Early American Technology: Making and Doing Things From the Colonial Era to 1850 - Softcover

 
9780807844847: Early American Technology: Making and Doing Things From the Colonial Era to 1850
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0807844845 ISBN 13: 9780807844847
Publisher: The University of North Carolina Press, 1994

Synopsis

This collection of original essays documents technology's centrality to the history of early America. Unlike much previous scholarship, this volume emphasizes the quotidian rather than the exceptional: the farm household seeking to preserve food or acquire tools, the surveyor balancing economic and technical considerations while laying out a turnpike, the woman of child-bearing age employing herbal contraceptives, and the neighbors of a polluted urban stream debating issues of property, odor, and health. These cases and others drawn from brewing, mining, farming, and woodworking enable the authors to address recent historiographic concerns, including the environmental aspects of technological change and the gendered nature of technical knowledge. Brooke Hindle's classic 1966 essay on early American technology is also reprinted, and his view of the field is reassessed. A bibliographical essay and summary of Hindle's bibliographic findings conclude the volume. The contributors are Judith A. McGaw, Robert C. Post, Susan E. Klepp, Michal McMahon, Patrick W. O'Bannon, Sarah F. McMahon, Donald C. Jackson, Robert B. Gordon, Carolyn C. Cooper, and Nina E. Lerman.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Author

Judith A. McGaw is associate professor of the history of technology at the University of Pennsylvania. She is author of Most Wonderful Machine: Mechanization and Social Change in Berkshire Paper Making, 1801-1885.

From the Back Cover

This collection of original essays documents technology's centrality to the history of early America. Unlike much previous scholarship, this volume emphasizes the quotidian rather than the exceptional.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Publisher
The University of North Carolina Press
Publication date
1994
Language
English
ISBN 10 
0807844845
ISBN 13 
9780807844847
Binding
Paperback
Number of pages
494
Editor
McGaw

Other Popular Editions of the Same Title

9780807821732: Early American Technology: Making and Doing Things from the Colonial Era to 1850 (Published for the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Virginia)

Featured Edition

ISBN 10:  080782173X ISBN 13:  9780807821732
Publisher: The University of North Carolina..., 1994
Softcover