Sailors’ Snug Harbor: A Landscape of Gender and Power

Abstract

Sailors’ Snug Harbor was a nineteenth century private charitable institution on the northern shore of Staten Island in what is now one of the boroughs of New York City (Fig. 8.1). It was the first home built specifically for retired seamen in the United States (Hardin 1983). This chapter focuses on the complex power dynamics reflected in this institution’s gendered landscape. Gendered landscapes can be found in diverse archaeological locations including residential sites, work places, military sites, religious sites, and institutional settings such as reformatories, prisons, and almshouses. Sailors’ Snug Harbor evolved within the context of almshouses in the colonial and early national periods, but unlike most almshouses that served both men and women, Sailors’ Snug Harbor was established exclusively for males. But because Sailors’ Snug Harbor employed women as well as men, its history reflects a gendered landscape within which issues of power and class were played out.