Wooden packaging for shipping across the globe began with the settlement of Jamestown in North America. From there, timber production began to rise and spread across the globe. Wood was a valuable resource and wooden packaging was the most common way to transport all kinds of commodities.
As soon as colonists landed in the Chesapeake in 1607, they build a small boat and launched it to explore rivers and creeks. It was also used for trading and transporting tobacco in ships. This began the importance of timber in the New World for constructing ships to carry goods to other colonies and back to Britain.
Shipbuilding in the Virginia colony became simple, carried out by plantation owners. They were constructed along the bank of a stream with water deep enough to let the vessel float as it was being built. The Virginia colony also had access to high quality timber with ways to transport the materials. The boat building business faltered in 1622 when a massacre killed many builders.
Financiers were worried about the colony's ability to return the investment. The New England company and the Massachusetts Company sent ship builders to jump start shipbuilding again. Boston and Charlestown became known as shipbuilding capitals in North America.
Those who built ships received two shilling exemptions off export duties per tobacco shipment. They were also exempt from castle duties, had a two pence reduction of imported liquor, and were exempted from duties on entering and clearing ports.
White oaks were the best for shipbuilding and wooden packaging. Cedars, chestnuts, and black oaks were used for the underwater portion of the ships because of their impermeability to liquids, shock resistance, strength, durability, and decay resistant properties.
Investors in the colonies were not happy with the return on investment for timber production, even though they were making a great deal of profit. Colonists required higher wages than serfs in England, and transatlantic shipping was very expensive and time consuming. Boston ports charged forty to fifty shillings for shipment while Baltic outposts only charged nine.
England experienced a timber crisis with competition from the Dutch. The Navigation Acts of 1651 restricted North America from exporting to any other country besides England. Denmark then stormed British ships as they sailed in the Baltic Sea transporting timber cargo. Even though England preferred North European fir, they instead started shipping North American white pine.
White pine was considered more resilient, lighter in weight, and larger. This made the white pine a worthwhile investment for shipping costs. White pine was used in English shipbuilding to make them stronger against Dutch attacks, whose ships had the far less superior fir from Europe.
There were many naval stores and good timber in North America, allowing colonists to make ships that were 30 percent cheaper than English shipbuilding. This made wooden ships and wooden packaging the most profitable manufactured export during the colonial period.
Over 90 percent of New England pines that were harvested were unsuitable for ships. This created a huge domestic lumber industry with the ship rejects. Lumber was used for merchantable boards, joists, and structural lumber. More colonial entrepreneurs were switching to the domestic lumber industry instead of the international one, making England worried about the profit and resource of their shipbuilding material.
War with the Baltics also prevented England from getting timber from other sources. Essentially, England implemented a new charter saying the Crown owned most of the trees in North America. They demanded they all be shipped overseas, even if they could not be used for shipbuilding.
The charter was impossible to enforce, causing the domestic timber industry to continue to boom. Wood became an essential resource in North America. It was used for just about everything, especially wood packaging to hold goods in stores, in the home, and for shipment to other colonies where immense profits were made. Even with trade disagreements with England, timber trade continues from North America to other colonies thanks to loopholes in the Navigation Acts.
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