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In “A Shoekeeper’s Millennium,” by Paul E. Johnson, an evangelist named Charles Grandison Finney signified the people of Rochester to choose moral sentiment in his speech that paved the way for the Second Great Awakening. It was one of the many revivals since 1790’s that has been altering religious practices and moral beliefs and contributing to changes on an economical, social, and political level. These changes helped shape a rural village into a booming merchant capitalist industry in the center of an agriculturally commercialized economy by distinction between social classes. Prior to the Rochester revival in 1831 and the development of a merchant capitalist economy, New England farmers on the Genesee Valley were commercializing agriculture by creating enough surpluses to export or trade. The Genesee Valley was becoming the largest grain-growing region in the world, and increased inland transportation extended the farmer’s market for trade and business possibilities. The surplus they had brought them into nearby towns to trade for manufactured goods. All traditionally industrialized cities have been on the coast for foreign trade, so prosperous farmers in the Genesee Valley found themselves far away from any largely commercial communities. At the time, Rochester was a rural community consisting of mostly male merchants and skilled master artisans. They provided the nearby farmers with necessities needed to sustain the farm in their time of demand. With the abundance of farmers coming intro Rochester to purchase goods, the demand for an urban business industry was overwhelming. In a rural community such as this, the economy heavily relies on imports because it is not urban industry that can supply the farmers with the equipment they need. Even with the finishing of the canal in 1823, it was still a long trip to Albany, and the product would remain expensive to ship.
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