Download or read book The Second Great Emancipation written by Donald Holley and published by University of Arkansas Press. This book was released on 2000-07-01 with total page 309 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In The Second Great Emancipation, Donald Holley uses statistical and narrative analysis to demonstrate that farm mechanization occurred in the Delta region of Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi after the region’s population of farm laborers moved away for new opportunities. Rather than pushing labor off the land, Holley argues, the mechanical cotton picker enabled the continuation of cotton cultivation in the post-plantation era, opening the door for the civil rights movement, while ushering a period of prosperity into the South.