[freddie_mercury]

> America was an economic backwater until the 1900s.

The US was the largest economy in the world by 1890.

It should be obvious that it wasn't an economic backwater even before that.

By 1850 it bigger than Russia, Italy, Spain, Germany, or France.

The US stopped being an economy backwater sometime in the early 1800s. Well over a century earlier than your claim.

[tzs]

I'd guess that the size of a country's import/export economy is more important than the size of its total economy when it comes to how much a country will influence language in the rest of the world.

Google is refusing to turn up anything useful when I try to find information on when the US became a top importer/exporter.

[freddie_mercury]

The US has always been one of the world's top exporters due to its cotton industry and the cotton boom that started in the 1780s. It is quite likely that the US was a Top 1 or 2 exporter by the time the Constitution was signed in 1789. Remember there were very few manufactured goods yet and not even that much else that was worth importing.

By the 1850s US cotton accounted for 77% of the cotton used in Britain, 90% used in France, 60% used in Germany, and 92% used in Russia.