¹ Bidwell, P. W. and Falconer, J. I., History of Agriculture in the Northern United States, 1620–1860 (New York, 1941), p. 5Google Scholar.

² Some of these, for example, are the introduction of European grasses and fodder complementary to livestock raising, the increased use of plows in place of hoes, and the substitution of private holdings for communal arrangements. In addition, later pioneering settlements, such as in Pennsylvania, did not experience the torturous “starving” period undergone in early New England and Virginia.

³ Shepherd, James F. and Walton, Gary M., Shipping, Maritime Trade and the Economic Development of Colonial North America (New York and London, 1972), p. 31Google Scholar.

⁴ Gallman, Robert E., “Changes in Total U.S. Agricultural Factor Productivity in the Nineteenth Century,” Agricultural History, 46 (January 1972), pp. 191–210Google Scholar; and Idem, “The Agricultural Sector and the Pace of Economic Growth: U.S. Experience in the Nineteenth Century,” Klingaman, David C. and Vedder, Richard K., eds., Essays in Nineteenth Century Economic History (Athens, 1975), pp. 35–76Google Scholar.

⁵ Gallman “The Agricultural Sector,” p. 48.

⁶ Ibid., p. 47.

⁷ Taylor, George R., “American Economic Growth Before 1840: An Exploratory Essay,” Journal of Economic History, 24 (December 1964), p. 429Google Scholar. Simliarly, the conjecture by Egnal that the rate of growth of per capita income was 0.5 percent during the period 1720–1775 appears questionable, both for the above reasons and for the flawed statistical procedures upon which the 0.5 percent calculation is based; Egnal, Marc, “Economic Development in the American Colonies,” William and Mary Quarterly, 32 (April 1975), pp. 199–200Google Scholar. In particular, his Table II (p. 200) is misleadingly titled “Rate of Annual Growth of Per Capita Income in the Thirteen Continental Colonies, 1720–1775” when, in fact, it actually presents only the rates of growth of the sum of per capita imports (in official values) from Great Britain (but not from other areas) and partial figures on exports per capita. Although it is not explicitly stated, the series for exports appears to be in current values rather than in real terms, and the implicit assumption that these partial figures on imports plus exports (per capita) remain a constant percentage of income is not established.

⁸ David, Paul A., “The Growth of Real Product in the United States before 1840: New Evidence, Controlled Conjectures,” The Journal of Economic History 27 (June 1967), p. 154CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

⁹ Ball, Duane, “The Process of Settlement in Eighteenth Century Chester County, Pennsylvania: A Social and Economic History” (Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1973), Table 28, p. 128Google Scholar.

¹⁰ Our use of these somewhat arbitrary terms is based on evidence of household formation. In 1715 there were 0.31 households per square mile and in 1766, 4.50 households per square mile (and 5.08 in 1791); see Ibid., p. 197. Moreover, as a percentage of total assessed acreage in 1791, 96.6 percent of this was assessed in 1764 but only 58.0 percent in 1717; Ibid., Table 30, p. 130.

¹¹ Of course, uncleared land had a positive price, but this was primarily because of its potential cleared productivity.

¹² Easterlin, Richard et al. , “Farm and Farm Families in Old and New Areas” (Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania, January 1975), Table 23, p. 81Google Scholar.

¹³ Fogel, Robert W. and Engerman, Stanley L., “The Relative Efficiency of Slavery: A Comparison of Northern and Southern Agriculture in 1860,” Explorations in Economic History, 8 (Spring 1971)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

¹⁴ Ball, “The Process of Settlement,” pp. 102–107. It may be recalled from Table 3, note c, that strictly nonagricultural workers were excluded from the labor index, but mixed labor was included.

¹⁵ For instance, 4 percent is approximately 20 percent – 5 percent times 25 percent.

¹⁶ One possible labor index adjustment accents this finding of retardation. Suppose women are excluded from the labor index on the assumption that they did not contribute to agricultural output. This extreme assumption results in slightly increasing the difference in the indexes between Period (1) and those remaining, but leaves unchanged the relative standings among Periods (2) and (3) and (4). Therefore the rate of productivity increases somewhat between Periods (1) and (2) but remains unchanged between Periods (2) and (3) and thereafter. Alternatively, a decline in fertility over the period probably led to an increase in the average age of children. Adjusting for age would lower the rate of decline in the labor index over the eighteenth century, but the most important adjustment would be between Periods (1) and (2). This would tend to reduce the-finding of retardation and to lower the measured rate of productivity over the century. In any case, these two possible alterations in the labor index are probably minor considerations which tend to offset each other.

¹⁷ Lemon, James, Best Poor Man's Country: A Geographical Study of Early Southwestern Pennsylvania (Baltimore, 1972)Google Scholar.

¹⁸ Ibid., pp. 150–151.

¹⁹ Lemon's conclusion that “by contemporary English and modern American standards … fanners generally did not exploit the soil extensively [sic] or efficiently” (p. 150) is also unfounded, but outside the point of our inquiry here.

²⁰ For example, see Lockridge, Kenneth, “Land, Population and the Evolution of New England Society, 1630–1790; and an Afterthought,” in Katz, Stanley N., ed., Colonial America: Essays in Politics and Social Development (Boston, 1971), pp. 466–491Google Scholar; idem., “Social Change and the Meaning of the American Revolution,” Journal of Social History, 6 (Summer 1973), pp. 403–439Google Scholar; Henretta, James A., “The Morphology of New England Society in the Colonial Period,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History, 2 (Autumn 1971), pp. 379–398Google Scholar; Murrin, John M., “Review Essay,” History and Theory, 11 (1972), pp. 236–275Google Scholar.

²¹ Shepherd, James F. and Walton, Gary M., “Economic Prospects after the Revolution,”presented to the Western Economic Association's 50th Annual Conference,June 28, 1975,San DiegoGoogle Scholar, and forthcoming in Explorations in Economic History, 13 (October 1976)Google Scholar.

²² Shepherd and Walton, Shipping, Maritime Trade and the Economic Development of Colonial North America, p. 72.

²³ It is important to note that according to Deane and Cole 0.3 percent was the rate of growth in England during the eighteenth century up to 1785; Phyllis Deane and Cole, W. A., British Economic Growth 1688–1959: Trends and Structure (London, 1964), p. 80Google Scholar.