Cultivating Success in the South

'Ferleger and Metz use an underutilized resource - probate records - to explain household-level production and consumption of yeoman farmers in three Georgia upcountry counties. They supplement probate data with census and Georgia tax data and tell a compelling story about how rural yeoman farmers faced economic and social challenges during the postbellum period. In doing so, they make a worthy contribution to the literature on subsistence farming and postbellum agriculture, introducing historians to a set of underutilized resources that offer details about household behaviors, production, and consumption.' Peggy Hargis, Georgia Southern University
'This engagingly written, deeply researched, and strongly argued work explores the economic context and material conditions of late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Georgia farm families. Through a careful quantitative and descriptive analysis of probate, estate sale, and tax records from three Georgia counties, this book provides a rich portrait of the material lives of black and white farmers of middling rank in the New South period.' Louis Kyriakoudes, The University of Southern Mississippi