The Importance of Woodworking In Colonial America
You are called to build a house. It's a big house, and you'll need all your tools, but you will be paid fairly. You are the colonial woodworker. The colonial woodworker was very important in the colonies. Woodworking provided jobs, houses, and skilled tradesmen ready to fix a broken structure. Anything made of wood was most likely built by a woodworker. The woodworker used various tools to make different cuts and shapes in wood. Woodworkers used many different types of wood for different pieces of furniture. Woodworking in Colonial America provided houses and jobs for colonists.
“Woodworker” is a very broad term for a large number of jobs. Anything made out of wood was made by some type of woodworker. The carpenter was responsible for building houses. He made planks out of logs. He used the planks to make shingles and boards, which were given to the joiner so he could finish the roof. The joiner was responsible for finishing the house. He made doors, windows, and roofs with shingles. There was the cabinetmaker, who was responsible for making a wide variety of furniture. This included cabinets, dressers, candlestands, chairs, and tables. The carpenter was the head craftsman, but he had many slaves and other people working for him. This shows that the woodworker had a very wide variety of tasks to do. Woodworking provided employment for many settlers. The woodworker could not do all of these tasks with just his hands, he needed tools.
The woodworker had many tools to help him get the job done. Among them, he used saws to cut. Saws were not new tools. They had been used for over 5,000 years by the time the colonial woodworker utilized them. He used different types of sa...
... middle of paper ...
...e of woodworker used different tools and varieties of wood to create different products. The woodworker was paid a fair amount of money for his job. Even though the importance of the woodworker has shortened because of factories, the woodworker still has importance in the society today. If you need a nice piece of furniture or wood floor done, you can confidently ask a Woodworker.
Works Cited
Colonial Williamsburg. History, 30 Apr. 2012. Web. 8 Oct. 2013. .
Kalman, Bobbie. Historic Communities Tools And Gadgets. Illus. Antoinette Cook DeBiasi. N.p.: Crabtree, 1992. Print.
Lukes, Bonnie L. Colonial America. San Diego, CA: Lucent, 2000. Print.
Tunis, Edwin. Colonial Living. London, UK: The John Hopkins University Press, 1951. Print.
Williamsburg Interpreter. Personal interview. 26 Oct. 2013.
Looking at the early English colonies in the Chesapeake Bay region, it’s clear that the English had not learned any lessons from their experiences at Roanoke. Poor planning, a bad location, unrealistic expectations, flawed leadership, unsuccessful relations with the local Indians, and no hope of finding the mineral wealth the Spanish found in Mexico, all contributed to failure. The first colonists in the Chesapeake region were not only ignorant, lazy and unambitious, but their attempts were hampered before they had begun. However, a solution to these problems was found in a single plant: tobacco. Nevertheless, this cash crop ultimately created numerous problems for the colonists. The ignorance and indolent acts of the Chesapeake colonists to unsuccessfully restore the colony by themselves led to the demise of the colony as a whole especially regarding the planting of agricultural goods for food.
Mrozowski, Stephen A. "Creole Materialities: Archaeological Explorations Of Hybridized Realities On A North American Plantation." Journal Of Historical Sociology 23.1 (2010): 16-39. Academic Search Complete. 27 Apr. 2014. Web.
consciousness of artisans in New York City during the Jacksonian period. (pp. 14 & 25) The pre-industrial revolutions of the 1800s provided many avenues of employment for masters, journeymen, and laborers; however, the transformation of a merchant capitalist economy provided for many masters to subdivide labor. (pp. 113) Contracted work caused a rift in the structure of the old artisanal class. Masters no longer needed to employ apprentices since they hired out separate tradesmen for the...
In 1750 workers would do the same thing such as making shoes. Their means of production would simply be small tools. In 1850 they would do many boring things instead of just one.
The Chattahoochee Legacy Hall provides a timeline of history from the first civilizations to the modern day. When first entering I encountered a 15 foot alligator that was illegally killed and preserved and enclosed in a glass case, Oscar the Alligator is a fitting name. Down the hall I encountered an old slave house, where I met Cicero, a young slave who claimed the house was his. He spoke about Horace King and his great building skills. Across from the house, I noticed a beautiful red ceremonial beaded sash. According to the information next to the display I learned it was carried by a Yuchi chief named Sakasemyer, who snuck it through the Trail of Tears. Next to that was a school house, this exhibit was a favorite when I would visit the museum as a child. It is a one-room school complete with a large chalkboard in front behind the teacher’s desk and a smaller one on each of the sixteen desks. The detail is decent, upon walking in I heard an echo from the wooden floors and I noticed a bucket of coal for warming the room in the winter months. On the chalkboard assignments were listed for each particular grade level. The next era i...
Kelso, D. H. (2005, May 18). Williams Bradford. Retrieved February 28, 2011, from Pilgrim Hall Museum - Americac's Museum of Pilgrim Possessions: www.pilgrimhall.org/bradfordwilliam.htm
In the 1800's the construction of cotton mills brought about a new phenomenon in American labor. The owners needed a new source of labor to tend these water powered machines and looked to women. Since these jobs didn't need strength or special skills th...
The Industrial Revolution in America began to develop in the mid-eighteen hundreds after the Civil War. Prior to this industrial growth the work force was mainly based in agriculture, especially in the South (“Industrial Revolution”). The advancement in machinery and manufacturing on a large scale changed the structure of the work force. Families began to leave the farm and relocate to larger settings to work in the ever-growing industries. One area that saw a major change in the work force was textile manufacturing. Towns in the early nineteen hundreds were established around mills, and workers were subjected to strenuous working conditions. It would take decades before these issues were addressed. Until then, people worked and struggled for a life for themselves and their families. While conditions were harsh in the textile industry, it was the sense of community that sustained life in the mill villages.
These slaves had different tasks. The women would often do chores around the home or plantation, such as prepare food, wash clothes, and clean. They would also work on the agricultural crop the owner would be growing. The majority of men would typically worked in the plantations crop fields and herd animals.
During the late 16th century and into the 17th century, European nations rapidly colonized the newly discovered Americas. England in particular sent out numerous groups to the eastern coast of North America to two regions. These two regions were known as the Chesapeake and the New England areas. Later, in the late 1700's, these two areas would bond to become one nation. Yet from the very beginnings, both had very separate and unique identities. These differences, though very numerous, spurred from one major factor: the very reason the settlers came to the New World. This affected the colonies in literally every way, including economically, socially, and politically.
Pre-industrial labor mostly consisted of farming and agriculture involving the entire family. In 1823, 97 percent of all Americans still lived in farms therefore the rural population and workforce was much larger than the urban population and workforce. The production and growing of food was used by the...
the crafts of stonecutting, brick making and carpentry to carry out the work of construction. The only things he had to get elsewhere were the intricate fittings like brass locks and doorknobs or glass.
During the childhood of Sanders, as father and son performed their own carpentry tasks, the two were able to bond and spend quality time together doing something both enjoyed. This passion and joy of carpentry is also shown through the children of Sanders. His son and daughter ended up doing the same things he did as a child, such as creating porcupines of wood and nails, making sawdust highways, and learning how to use carpentry tools (par. 13). In this way, carpentry was used as a good way for father and children to spend time together; advice was given, but not many restrictions were placed down, which left room for freedom of creativity, exploration, and
Life was hard, everyone had to endure hardships in order to meet the daily challenges of survival. Most people (those who weren’t rich) had to start from scratch with nothing but uncultivated land, only the crown and the church had the already cultivated valuable land. Why did people come here? They came here because they were promised with a better life in Canada. Though this was the case for many colonists, they still had to put a lot of effort on to not only their land, but also on their families for the sake of surviving. Most men worked outside, usually either constructing, farming, hunting, chopping trees, chopping wood (for warmth near the fireplace), or just simply managing their own lands. They had to use nothing but their hands and
The local industry exchanged flour, lumber, bricks, furniture, wagons, coffins, shoes, and ironware, all of which were produced at small mills and shops. All materials were produced locally; even the iron was smelted in town. In addition to craftsmen, jobs were available as lawyers, bankers, land office officials, tax collectors, sheriffs, teachers, and politicians.