Okay, here's Dr. Stephen Lubar's e-mail address: lubars@nmah.si.edu
And here's the original question I sent, which I think pretty evenhandedly presented the argument:
Dr. Lubar--
I'm currently engaged in an online debate with someone concerning the mechanization of cotton farming and its role in southern society. Specifically, just when practical, efficient machinery was developed to replace hand picking. My opponent claims that this machinery was available in the 1850s, along with steam and coal-oil driven tractors, and that had the south not been impoverished by the Civil War, it would have adopted these machines by, say, 1875. This would have led to a voluntary emancipation of the slaves by the south at that time.
My position is that practical tractors weren't available until the 1910s, when the internal combustion tractors came into production, and that the steam tractors were relatively unusual anywhere in the U.S., and weren't commonly owned by farmers and instead were operated by crews who followed the harvests with their equipment and were hired by farmers. Further, I contend that practical cotton harvesting machinery wasn't developed until the late 1930s/1940s by the Rust brothers and that the adoption of this machinery came pretty quickly to the cotton industry once the machinery was available.
My opponent has cited you as an expert, so I turn to you for your opinion.
Sincerely,
And here's Lubar's response:
"I'm no expert on this topic at all, but I am pretty certain that you are correct on all counts. THe expert on the subject is my former colleague at the Smithsonian, Pete Daniel. You might want to address the question to him at danielp@si.edu."
Forwarding the same question to Daniel, here's his response:
Historians continue to disagree about the pace of mechanization in the South, and my work has pointed out that in some respects the commodity being mechanized is one of the most important factors. In Breaking the Land: The Transformation of Cotton, Tocacco and Rice Cultures since 1880, I looked at these commodity cultures and, among other issues, attempted to weigh the factors in mechanization.
There were, I would argue, no machines available in the nineteenth century that would have transformed southern cotton cultivation from labor to machine-intensive operations. Steam traction engines were poorly equipped for plowing but were used primarily for belt work. Mules would pull the plows until tractor ownership spread in the twentieth century.
It would be difficult to argue a counterfactural thesis that mechanization would have ended slavery, for there were other political considerations that weighed on the minds of slave owners and the white population.
Although there were numerous attempts to mechanize cotton picking, most were not successful until the 1930s with the Rust Brothers and then development work on the Hopson Plantation near Clarksdale, Mississippi, by International Harvester during World War II. Finally, herbicides that emerged after World War II ended the need for a large cotton chopping crew. With tractors breaking the land and cultivating, herbicides doing the weeding, and mechanical picking machines doing the picking, cotton cultivation was totally mechanized. The crucial ingredients in this process, herbicides and the picking machine, came during and after World War II.
The South was highly mechanized, which goes against most mythological treatments of its history. Agricultural censuses reveal steam engines, water powered mills, and mule-drawn appratuses, and there was a large cadre of skilled workers, black and white, to keep them going. When automobiles and tractors appeared, there was no shortage of mechanics to tinker on them.
The questions that you are raising are extremely complex, and my reply is necessarily superficial. As I mentioned, historians continue to disagree on the pace of mechanziation. Still, I hope that my reply has been of use.
Pete Daniel
It's pretty funny that you're now trying to deny that I even wrote to Lubar, or that he responded, or that I somehow misinterpreted his response, when I posted the response in its entirety along with a number of challenges to you to write to Lubar yourself, which you declined. So here it is for all to see, and anyone who wants to write to Lubar or Daniel at the Smithsonian to see if I've fabricated or misstated anything is free to do so. I'll also forward the e-mails in their original format, with all the headers and routing information to anyone who requests it.
Meanwhile, let's see you put up a single bit of original evidence that only 5-6% of southern families owned slaves, using the standards fo evidence that you insist on.
the reason that i disbelieve ANYTHING you say now is:
a. Dr Lubar seems to be a man of honor,(UNlike HANOI-john kerry he doesn't change his opinion based on who is asking.)
b.i SERIOUSLY doubt that he would contradict what he said the first time i talked to him if i asked him the same question again &
c. you have the REPUTATION of a HATER. i do NOT trust HATERS, regardless of their message.
'NUFF said.
free dixie,sw