European Exploration In Arkansas

The first documented European exploration in Arkansas occurred in 1541 CE by Hernando de Soto. De Soto’s exploration was sponsored by the Spanish government to find wealthy Native American civilizations and to take their wealth from them. The next documented European interaction with the people of Arkansas was in 1673 CE by Jacques Marquette. Marquette was a Jesuit missionary that explored the Mississippi in search of a way to the Caribbean Ocean. Besides the fact of these two explorations both involved European powers, they could not be more different. The Spanish were in Arkansas to find riches and conquer the natives, but the French were peaceful and looked for allies along the Mississippi river. The Native American people each exploration encountered were completely different as well. The Spanish conquers encountered numerous different tribes of Native Americans as they traveled throughout Arkansas. However, the French mainly dealt with the Native American Quapaw tribe. The two waves of European exploration that made their way …show more content…
This changed drastically when the industrial revolution in England caused a high demand for cotton. Cotton soon became the major crop throughout the South. With farmers growing cotton throughout eastern and southern Arkansas the state now had a good to exchange for cash. This exchange caused Arkansas to develop a market economy instead of a frontier exchange. This economic shift caused Arkansas to become much more closely aligned with the South, because almost all southern states had a market economy. With this boom of cotton production, in 1860 Arkansas was ranked 16th out of 34 states in economy production. However, cotton was still not as popular in Arkansas as other southern states. Arkansas still had a variety of crops grown within its borders. Unlike in the other southern states where cotton was the primary crop and given most of the land to