The Market Economy. "Wealth," Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote, "by bringing things from where they abound to where they are wanted," gave the farmer's peaches "a new look and a hundredfold value over the fruit which grew on the same bough and lies fulsomely on the ground." Most farmers in the 1815-1850 era would have agreed with Emerson, if in less florid style. They planted their fields and raised their livestock with the needs of the market in mind. Although many (especially those living far from markets) clung to the Jeffersonian ideal of self-sufficiency and planned to sell locally only whatever surplus remained after filling their families' needs, most American farmers entered the new national market economy eagerly. Improved transportation networks made marketing farm goods economical while also bringing to the farmer's attention a new array of compelling items ready for cash purchase...