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"I Was Sure of Getting a Trade": John Fitch's Long Journey Towards Becoming an Artisan

Read the Fine Print
Author:
Subject:
Humanities
Institution Name:
American Social History Project/Center for History and New Media
Collection:
Many Pasts (CHNM/ASHP)
Grade Level:
Secondary, Post-secondary
Abstract:

In colonial America, apprenticeship was the usual means by which young men entered a trade and master craftsmen obtained the labor necessary to staff their workshops. A young man's guardian signed an indenture (contract) for a period of time and the apprentice in turn was to receive food, lodging, and knowledge of "the mysteries of the trade," or traditional craft practices. For young John Fitch of Connecticut in the 1760s, anxious "to learn a trade" and "subsist myself in a genteel way when I came for myself," that exchange was no simple matter. The Cheney brothers, Connecticut clockmakers who were innovated in making moving wooden clocks that were far cheaper than the usual brass ones, were not eager to share either their dinner or their knowledge of clockmaking with Fitch. He found himself caught between his father's and his master's patriarchal expectations of receiving his labor, while he had to worry about how he would support himself when he came of age.

Languages:
English
Material Type:
Primary Source
Media Format:
Text/HTML
Conditions of Use:
Custom License
Fair Use for educational purposes
Copyright Holder:
Copyright 1998-2005 American Social History Productions, Inc. All rights reserved.

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