Seeing the Industrial Revolution Through Shaker Colored Glasses

Seeing the Industrial Revolution Through Shaker Colored Glasses

Matthew Laney
Gray-New Gloucester High School
Gray, Maine
2012 NEH Seminar for School Teachers
Historical Interpretations of the Industrial Revolution in Britain

My impetus for participating in this NEH seminar was multi-faceted, but it was mostly a desire to discover more about the origins of the Shaker religion that I teach at my high school. The Shakers can trace their origins at least as far back as industrializing Manchester, England in the 1740s. I would like to place the United Society of Believer's in Christ's Second Appearing, more commonly known as the Shakers in the context of the Industrial Revolution. They were definitely dissenters (not in the mainstream of English society) along with other famous people involved in the Industrial Revolution. From the murky environs of Manchester, a group arose which professed certain things. Whether those ideals were influenced or shaped by the Revolution happening around them is beyond the scope of this project. However, there can be no doubt that the summative transformation of England from a largely agricultural society into one geared towards industrialization must have influenced Shaker theology and practice. The Shakers aren't fatalists, so they fully expected, and demanded, change to better their condition, which is one of the practical reasons why they left for America in 1774.

In the end, the Industrial Revolution can best be characterized through sustained population growth and sustained economic growth. For the Shakers, there really isn't either type of sustained growth in their history. In the beginning, the Shakers did grow. Eventually, their ranks swelled to nearly 6,000 members and some communities thrived. However, that came to a halt around the time of the American Civil War when male members left in droves, communities were forced to retool to take advantage of a mostly female workforce, and, Shaker population growth is, well, practically zero in the grand scheme of things. Their numbers have dwindled from a high of several thousand to just several today.

What follows is my attempt to make connections between what I learned and observed during this seminar about the Industrial Revolution and the Shakers as I seek to preserve their legacy, like that of the Industrial Revolution, in our contemporary society.

Connections Between the Shakers and the Industrial Revolution

Football Names

Let's start with an easy one. A man at the Manchester Cathedral tried to convince me that the Bury Shakers football (soccer) team name comes from the religious Shakers. It does not. A quick check of their website confirms this. When I returned to Maine I told the Shakers about this football team and was disappointed that they already knew of its existence and non-connection with their religion.

Innovation

The Shakers were quick to use devices that saved labor, capital, and resources. At most of their communities, they were the first in their regions to have telephones, electricity, and cars. On the other side of the coin, the Shakers tinkered and innovated with the world around them. They may not have been the people who discovered how to infuse carbon atoms from coke into iron to form steel, but they did innovate with what they had around them.

Patents

There are different accounts on whether the Shakers patented their products or not. For most of their existence, they have shunned patenting ideas. They were granted a little over 100 patents during the mid-1800s, but they viewed patents as monopolistic and selfish. If God gave you an idea, how was it your right to profit exclusively by it. They preferred to give the technology or innovation to the greater good. In our readings, the subject of patents came up. During the Industrial Revolution, the volume of patents increased dramatically. Whether this is due to increased innovation, or the emerging market for ideas, this contrasts with Shaker tradition.

Ostentatiousness

Perhaps the biggest contrast between the Shakers and the people of the Industrial Revolution can be found in how they displayed their success. It can be divided into three segments. First, are the Chatsworth and Haddon Hall country estates. Granted, those predate the Industrial Revolution, but they are ample reminders of what the wealthy did with their funds during the Industrial Revolution. The second style of homes we saw were similar to the Shakers in that they sought to downplay any type of ornamentation. These houses were at the Coalbrookdale settlement and owned by the Abraham Darby family. Yes, they were wealthy people and their homes were beautiful, but they were in keeping with their Quaker and dissenter views of downplaying ostentation. The third type of home we saw was in keeping in line with the realities that the Shakers, and other poor people, faced. The best example of this was at the lead mine in Killhope or the Apprentice House at Styal. I'll use the Apprentice House to illustrate. At the Apprentice House, genders were segregated by floor and the children shared beds. This was so similar to the Boys' Shop at Sabbathday Lake, it was uncanny.

Dissent

Many Dissenters played leading roles in the Industrial Revolution was led by dissenters, people excluded from holding government jobs or attending universities. From adversity comes revolution and the dissenters were the ones who improvised and adapted to overcome obstacles and spawned the Industrial Revolution. In some ways, the Shakers were some of the original dissenters along the same lines as Martin Luther in Germany, the Shakers saw fault with how the established church, in this case the Church of England, was promoting a relationship with God. The Shakers disrupted Anglican services to try and convince others of their folly.

Communalism

For religious and security reasons, the Shakers created communities in their early years and continue that tradition today. They live, work, and relax all within the confines of their settlements. This was first evident in our visit to Arkwright's mill in Cromford. He created a village where his workers could work, live, and relax when possible. I also noted that the Shakers lived together for protection, just like Arkwright built protection around his village.

Success and Failure

One item that seems to be missing from the larger debate over the merits of the Industrial Revolution is the idea of risk. The people who benefited most from the Industrial Revolution were usually the ones who put in the most effort and extended the most risk. I'm reminded of Robert Stephenson who tinkered endlessly with the steam locomotive before making it profitable enough to run. I'm also reminded of the Lead Mine in Killhope that we visited. The guide told us that the boom time for the lead mine was roughly 1850 to 1880 and that the company had invested in a large waterwheel when the lead market prices fell. At Sabbath day Lake in Maine, the Shakers built their largest mill in the 1850s in an attempt to profit from the Crimean War. The War ended before the mill was completely finished and in a bit of poetic justice (or divine wrath) the mill nearly sunk the Community financially. All that is left is the stone foundation.

Monasticism

This may may be a stretch, but in many cases, I felt as if the lives of the worker during the Industrial Revolution became monastic like the Shakers. For example, at the coal mine, the guide talked about the routine of the miners. They awoke at the same time, consumed the same food, lived in similar housing, and performed similar work. The purpose of the “pit town” is indeed very similar to a monastic life.

Shakers in Australia?

In 1774, at the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution, the Shakers boarded the Mariah in Liverpool and sailed to America, landing in New York City and eventually settling near Albany. In a conversation with Australians in the Manchester Cathedral, they posited that the Shakers could have easily ended up in Australia and not the American colonies. They suggest that the Shakers were some of the last “criminals” to be dispatched from England to far off lands. With the beginning of the American Revolution, the English started sending the unwanted to Australia. I'm not sure if I agree, but it got me thinking.

Child Labor

The Shakers, like others during the Industrial Revolution, relied on child labor for their success. The Shakers adopted children as their membership dwindled as a way to find farm labor. This was the case until the 1950s in Maine when it became illegal for religious communities to adopt children. I liked how many of the museums we visited focused on the lives of children and how they were impacted by the Revolution. Whether this was designed to attract elementary school students, or a serious historic undertaking, it made an important point.

Pacifism and Militarism

The Industrial Revolution brought many benefits to the world: an increased standard of living, advanced technologies, improved transportation, and better communication to name a few. However, it also brought an increase in militarism. It exacerbated the natural rivalries among the European nations and eventually the whole world. When one builds a large army, one tends to want to use the large army to promote its nationalistic goals. For modern Shakers, militarism is bad and pacifism is good.

Charles Dickens

Six years after publishing the Pickwick Papers, Charles Dickens was an international celebrity. To cash in on his celebrity, he toured the United States, and in the spring of 1842, Dickens found himself at the Mount Lebanon Shaker Village near Albany New York. Instead of viewing the Shakers as the epitome of balance between industry and agriculture. Dickens blasted them as anachronistic and foul. The theory is that Dickens was upset because the Shakers did not receive him as he expected. He wanted celebrity treatment and they treated him as a normal human.

Hard Times

Another Dickens connection has to do with the novel Hard Times. He wrote the book a dozen years after first meeting the Shakers in New York. For starters, it has to be Dickens' shortest novel, a sign of increased efficiency. However, most of the story takes place in an urban setting, Coketown, and not in the urban landscape where you would find the Shakers. One theme that Dickens seemed to write about was how the pursuit of an industrial society focused too much on numbers and averages, not on the finer things in life. This is an interesting example in that it relates to the Shakers' pursuit of a perfect society on earth although they had to perfect the art of capitalism to achieve this goal, sort of like Marx and Engels relying on the profits of industry to fund their creation of Communist philosophy.

Mills

One aspect that we study in our classroom is the development of mills at the Village in New Gloucester, Maine. We can trace the development of the mills from the first mill and it's flutter wheel all the way up to the Great Mill, which was built in the 1850s to produce large quantities of processed wood. All that's left now is some indentations in the ground alongside the stream and crumbling stone foundations and a raceway at the Great Mill. I often talked about overshot and undershot and breast water wheels, but until you see one in person, in action, you have no idea the power, noise, and impression that these huge mechanisms make. The Shakers were not wealthy enough to use steam power for industry and so basically made the jump from large-scale water powered industry to small-scale electric powered industry. They would like me to point out that the Shakers used wind power to run well pumps in New Gloucester. We did see some modern windmills, but they were presumably used for electricity generation, not industry.

Gender Equality

The Shakers have long been known for their attitude towards gender equality. From having a woman as their first leader to treating men and women equally to not forcing women to bear and raise children, they have long espoused gender equality. I saw glimpses of 18th and 19th Century gender equality during the seminar. Unfortunately, I spent the day we discussed Honeyman's article in the Manchester Cathedral Archives. She writes about how the Industrial Revolution defined gender roles through the responsibilities women assumed and the occupations they pursued. She also explained how women were excluded from the more skilled trades. The Shakers, similarly, defined the responsibilities of women to domestic pursuits, but able bodied women would also often find themselves working gardens, orchards, and with the animals. Furthermore, as more and more men left the Shaker communities during and following the Civil War, women assumed very skilled crafts, called the 'fancy goods industry.' They sewed, knitted, spun, and sold their goods independent of men. The Shakers were also one of the first societies in the United States to allow women equal responsibilities in politics. Women led several communities and even dabbled in national peace movements in the early 1900s.

Celibacy

One of the greater misconceptions about the Shakers centers around celibacy. Perhaps it is because I teach adolescents, but adults also have as many misconceptions. It's usually the first thing that people want to talk about when they discover the classes I teach. To a Shaker, celibacy is the least of their problems. In fact, of all the things a person may quit the religion over, celibacy is not really one of them. In fact, as the Shakers often say, “It's not like we spring celibacy on them when they arrive” (Often, people leave over the principle of communalism and the lack of individuality). So, how does this connect with the Industrial Revolution? Good question. Ummmm, how about if more people were celibate, there would be less child labor? Celibacy would prevent primogeniture. Family structures would also be non-existent. You wouldn't have to house men and women separately in the same building. None of those are any good. I guess the only connection between celibacy and this seminar is that I had to explain how Shakers aren't overly concerned about celibacy 15 different times to 15 different teachers.