Sitterson

Sugar Country: The Cane Sugar Industry in the South 1753-1950. By J. Carlyle Sitterson. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1953.

J. Carlyle Sitterson’s book Sugar Country: The Cane Sugar Industry in the South, 1753-1950 thoroughly chronicles the history of the sugar cultivation and manufacture in the South, primarily in southern Louisiana. Though the title says it covers the industry from 1753-1950, the vast majority of the book concerns the nineteenth century, primarily the years before the Civil War. Sitterson provides a comprehensive study of the growth of the sweet crop, and he also tries to make the story personal through discussions of planter and slave culture.

Although sugar is grown in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, and Florida, Sitterson points out that at no time before the First World War did Louisiana provide less than ninety-five percent of the country’s domestic sugar. As such, most of the book focuses on the history of the industry in Louisiana. By the beginning of the nineteenth century, sugar was the primary crop in south Louisiana, and the possibility of its cultivation attracted many Anglo settlers after 1803. Unfortunately, though sugar can grow in Louisiana’s semi-tropical climate, it prefers a tropical one. Thus, sugar planters have always faced hardship as they have battled the weather. Cold weather ruined many harvests. Nonetheless, the sugar industry grew in the 1820s and peaked in the 1850s. During this time, sugar planters amassed vast holdings, often pushing out smaller Creole land owners. In fact, he says, “The Creoles, with their narrow experience and limited education, could not compete with the aggressive Anglo-Americans.” (69)

The industry was, of course, built on the backs of slaves, but Sitterson tries to down play this issue by stressing the relatively kind and gentle treatment the slaves on sugar plantations received. He points out that they were seldom whipped and that overseers were warned not to break the skin during beatings. Sitterson did not consult any slave narratives or sources when constructing the book, and the sections on African Americans reflect the time period during which he wrote.

The Civil War almost destroyed the sugar industry in the South. First of all, the physical damage in Louisiana to the processing facilities and the plantations made reconstruction difficult. Also, the South experienced a credit contraction, and planters found it difficult to get loans to make necessary improvements to their properties. Most importantly, however, was the problem of labor. Most planters hired former slaves to work the property for wages, and Sitterson expertly traces the labor disputes during the post-War period. He does, however, express a certain disdain towards the black workers, saying, “As long as the Negroes were assured of rations, neither wages nor the threat to put them on public works proved sufficient inducement to keep them at work. They had too long accustomed to working mainly under the threat of punishment.” (221).

After the end of Reconstruction, the industry experienced a rebirth, however. In addition to technological advances in evaporation, clarification, and cultivation, this period also saw the growth of professional organizations like the Louisiana Sugar Planters’ Association, the state experiment station, and the sugar school. These groups conducted experiments on the best farming practices, and disseminated information to the planters. In addition, rather than selling sugar to myriad factors based in New Orleans, the planters created a central factory system. The era also saw advances in marketing which boosted profits.

The sugar boom in Louisiana would prove short lived, and after World War I, the industry entered a long decline. A combination of factors including poor weather, chronic labor shortages, federal tariffs, and tensions between growers and refiners led to dramatic falls in sugar production. As a counter point, Sitterson studied the success in the post-War period of the United States Sugar Corporation in Florida. Sitterson attributes Florida’s success to agribusiness and the abandonment of ante-bellum ideas about the planter class.

The book succeeds in providing thorough explanations of the cultivation, production, and sale of sugar as it changed over time. Sitterson’s attempts at cultural histories of the planters and the slaves and laborers, however, lack the clarity and thought of his more technical sections. Still, the book succeeds as a comprehensive agricultural history.

Amanda Bresie Texas Christian University

Sugar Cane: The Cane Sugar Industry in the South, 1753-1950. By J. Carlyle Sitterson. (Lexington, Kentucky: University of Kentucky Press, 1953, Pp.ix, 414.)

This is a fascinating work covering the entire span of the sugar industry in the South. Sitterson brings not only the economics of the industry to the reader, but provides an in depth examination of the sugar society that developed out of the industry. His focus is on southern Louisiana as the bulk of sugar plantations were located there, but he also brings into his story the Atlantic coast areas that got into sugar cultivation, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, and he gives notice to the areas in Texas that embraced the sugar industry as well. The book is divided into two parts: the first part focuses on the ante bellum South and the last part looks at the industry after the Civil War up until the 1950s. He examines the changes and the consistencies within the world of sugar cultivation in a readable and interesting fashion, looking at planter’s diaries and personal papers as well as economic publications dealing with the sugar industry.

He begins his story dealing with the first planters who took the chance in cultivating sugar. This began in the late eighteenth century in southern Louisiana as the prices for indigo were falling dramatically and Creole planters needed a new crop to make up for their losses. Sugar became know as the “savior of Louisiana” as the conditions in southern Louisiana, though not perfect, were good enough for cultivation. The ideal climate for sugar cultivation is seventy-five degree weather year round with an annual rainfall of about sixty inches occurring at an even rate throughout the year. The planters learned adaptive methods through trial and error and the cultivation of sugar grew. Sugar cultivation was expensive to get started and those huge plantations that could acquire the most capital were the most successful by far. They required a large work force of slaves and occasionally required additional skilled labor along with large tracts of land and expensive farming equipment. Sugar came to dominate the economy in southern Louisiana and a portion of Texas by the 1850s.

One of the most interesting aspects of this work is the quintessence traditionalist view of planter society and slavery. Sitterson devotes much time in the discussion of both and provides the present-day historian an accurate depiction of ante bellum life through the eyes of a traditionalist. It is difficult for Sitterson to hide his belief that the sugar planter embodied the ideal Southern gentlemen. He examines the planter and praises him for his southern hospitality; his beautiful plantation home built from the toils of his slave population, and seems fascinated with leisure activities of the planter and his family. He paints a beautiful picture of the Old South and distinguishes the sugar planter as one who is fair to his slaves and provides a good living for them. The only critique he offers of the planter is the inefficiency and lack of modern methods in cultivating. This was the primary cause of much crop failure.

The topic of slavery is dealt with in much of the same traditionalist fashion. He obviously buys into Elkin's “Sambo” theory. Much of his dealings with slavery issues are speculations and this is obvious through his use of language. He draws from a travel account of a French traveler who comments on a particular plantation and the adequate treatment of its slaves. Sitterson responds with “there is no reason to question the truth of this observation” (p. 89) and goes on to apply this adequate treatment to all slaves of sugar plantations. He discusses how well fed and clothed they were and that abuse was only used out of absolute necessity. When discussing slave quarters, he proceeds to assume that because of the close proximity that slaves were forced to live in, cleanliness and morality had to be lacking. He also contends the slaves favorite time of year began in October, the beginning of the harvesting season. Though this is widely know as the time when the work load of the slave population was the most strenuous, sometime lasting twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, for some reason, Sitterson argues that the slaves had more fun during this time that any other, but offers no real explanation for this phenomenon.

Though the majority of sugar planters were anti-secessionist, the beginning of the Civil War was a profitable time for the industry, but by 1862 a combination of increasing competition, falling sugar prices, and the scientific advances being made in the area of production led to the beginning of the downfall of the sugar industry which would prevail throughout the following forty years. War ravaged the land as well and creating a new labor force, which would be comparable to the slavery system, was difficult. There were substantial financial losses of both land and labor, but shortly after the war a slow recovery process began. After the war, technological concerns moved to the forefront, more so than ever before. A concern of the post-war planter class was the flooding of the Mississippi and there was a movement to create levees. Many of the planters went into huge financial debt trying to recover from the war and just as this recovery process was in full swing, up until about 1920, mosaic, a sugar cane disease, took its toll once again. This devastated many of the crops. The government stepped in and brought in new disease free varieties of cane and after the Depression, these new varieties was somewhat successful. The greatest post-Depression success was in the Florida Everglades. This was due to the use of advanced technology and centralization of operations that were foreign to the Louisiana planter.

Though Louisiana has faced many problems throughout the years of involvement with sugar, there has been no other industry has been "equally satisfactory for south Louisiana." A huge number of lives have depended on sugar as means of support, both economically and socially.