Tobacco Cultivation

Timeline

1. 1492–1600Caribbean and Spanish ports · CaribbeanEuropeans learned smoking and cultivation from peoples such as the Taíno; tobacco quickly became a fashionable consumer good in Europe, spurring plantation experiments in the Americas.
2. 1611–1620Virginia colony · VirginiaJohn Rolf and others introduced the more marketable Orinoco variety and improved drying techniques; large shipments went to London after 1614, giving the colony a stable revenue source and expanding farmland.
3. c. 1620–1700Chesapeake Bay tobacco belt · Chesapeake BayDependence on tobacco exports drove the expansion of indentured servitude and later enslaved labor, forming a monocrop economy and intensifying land conflicts with indigenous peoples.