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AAs profitable as naval stores were, The lower Cape Fear region was well suited for growing rice. Clockwise from top: Carrying rice. Hulling rice. Rice was gathered by hand. This young woman is identified as Kate Moore, on Orton Plantation circa 1890. rice became the real king of the exports along the Cape Fear. In the Carolina lowcountry, the grain arrived aboard a merchant ship captained by James Thurber. Sailing from Madagascar in 1685, Thurber and his vessel weathered an Atlantic hurricane en route to their final destination and put into Charleston, South Carolina, for repairs. Thurber is said to have given Dr. Henry Woodward a store of rice seeds, with which Woodward proceeded to experiment. By the time the Moore family relocated from Goose Creek, South Carolina, to the banks of the Cape Fear River at Brunswick Town in 1725, rice was becoming a major cash crop for Carolina planters. Soon the plantations of the Cape Fear marked the northern-most boundary of the Carolina rice culture. The Carolina Gold strain of the grain grown along the river was said to be so distinctive that one could taste the difference between rice grown on the west bank of the Cape Fear versus that grown on the east bank. Rice required two things to grow successfully — fresh water and large pools of laborers. The tidal fluctuations of the Cape Fear River made it ideally suited for rice cultivation, its freshwa-ter overflow irrigating the young plants via floodgates controlled by slave labor. Indigo, silk, and later, cotton were all cultivated with varying degrees of success along the Cape Fear, but until the end of the plantation era after the Civil War, rice was king on area plantations. Slaves made it all work. The planta-tions, the naval stores, the rice fields — 36 WBM november 2014 rice e Indigo, silk, and later, cotton were all cultivated with varying degrees of success along the Cape Fear, but until the end of the plantation era after the Civil War, rice was king on area plantations. e PHOTO COURTESY OF NEW HANOVER COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY PHOTO COURTESY OF JACK FRYAR PHOTO COURTESY OF JACK FRYAR


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