The value of the wheat and corn crops of the Northwest increased from $80,000,000 in 1850 to $225,000,000 in 1860. In addition to this the Northwest produced pork in great quantities for the cotton plantations, and fresh meats for the industrial cities of the East. The railways, of which mention has already been made, thus brought the isolated farmers of the Western interior into close contact with the markets of the world, and the Northwest was fast becoming the food-producing region of the country and at the same time exporting grain worth at least $50,000,000 a year. In New York, Pennsylvania, and other Eastern States the corn and wheat output steadily declined between 1850 and 1860, while the up-country of the South failed to produce the foodstuffs needed by the planters. Thus the manufacturing and the older staple-producing States came to rely on the Northwest for a large part of their provisions. Western farmers were now well-to-do. They deserted their log cabins and built frame houses; they bought large quantities of the finer goods of the East. Pianos made in Germany and silks from France found their way to Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa. Villages became towns and towns grew rapidly into cities. Pittsburg, Cincinnati, Cleveland, and Chicago imitated the ways and manners of Boston and New York. It was a busy, ambitious life that animated the West and produced industrial leaders like Cyrus McCormick, William B. Ogden, and John Y. Scammon, and politicians like Stephen A. Douglas, Salmon P. Chase, and the Dodges of Iowa and Wisconsin. But in this busy region with its self-sufficing agriculture, the actual surplus capital, as in the South, found its way to Eastern cities. With a population of nearly 8,000,000 and foreign exports of more than $50,000,000, the Northwest still had only $10,425,000 on deposit in her banks and $27,000,000 invested in banking enterprises. Her _per capita_ circulation was only $4. Here as in the South the amount of specie in the banks was twice as great in proportion to population and the volume of business transacted as in the East. The debts of the Northwest to the East and to Europe cannot well be estimated, but they were enormous. States, counties, and corporations owed hundreds of millions, and when the interest on these obligations was paid at the end of each year, the remaining net increase was small indeed. The West had been badly in debt during the Jackson period; it was still in debt.