Slavery was its fuel. Many stakeholders benefited from the cotton economy — plantation owners in the South, banks in the North, shipping merchants, and the textile industry in Great Britain.

Until her death 85 years ago on January 13, 1940, Matilda was the last surviving passenger on the last-ever slave ship bound ...

In the lower South the majority of slaves lived and worked on cotton plantations ... their work appeared to be easier than that of the "field slaves," in some ways it was not.

but their supply of cotton came from the slave-reliant south. Brands like Brooks Brothers, the oldest men's clothier in the US, turned southern cotton into high-end fashion. Domino's Sugar ...