Rice to Riches

Abstract

Campbell Coxe grows a pretty serious rice crop, one of a precious few located east of the Mississippi. He cultivates Carolina Gold, a nutty-tasting heirloom rice, on 200 acres along the Great Pee Dee River in South Carolina. Between the late 17th and late 19th centuries, this crop gilded lowcountry South Carolina’s fortunes, as the colony led North American rice production. In fact, rice couldn’t be ferried to northern European markets fast enough. Plentiful slave know-how and labor, tide-flooded fields, and savvy trade lobbying abroad created South Carolina’s comparative advantage in rice production. Its prosperity was unequaled in the New World. “In no time in history has the state been as wealthy financially, socially, politically. In that era, South Carolina ruled. It’s never happened before and never happened again,” notes Coxe, who is an ardent student of his pet crop’s history. But by the late 1800s, world trade and transportation (the Suez Canal opened in 1869) brought in cheaper South Asian rice. India, Java, and Burma usurped the European market. South Carolina lost its edge as the low-cost producer. This cycle would repeat in the 20th century for South Carolina — only this time, the textile industry would go. When the commercial rice industry eroded, so did the backbone of the economy.