| Farmers and Fishermen: Two Centuries of Work in Essex County, Massachusetts, 1630-1850 Contributor(s): Vickers, Daniel (Author) |
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ISBN: 0807844586 ISBN-13: 9780807844588 Publisher: Omohundro Institute and University of North C OUR PRICE: $40.38 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: December 1994 Annotation: Daniel Vickers examines the shifting labor strategies used by colonists as New England evolved from a string of frontier settlements to a mature society on the brink of industrialization. Lacking a means to purchase slaves or hire help, seventeenth-century settlers adapted the labor systems of Europe to cope with the shortages of capital and workers they encountered on the edge of the wilderness. As their world developed, changes in labor arrangements paved the way for the economic transformations of the nineteenth century. By reconstructing the work experiences of thousands of farmers and fishermen in eastern Massachusetts, Vickers identifies who worked for whom and under what terms. Seventeenth-century farmers, for example, maintained patriarchal control over their sons largely to assure themselves of a labor force. The first generation of fish merchants relied on a system of clientage that bound poor fishermen to deliver their hauls in exchange for goods. Toward the end of the colonial period, land scarcity forced farmers and fishermen to search for ways to support themselves through wage employment and home manufacture. Out of these adjustments, says Vickers, emerged a labor market sufficient for industrialization. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - History | United States - State & Local - New England (ct, Ma, Me, Nh, Ri, Vt) - Sports & Recreation - Political Science | Labor & Industrial Relations |
| Dewey: 974.45 |
| LCCN: 93-36514 |
| Series: Published by the Omohundro Institute of Early American Histo |
| Physical Information: 0.79" H x 5.63" W x 9.7" (1.14 lbs) 372 pages |
| Themes: - Geographic Orientation - Massachusetts - Cultural Region - New England |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: Daniel Vickers examines the shifting labor strategies used by colonists as New England evolved from a string of frontier settlements to a mature society on the brink of industrialization. Lacking a means to purchase slaves or hire help, seventeenth-century settlers adapted the labor systems of Europe to cope with the shortages of capital and workers they encountered on the edge of the wilderness. As their world developed, changes in labor arrangements paved the way for the economic transformations of the nineteenth century. By reconstructing the work experiences of thousands of farmers and fishermen in eastern Massachusetts, Vickers identifies who worked for whom and under what terms. Seventeenth-century farmers, for example, maintained patriarchal control over their sons largely to assure themselves of a labor force. The first generation of fish merchants relied on a system of clientage that bound poor fishermen to deliver their hauls in exchange for goods. Toward the end of the colonial period, land scarcity forced farmers and fishermen to search for ways to support themselves through wage employment and home manufacture. Out of these adjustments, says Vickers, emerged a labor market sufficient for industrialization. |
Contributor Bio(s): Vickers, Daniel: - Daniel Vickers is currently Chair of the Maritime Studies Research Unit at Memorial University of Newfoundland. |