Rockdale: The Growth of an American Village in the Early Industrial Revolution

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U of Nebraska Press, Jan 1, 2005 - History - 553 pages
A celebrated triumph of historiography, Rockdale tells the story of the Industrial Revolution as it was experienced by the men, women, and children of the cotton-manufacturing town of Rockdale, Pennsylvania. The lives of workers, managers, inventors, owners, and entrepreneurs are brilliantly illuminated by Anthony F. C. Wallace, who also describes the complex technology that governed all of Rockdale?s townspeople. Wallace examines the new relationships between employer and employee as work and workers moved out of the fields into the closed-in world of the spinning mule, the power loom, and the mill office. He brings to light the impassioned battle for the soul of the mill worker, a struggle between the exponents of the Enlightenment and Utopian Socialism, on the one hand, and, on the other, the ultimately triumphant champions of evangelical Christianity.
 

Contents

Sweet Quiet Rockdale
3
SLEEPY HOLLOW DAYS
8
THE LORDS OF THE VALLEY
11
The Mills and the Mill Hamlets
13
The Cotton Lords
16
THE SISTERHOOD
22
A Town of Mules and Widows
33
General Facts About the Manufacturing District
36
The Network of InLaws
225
THE FRANKLIN INSTITUTE
227
The Founding of the Franklin Institute
229
The Committee on Water Power
233
THINKING ABOUT MACHINERY
237
THE ENLIGHTENMENTS LAST CAMPAIGN
243
THE FREETHINKERS OF CHESTER CREEK
246
John S Phillips the open Infidel
247

General Facts About the Mill Hamlets
37
The Uniqueness of Each Mill Hamlet
41
THE SOCIAL STATIONS
44
The Managerial Class
45
The Level of Poor Professionals Small Farmers Storekeepers and Master Craftsmen
56
The Working Class
58
THE FORMS OF THE FAMILY IN A COTTONMANUFACTURING DISTRICT
65
THE ASSEMBLING OF THE INDUSTRIALISTS
73
THE FIRST ARRIVALS
74
William Martin Jr
75
John S Phillips
77
John P Crozer
79
John D Carter
84
THE FIRST CASUALTIES AND REPLACEMENTS
86
Peter Hill and the Sellers Family
87
Daniel Lammot Jr
91
Samuel and James Riddle
98
THE SMITH FAMILY
101
Clementina and Sophie
104
THE MECHANICAL KNOWLEDGE OF THE INDUSTRIALISTS
113
Books Articles Conversation and Travel
114
Experience in England
117
ENTERING THE COTTON MANUFACTURE IN THE 1820s
119
THE MACHINES PHEIR OPERATIVES AND THE FABRICS
124
THE MILLS AND MILL SEATS
125
The Buildings
129
Gears Shafts Pulleys and Belts
131
THE SPINNING MACHINERY
134
The Picker House
136
The Card Room
137
The Frames for Preparing the Roving
138
The Throstle
139
The Mule
140
Warping Balling Spooling and Dyeing
143
THE WEAVING MACHINERY
144
THE MACHINE SHOPS
147
Working in a Machine Shop in the
148
Machine Shops in the Rockdale District
150
The Garsed Manufactory of Power Looms
152
John Hydes Contract for Making Four Mules
154
Local Assembly of Imported Parts
155
Patent Machinery from Distant Manufacturers
156
COMMERCIAL ASPECTS OF COTTON MANUFACTURING
158
The Quality of the Product
159
Buying and Selling
160
The Shift to Complete Process Factories
163
WORKING IN PARKMOUNT MILL IN 1832
164
The December 12 1832 Cohort of Workers
171
The Organization of Work in the Factory
177
Physical Working Conditions
181
THE FABRICS OF CHESTER CREEK
183
THE INVENTORS OF THE MACHINES
186
THE MAIN SEQUENCE OF INVENTIONS
188
The SelfActing Mule
189
Improvements in the Throstle
196
Richard Garsed and Improvements in the Power Loom
198
THE LESSER INVENTORS OF CHESTER CREEK
200
John S Phillips and His Filter for Turbid Liquors
201
The Riddles and Their Sizing Trough
203
The Duttons and the New Planet
204
Thomas Odiorne Henry Moore and Their Old Sable Works
207
Nathan Sellers and the Making of Card Teeth
210
THE INTERNATIONAL FRATERNITY OF MECHANICIANS
211
The Philadelphia Mechanicians
214
The Network Outside Philadelphia
217
The Size of the Fraternity
219
THE SELLERS FAMILY
220
Minshall and Jacob Painter and the Delaware County Institute of Science
250
The Workers
254
The Hecklers
256
The Pennsylvania Constitution 01776
257
Jeffersonian Republicans Freethinkers and New Lights
259
French Educators in the Enlightenment Tradition
263
The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia
270
The Associationists in Philadelphia and Wilmington
273
PREACHING THE NEW MORAL WORLD
275
Lafayette and Fanny Wright
276
The Advance on New Harmony
277
The Valley Forge Commune
284
Craft Unions and the Workingmen s Party
289
THE THEORY OF COMMUNAL INDUSTRIALISM
293
THE EVANGELICAL COUNTERATTACK
296
CALVARY CHURCH IN ROCKDALE
298
The Congregation
303
The Message from Calvary
306
Evangelical Womanhood
312
THE BENEVOLENT WORK OF OTHER MANUFACTURERS
318
James Riddle and the Methodists
322
The Society of Friends
323
Daniel Lammot the New Church and Fourierism
324
MORAL ORDER IN THE MILLS
326
Work Rules in Cotton Factories
327
Creating an Ethical System for the Workers
332
THE RISE OF POLITICAL ANTIMASONRY
337
John Speakman and the Pittsburgh Society of Deists
338
Anne Royall and the blueskinned Presbyterians
339
Edward Darlington and the AntiMasonic Party
341
The Odiornes and the Meaning of AntiMasonry
342
DEFEATING THE INFIDELS ON CHESTER CREEK
347
THE EMERGENCE OF CHRISTIAN INDUSTRIALISM
350
THE RECESSION OF 1834 TO 1842
351
THE STRIKES OF 1836 AND 1842
355
The Strike in 1836
356
The Strike in 1842
359
The Meaning of the Strikes
365
THE GREAT FLOOD
374
THE REDEFINITION OF THE COTTON MILL OPERATIVE
380
The Depoliticizing of Labor
383
Management Skills as the Pathway to Success
386
THE TEN HOURS LAW
388
THE THEORY OF CHRISTIAN CAPITALISM
394
MARCHING TO MILLENNIUM
401
THE ECONOMIC TAKEOFF
402
The Rise of Workingmen to Wealth in the Rockdale District
408
THE POLITICS OF THE MANUFACTURING INTEREST
412
The Second Bank of the United States and the Delaware County Memorial
418
Tariff Free Soil and Slavery
422
The ManufacturerPoliticians
424
MISSIONS AND THE MILLENNIAL PASSION
430
Missionary Zeal
435
The Millennial Transformation
446
ARMAGEDDON
455
Signs and Portents
456
Rockdale in the Civil War
459
Hatties Boys
467
ENVOI
472
Paradigmatic Processes in Culture Change
477
ABBREVIATIONS
487
Bibliography
515
NEWSPAPERS AND JOURNALS
517
PUBLISHED WRITINGS BY ROCKDALERS AND OTHER NINETEENTHCENTURY OBSERVERS
518
SCHOLARLY AND TECHNICAL BOOKS AND ARTICLES
524
Index
535
Copyright

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About the author (2005)

Anthony F. C. Wallace is University Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at the University of Pennsylvania. His many books include Revitalizations and Mazeways, Modernity and Mind, and The Social Context of Innovation, all published by the University of Nebraska Press.

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