Rum and axes
Subtitle: the rise of a Connecticut merchant family, 1795-1850
By: Janet Siskind
Series: Anthropology of contemporary issues
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 2002
Place of publication: Ithaca, N.Y
Language: eng
Number of pages: 191
Subjects: Watkinson (Family); Merchants -- Connecticut; Connecticut -- Commerce -- History
Other titles: Rum & axes
Description: "Janet Siskind goes back to the beginnings of industrial capitalism in the United States to better understand the formation of the country's capitalist culture. She studies the papers and letter of three generations of the Watkinson family. The stories of their lives demonstrate how merchants amassed the capital to become industrial entrepreneurs, organized factories and private corporations, and constructed philanthropic and cultural institutions.

The author traces how "upper-class work," the everyday tasks of organizing and maintaining trade or a system of production, shaped the family's experience and New England's culture. The result is an intimate story of social class and capitalism."--BOOK JACKET.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. [179]-188) and index
Table of contents: title: The voyage; title: Capital, kin, and connections; title: Balancing the books; title: Continuity and change; title: The Collins Company; title: Breaking community, building class; title: For their own good