Abstract
ABSTRACT Drawing on regional price data, prison calendars, poorhouse records, and insolvent debtor petitions, this article considers the lives and material conditions of Jacksonian-era Cumberland County workingmen. While much attention has been paid to the state's destitute urban populations, much less scholarship has been devoted to offering a comparable analysis of the economic lives of nonagricultural rural laborers. By examining the causes and consequences of insolvency and by constructing a detailed picture of insolvent laborers' material conditions, this article offers greater insight into the lives of impoverished rural laboring men and, in so doing, demonstrates a clear uniformity in the economic experiences of rural and urban workers living in Jacksonian Era Pennsylvania. Indeed, if economic historians have demonstrated a convergence of urban and rural prices and wages in the antebellum era, the petitions and petitioners speak to a similar alignment in the material lives of urban and rural workers.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
More From: Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.