Forging America
Subtitle: ironworkers, adventurers, and the industrious revolution
By: John Bezís-Selfa.
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 2004
Place of publication: Ithaca, N.Y
Language: eng
Number of pages: 279
Subjects: Iron industry and trade -- United States -- History -- 18th century.; Work ethic -- United States -- History.; United States -- History -- Revolution, 1775-1783.
Description: "Forging America illuminates the fate of labor in an era when industry, manhood, and independence began to take on new and highly charged meanings. John Bezis-Selfa argues that the iron industry, with its early concentration of capital and labor, reveals the close links between industrial and political revolution. Through means ranging from religious exhortation to force, ironmasters encouraged or compelled workers - free, indentured, and enslaved - to adopt new work styles and standards of personal industry."--Jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 231-267) and index.
Table of contents: title: Mastered by the furnace; title: Part 1: Iron and empire: the colonial era; title: Molding men; title: Passages through the ledgers; title: The best poor man's country; title: Part 2: Iron and nation: the early republic; title: Industrial slavery domesticated; title: Manufacturing free labor.