ABSTRACT
Like many other essays in this volume, the springboard for Tim Breen’s argument is the diversity of early America. Early in the eighteenth century, he points out, colonies and regions had little in common with one another. But they came together. One way that they did involves an activity that touched all-getting and spending. Ordinary consumers began purchasing ever more British products. Exciting new commodities such as tea, sugar, chocolate, and tobacco whet appetites, while better and cheaper textiles, pottery, and glass improved the domestic environment. The self-sufficient frontier farmer is a myth.
