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48-664: Rison School District was a school district headquartered in Rison, Arkansas . It operated Rison Elementary School and Rison High School . Its mascot was the wildcat. It included the community of Staves . On July 1, 2004, it consolidated with the Kingsland School District to form the Cleveland County School District . This Arkansas school-related article is a stub . You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it . Rison, Arkansas Rison , officially

96-509: A dozen or more sawmills . The largest lumber mills were the J. I. Porter Lumber Company and the Clio Lumber Company. The Clio mill was built in 1887 five miles north of Rison. According to a 1909 issue of Lumberman's Magazine , the Clio mill owned several thousand acres of timberland and had 432 employees in the sawmill, 130 on the woods crew, and eighty operating the tramlines that transported

144-673: A form of the system. Some are governed by tradition, and others by law. The French métayage , the Catalan masoveria , the Castilian mediero , the Slavic połownictwo and izdolshchina, the Italian mezzadria , and the Islamic system of muzara‘a (المزارعة), are examples of legal systems that have supported sharecropping. Under a sharecropping system, landowners provided a share of land to be worked by

192-463: A great deal of land but no liquid assets to pay for labor. They also maintained the "belief that gangs afforded the most efficient means of labor organization", something nearly all formerly enslaved people resisted. Preferring "to organize themselves into kin groups", as well as "minimize chances for white male-black female contact by removing their female kin from work environments supervised closely by whites", black southerners were "determined to resist

240-439: A household in the city was $ 20,865, and the median income for a family was $ 30,833. Males had a median income of $ 26,500 versus $ 18,229 for females. The per capita income for the city was $ 13,106. About 25.6% of families and 32.9% of the population were below the poverty line , including 46.0% of those under age 18 and 30.5% of those age 65 or over. Public education for early childhood, elementary and secondary school students in

288-523: A route three miles north and built a station through land that would later become Rison. Fordyce named the new station for William Rison, his former business partner in a banking venture in Alabama , who had fought on the opposite side of the Civil War . The first home erected in the community the small settlement that grew up around the new station was built in 1880 by lawyer and farmer James McMurtrey. In 1883,

336-728: A sharecropping basis. In South Africa the 1913 Natives' Land Act outlawed the ownership of land by Africans in areas designated for white ownership and effectively reduced the status of most sharecroppers to tenant farmers and then to farm laborers. In the 1960s, generous subsidies to white farmers meant that most farmers could afford to work their entire farms, and sharecropping faded out. The arrangement has reappeared in other African countries in modern times, including Ghana and Zimbabwe . Economic historian Pius S. Nyambara argued that Eurocentric historiographical devices such as "feudalism" or "slavery" often qualified by weak prefixes like "semi-" or "quasi-" are not helpful in understanding

384-715: A significant institution in many states for decades following the Civil War. By the early 1930s, there were 5.5 million white tenant farmers, sharecroppers, and mixed cropping/laborers in the United States; and 3 million Blacks. In Tennessee, sharecroppers operated approximately one-third of all farm units in the state in the 1930s, with white people making up two thirds or more of the sharecroppers. In Mississippi, by 1900, 36% of all white farmers were tenants or sharecroppers, while 85% of black farmers were. In Georgia, fewer than 16,000 farms were operated by black owners in 1910, while, at

432-429: A variable rental payment, paid in arrears . There are three different types of contracts. According to sociologist Edward Royce, "adherents of the neoclassical approach" argued that sharecropping incentivized laborers by giving them a vested interest in the crop. American plantations were wary of this interest, as they felt that would lead to African Americans demanding rights of partnership. Many black laborers denied

480-404: Is not as exploitative as it is often perceived. John Heath and Hans P. Binswanger write that "evidence from around the world suggests that sharecropping is often a way for differently endowed enterprises to pool resources to mutual benefit, overcoming credit restraints and helping to manage risk." Sharecropping agreements can be made fairly, as a form of tenant farming or sharefarming that has

528-498: The City of Rison , is a city in and the county seat of Cleveland County , Arkansas , United States. Its population was 1,344 at the 2010 U.S. census . It is included in the Pine Bluff, Arkansas Metropolitan Statistical Area . Rison is a bedroom community for people who work in Pine Bluff (in neighboring Jefferson County ). The largest employers are the city and county governments,

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576-721: The Cleveland County School District , the Cleveland County Nursing Home. There are two banks, eight churches, and about forty-five businesses within the city limits. Among the local properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places are the Rison Cities Service Station and the Rison Texaco Service Station . The Texas and St. Louis Railroad gave rise to Rison. The county seat of Dorsey County (present day Cleveland County)

624-522: The German occupying forces . When the news of Martin's survival reached Rison, a wild celebration broke out in streets and homes. Rison is located in north-central Cleveland County . U.S. Route 79 passes through the western side of the city, leading northeast 25 miles (40 km) to Pine Bluff and southwest 17 miles (27 km) to Fordyce . According to the United States Census Bureau ,

672-502: The Phoenix Hotel was built and served as a popular gathering spot for the local community. Three cotton gins operated in and around Rison. The largest and most efficient gin was owned by Ira E. Moore. That gin was built in 1933 to replace one owned by Moore that was built in 1926 and burned in 1933. The more modern and efficient all-electric gin built in 1933 was the first of its kind in the area. Residents of Rison owned and operated

720-476: The Western United States during World War II . By the end of the 1960s, sharecropping had disappeared in the United States. About two-thirds of sharecroppers were white, the rest black. Sharecroppers, the poorest of the poor, organized for better conditions. The racially integrated Southern Tenant Farmers Union made gains for sharecroppers in the 1930s. Sharecropping had diminished in the 1940s due to

768-518: The Great Depression, farm mechanization, and other factors. Sharecropping may have been harmful to tenants, with many cases of high interest rates, unpredictable harvests, and unscrupulous landlords and merchants often keeping tenant farm families severely indebted. The debt was often compounded year on year leaving the cropper vulnerable to intimidation and shortchanging. Nevertheless, it appeared to be inevitable, with no serious alternative unless

816-569: The Naval Ammunition Depot at Camden ( Ouachita County ). Others went to California to work in the shipbuilding industry. The Rison high school's football program was suspended until the end of the war due to a lack of players and coaches, as well as financial constraints. One of Rison's citizens, Airman Roy Martin, was shot down over occupied France and classified as missing in action. The French underground secured his freedom by hiding him in attics, barns, and other places not known to

864-511: The Southern states. It is still used in many rural poor areas of the world today, notably in Pakistan , India , and Bangladesh . In settler colonies of colonial Africa, sharecropping was a feature of the agricultural life. White farmers, who owned most of the land, were frequently unable to work the whole of their farm for lack of capital. They, therefore, had African farmers to work the excess on

912-488: The Southwest Improvement Association, a subsidiary of the railroad company, presented a parcel of land for use by the inhabitants of the area that became Rison. The settlement was incorporated on August 26, 1890, with J. T. Renfrow as mayor. The name of the county was changed from Dorsey to Cleveland in 1885; the popularity of U.S. Senator Stephen Dorsey had waned, and President Grover Cleveland 's name

960-531: The U.S. increased during the Great Depression with the creation of tenant farmers following the failure of many small farms throughout the Dustbowl . Traditional sharecropping declined after mechanization of farm work became economical beginning in the late 1930s and early 1940s. As a result, many sharecroppers were forced off the farms, and migrated to cities to work in factories, or became migrant workers in

1008-587: The United States originated in the Natchez District , roughly centered in Adams County, Mississippi with its county seat, Natchez . After the war, plantations and other lands throughout the South were seized by the federal government. In January 1865, General William T. Sherman issued Special Field Orders No. 15 , which announced that he would temporarily grant newly freed families 40 acres of this seized land on

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1056-629: The antecedents and functions of sharecropping in Africa. Prior to the Civil War, sharecropping is known to have existed in Mississippi and is believed to have been in place in Tennessee . However, it was not until the economic upheaval caused by the American Civil War and the end of slavery during and after Reconstruction that it became widespread in the South. It is theorized that sharecropping in

1104-486: The city has a total area of 2.6 square miles (6.8 km ), all land. As of the 2020 United States census , there were 967 people, 498 households, and 297 families residing in the city. As of the census of 2000, there were 1,271 people, 471 households, and 324 families residing in the city. The population density was 475.1 inhabitants per square mile (183.4/km ). There were 532 housing units at an average density of 198.9 per square mile (76.8/km ). The racial makeup of

1152-596: The city limits of Rison is provided by the Cleveland County School District , which is headquartered in Rison. Students graduate from Rison High School . The district was established by the July 1, 2004, consolidation of the Rison School District and the Kingsland School District . Sharecropping Sharecropping has a long history and there are a wide range of different situations and types of agreements that have used

1200-553: The city was 62.23% White , 33.36% Black or African American , 0.31% Native American , 0.24% Asian , 1.73% from other races , and 2.12% from two or more races. 2.20% of the population were Hispanic or Latino of any race. There were 471 households, out of which 36.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 45.0% were married couples living together, 19.1% had a female householder with no husband present, and 31.2% were non-families. 30.1% of all households were made up of individuals, and 15.3% had someone living alone who

1248-548: The crop was harvested, the planter or merchants who held the lien sold the harvest for the sharecropper and settled the debt. Sociologist Jeffery M. Paige made a distinction between centralized sharecropping found on cotton plantations and the decentralized sharecropping with other crops. The former is characterized by long lasting tenure. Tenants are tied to the landlord through the plantation store . This form of tenure tends to be replaced by paid salaries as markets penetrate. Decentralized sharecropping involves virtually no role for

1296-448: The cropper received half of cash paid for the crop on his parcel. Sharecroppers also often received their farming tools and all other goods from the landowner they were contracted with. Landowners dictated decisions relating to the crop mix, and sharecroppers were often in agreements to sell their portion of the crop back to the landowner, thus being subjected to manipulated prices. In addition to this, landowners, threatening to not renew

1344-408: The croppers left agriculture. Landlords opt for sharecropping to avoid the administrative costs and shirking that occurs on plantations and haciendas . It is preferred to cash tenancy because cash tenants take all the risks, and any harvest failure will hurt them and not the landlord. Therefore, they tend to demand lower rents than sharecroppers. Some economists have argued that sharecropping

1392-419: The inefficiency of agricultural share-contracting. Steven N.S. Cheung (1969), challenged this view, showing that with sufficient competition and in the absence of transaction costs, share tenancy will be equivalent to competitive labor markets and therefore efficient. He also showed that in the presence of transaction costs, share-contracting may be preferred to either wage contracts or rent contracts—due to

1440-448: The islands and coastal regions of Georgia . Many believed that this policy would be extended to all formerly enslaved people and their families as repayment for their treatment at the end of the war. In the summer of 1865, President Andrew Johnson , as one of the first acts of Reconstruction, instead ordered all land under federal control be returned to the owners from whom it had been seized. Southern landowners thus found themselves with

1488-408: The landlord: plots are scattered, peasants manage their own labor and the landowners do not manufacture the crops. This form of tenure becomes more common when markets penetrate. Farmers who farmed land belonging to others but owned their own mule and plow were called tenant farmers ; they owed the landowner a smaller share of their crops, as the landowner did not have to provide them with as much in

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1536-508: The lease at the end of the growing season, were able to apply pressure to their tenants. Sharecropping often proved economically problematic, as the landowners held significant economic control. In the Reconstruction Era, sharecropping was one of few options for penniless freedmen to support themselves and their families. Other solutions included the crop-lien system (where the farmer was extended credit for seed and other supplies by

1584-544: The logs to the mill. Other mills that added significantly to the economy were the J. L. Sadler Lumber Company, the C. L. Garner & Sons Lumber Company, and the Elrod Lumber Company. In the 1950s, Elrod employed about one-third of Rison's population, more than 300. During World War II , many Rison residents secured war-related jobs in nearby towns. These included the Pine Bluff Arsenal ( Jefferson County ) and

1632-463: The merchant entrepreneurs also affecting it somewhat. Nevertheless, family fortunes were built on the owner/sharecropper system, and they influenced the financial and social structure of the town. Sharecropping was the prevailing structure of the primary business enterprise in the county until the land became depleted by failure to rotate crops adequately. The Cleveland County Courthouse was built in 1911 after two contested elections. Two years later,

1680-483: The merchant), a rent labor system (where the farmer rents the land but keeps their entire crop), and the wage system (worker earns a fixed wage but keeps none of their crop). Sharecropping as historically practiced in the American South was more economically productive than the gang system plantations using enslaved workers, though less productive than modern agricultural techniques. Sharecropping continued to be

1728-434: The merchant. If there was any cash left over, the cropper kept it—but if their share came to less than what they owed, they remained in debt. A new system of credit, the crop lien , became closely associated with sharecropping. Under this system, a planter or merchant extended a line of credit to the sharecropper while taking the year's crop as collateral. The sharecropper could then draw food and supplies all year long. When

1776-482: The mitigation of labor shirking and the provision of risk sharing. Joseph Stiglitz (1974, 1988), suggested that if share tenancy is only a labor contract, then it is only pairwise-efficient and that land-to-the-tiller reform would improve social efficiency by removing the necessity for labor contracts in the first place. Reid (1973), Murrel (1983), Roumasset (1995) and Allen and Lueck (2004) provided transaction cost theories of share-contracting, wherein tenancy

1824-524: The old slave ways". Not with standing, many formerly enslaved people, now called freedmen , having no land or other assets of their own, needed to work to support their families. A sharecropping system centered on cotton , a major cash crop , developed as a result. Large plantations were subdivided into plots that could be worked by sharecroppers. Initially, sharecroppers in the American South were almost all formerly enslaved black people, but eventually cash-strapped indigent white farmers were integrated into

1872-424: The production of cotton, lumber, and, ultimately, a wide variety of wood products, including pulpwood, piling, pallets, broom handle squares, ammunition boxes, and Army pup tent poles. The financial make-up of the community was divided for several decades into owners and sharecroppers . The emergence of the timber-related wood products business ultimately skewed that economic picture, with the corresponding rise of

1920-658: The same time, African-Americans managed 106,738 farms as tenants. Around this time, sharecroppers began to form unions protesting against poor treatment, beginning in Tallapoosa County , Alabama in 1931 and Arkansas in 1934. Membership in the Southern Tenant Farmers Union included both blacks and poor whites, who used meetings, protests, and labor strikes to push for better treatment. The success of these actions frightened and enraged landlords, who responded with aggressive tactics. Landless farmers who fought

1968-399: The sharecropper, and usually provided other necessities such as housing, tools, seed, or working animals . Local merchants usually provide food and other supplies to the sharecropper on credit. In exchange for the land and supplies, the cropper would pay the owner a share of the crop at the end of the season, typically one-half to two-thirds. The cropper used his share to pay off their debt to

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2016-618: The sharecropping system were socially denounced, harassed by legal and illegal means, and physically attacked by officials, landlords' agents, or in extreme cases, angry mobs. Sharecroppers' strikes in Arkansas and the Missouri Bootheel , the 1939 Missouri Sharecroppers' Strike, were documented in the newsreel Oh Freedom After While . The plight of a sharecropper was addressed in the song Sharecropper's Blues , recorded by Charlie Barnet and His Orchestra in 1944. The sharecropping system in

2064-410: The system. During Reconstruction, the federal Freedmen's Bureau ordered the arrangements for freedmen and wrote and enforced their contracts. American sharecroppers worked a section of the plantation independently. In South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi, the dominant crop was usually cotton. In other areas it could be tobacco , rice , or sugar . At harvest time the crop was sold and

2112-476: The unilateral authority that landowners hoped to achieve, further complicating relations between landowners and sharecroppers. Sharecropping may allow women to have access to arable land , albeit not as owners, in places where ownership rights are vested only in men. The theory of share tenancy was long dominated by Alfred Marshall 's famous footnote in Book VI, Chapter X.14 of Principles where he illustrated

2160-622: The way of supplies. Historically, sharecropping occurred extensively in Scotland , Ireland and colonial Africa . Use of the sharecropper system has also been identified in England (as the practice of "farming to halves"). It was widely used in the Southern United States during the Reconstruction era (1865–1877) that followed the American Civil War , which was economically devastating to

2208-450: Was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.55 and the average family size was 3.16. In the city, the population was spread out, with 29.3% under the age of 18, 6.8% from 18 to 24, 25.3% from 25 to 44, 19.6% from 45 to 64, and 19.0% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 36 years. For every 100 females, there were 79.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 75.2 males. The median income for

2256-430: Was originally Toledo . When the railroad was routed through the county in 1882, Rison did not exist. Samuel Fordyce of Huntsville, Alabama , a former Union army officer, was authorized to determine the route of the railroad from Texarkana to Birds Point, Missouri . According to unsubstantiated legend, when the leading citizens of Toledo snubbed his plans to route the railroad through that community, Fordyce planned

2304-489: Was substituted. The Arkansas Supreme Court relocated the county seat from Toledo to Rison in 1891 after a spirited battle among the leading contenders, Toledo , Kingsland , and Rison. The railroad remained Rison's point of reference for decades. “Rison on the Cotton Belt” was the affectionate way residents referred to their community. The commercial value of the railroad was felt from the beginning. The economy depended on

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