855).Google Scholar

⁴⁵ Beginning in 1853, the Weekly Intelligencer, vol. 4, no. 35 (01 27, 1853), listed the advertisements of firms in Atlanta's principal markets; these included the Atlantic cotton ports and New York. See also Reed, History of Atlanta, Georgia, pp. 27–28; Russell, “Atlanta, Gate City of the South,” pp. 65, 92; and Wotton, “New City of the South,” pp. 33–35.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ Atlanta Daily Intelligencer, vol. 1, no. 85 (01 4, 1855). The editorial was directed against banks in port cities and the state road, which refused to accept notes issued by interior banks.Google Scholar

⁴⁷ Russell, Atlanta, 1847–1890, pp. 99–102, finds that a third of Atlanta's economic elite in the 1850s were born in the Northeast, and two-thirds of all elites had accumulated wealth holdings of at least $10,000, when they arrived in Atlanta. According to Wotton, “New City of the South,” p. 42, the share of native northerners among Atlanta's elites doubled over the decade.Google Scholar

⁴⁸ Georgia, vol. 13A, R. G. Dun & Company Collection, pp. 164, 166.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ Georgia Railroad and Banking Company, Reports of the Directors (1858), p. 16. According to the superintendent, “these reductions are not caused by rivalry of competing Lines within our State, but are determined by Western Routes competing for the trade connecting Roads had opened to us.”Google Scholar

⁵⁰ Atlanta Daily Intelligencer (May 10, 1858), (Nov. 9, 1858), (Nov. 11, 1858), (Oct. 15, 1858) and (Jan. 6, 1859); typed transcripts in the Ulrich B. Phillips Collection, Yale University Archives, box 32, folder 316.Google Scholar

⁵¹ Ibid. Atlanta merchants also complained that train schedules prevented passengers from stopping over in their city and so diminished their retail trade.

⁵² Atlanta Daily Intelligencer (Feb. 21, 1860); typed transcript in Ulrich B. Phillips Collection, box 32, folder 316. The article proposed that merchants use alternative rail routes to Charleston or Norfolk as an immediate solution to the problem. See also Reed, History of Atlanta, Georgia, pp. 438–42; and Cooper, Official History, pp. 320–22.Google Scholar

⁵³ Pioneer Citizen's Society, History of Atlanta, pp. 49–50, 59–60, 74–75; Phillips, A History, pp. 366–72; Garrett, Atlanta and Its Environs, vol. 1, pp. 383, 409; and Russell, “Atlanta, Gate City of the South,” pp. 75–84.Google Scholar

⁵⁴ The role of the Georgia Airline in integrating the eastern half of the Upcountry into the cotton economy is demonstrated by Weiman, David F., “The Economic Emancipation of the NonSlaveholding Class: Upcountry Farmers in the Georgia Cotton Economy,” this JOURNAL, 45 (03 1985), pp. 84–90.Google Scholar Anticipating the potential benefits of the road, the residents of the region had invested over $400,000 in the project by 1858; Martin, , Atlanta and Its Builders, vol. 1, p. 140.Google Scholar

⁵⁵ Russell, Atlanta, 1847–1890, pp. 72–74.Google Scholar

⁵⁶ These companies had substantial investments in complementary railroad companies that channeled traffic through their trunk lines; see Georgia Railroad and Banking Company, Reports of the Directors (Augusta, 1859), p. 30;Google Scholar and Central of Georgia Railroad and Banking Company, Annual Report (Savannah, 1856), p. 5.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ Woodman, King Cotton and His Retainers, pp. 269–94, documents the growing volume of direct trade along rail routes between interior cotton-producing regions and New York after the Civil War. During Reconstruction, in contrast, state governments under Republican rule heavily subsidized developmental railroad projects in white farming regions, like the Georgia Airline;Google Scholar see Summers, Mark W., Railroads, Reconstruction, and the Gospel of Prosperity Aid under the Radical Republicans, 1865–1877 (Princeton, 1984), part I.Google Scholar

⁵⁸ Reed, History of Atlanta, Georgia, pp. 87–89.Google Scholar

⁵⁹ Russell, Atlanta, 1847–1890, pp. 117–27;Google Scholar and DeCredico, Mary A., “Urban Entrepreneurs in the Civil War South” (unpublished manuscript, U.S. Naval Academy, 1986), pp. 5–6.Google Scholar