ABSTRACT
South Carolina companies soon constructed their own sulphuric acid vats to process the phosphate ore into superphosphates, and the industry grew rapidly. During the postbellum years many changes in landownership occurred in South Carolina, notably in the coastal areas where rice and Sea Island cotton plantations once flourished. The period after the War Between the States saw major changes that reordered the geography and landscape of South Carolina. General Wade Hampton’s election as governor in 1876 marked the end of Reconstruction, but the economic bondage of agriculture and its impact on the landscape persisted for another 75 years. Dams, reservoirs, and power plants have since become major components of the state’s landscape. The pattern of South Carolina’s post-bellum landscape was well established by the end of the nineteenth century, and this was seen especially in agriculture, which dominated the state’s economy and land use.
