The mineral resources of the United States were practically
unknown. The country seems to have produced iron enough for its
simple needs, some coal, copper, lead, gold, silver, and sulphur.
But we may say that mining was hardly practiced at all.
The fisheries and the shipyards were great sources of wealth,
especially for New England. The cod fishers numbered several
hundred vessels and the whalers about forty. Thousands of
citizens living along the seashore and the rivers fished more or
less to add to the local food supply. The deep-sea fishermen
exported a part of their catch, dried and salted. Yankee vessels
sailed to all ports of the world and carried the greater part of
the foreign commerce of the United States. Flour, tobacco, rice,
wheat, corn, dried fish, potash, indigo, and staves were the
principal exports. Great Britain was the best customer, with the
French West Indies next, and then the British West Indies. The
principal imports came from the same countries. Imports and
exports practically balanced each other, at about twenty million
dollars annually, or about five dollars a head. The great
merchants owned ships and many of them, such as John Hancock of
Boston, and Stephen Girard of Philadelphia, had grown very rich.
Inland transportation depended on horses and oxen or boats.
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