The New Middle Kingdom
Johnson, Kendall A. (Associate Professor of American Studies and Head of the School of Modern Languages and Cultures, University of Hong Kong)
In the imaginations of early Americans, the Middle Kingdom was the wealthiest empire in the world. Its geographical distance did not deter commercial aspirations¿rather, it inspired them. Starting in the late eighteenth century, merchants from New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Salem, Newport, and elsewhere cast speculative lines to China. The resulting fortunes shaped the cultural foundation of the early republic and funded westward frontier exp...