The contrast in the land of the English colonies, with stark contrast between the North and the South created considerable economic disparity between the two regions. Dreams of undiscovered financial hotbeds drove the early colonization attempts, as is the case with Virginia, the first English colony in America. The investors behind the Virginia colony, the London Company, looked for a profitable market, which they soon found in tobacco (Brinkley 37). Maryland, another Chesapeake colony, was also supported by the cash crop of tobacco. Tobacco actually made up more than 72% of the exports in the Upper South from 1768 to 1782, and the next closest exports were grains, making up almost 20% of the exports (packet 25). Therefore, the Upper
