New York Farmers and the Market Revolution: Economic Behavior in the Mid-Hudson Valley, 1780–1830

The essay examines how the "market revolution" impacted ordinary farm families in the agriculturally rich Hudson River Valley. Like their New England counterparts, larger farmers responded to the new opportunities by increasing agricultural production and becoming "commercial farmers." Most smaller producers did not, however, although the "market revolution" did impact their lives. These families diversified their production, turning to various forms of rural manufacturing in order to maintain their standard of living. This production brought even these small households closer to the market than they had been in the eighteenth century as they now responded to new demands and opportunities that had not existed earlier. However, unlike their New England neighbors, who increasingly became wage-laborers in capitalist "outwork" networks, valley farm families remained relatively independent of this form of productive relations, at least through the 1830s. Many families continued to structure their production around the home, maintaining control over what was produced and the methods employed. Furthermore, a vibrant local trading system, centered around household production and barter with neighbors and storekeepers, continued to exist along with the more commercially-driven New York City trade.