Download The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross
Is The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross publication your favourite reading? Is fictions? Just how's concerning record? Or is the very best vendor unique your option to fulfil your spare time? And even the politic or spiritual books are you searching for currently? Here we go we provide The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross book collections that you require. Great deals of numbers of books from several fields are provided. From fictions to scientific research and also spiritual can be searched and learnt here. You may not fret not to discover your referred publication to review. This The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross is one of them.
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross
Download The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross
Some people may be chuckling when taking a look at you reading The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross in your extra time. Some may be admired of you. And also some could really want be like you who have reading pastime. What concerning your own feeling? Have you felt right? Checking out The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross is a requirement and also a leisure activity at once. This problem is the on that particular will certainly make you really feel that you should review. If you recognize are seeking the book entitled The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross as the selection of reading, you can discover here.
However, just what's your matter not also liked reading The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross It is a terrific task that will certainly constantly provide excellent benefits. Why you end up being so strange of it? Several things can be sensible why individuals don't like to check out The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross It can be the uninteresting tasks, guide The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross compilations to read, also lazy to bring spaces almost everywhere. Now, for this The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross, you will certainly begin to enjoy reading. Why? Do you understand why? Read this web page by completed.
Starting from visiting this website, you have aimed to begin caring reading a book The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross This is specialized site that sell hundreds collections of books The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross from great deals sources. So, you will not be burnt out anymore to pick guide. Besides, if you likewise have no time to look the book The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross, merely rest when you remain in office and open up the browser. You can discover this The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross lodge this site by connecting to the net.
Obtain the connect to download this The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross and begin downloading and install. You can really want the download soft file of the book The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross by undertaking other tasks. Which's all done. Now, your turn to check out a book is not constantly taking and lugging guide The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross anywhere you go. You could conserve the soft data in your device that will certainly never ever be far and also read it as you like. It resembles reviewing story tale from your gadget after that. Currently, start to enjoy reading The Minutemen And Their World (American Century), By Robert A. Gross and also get your brand-new life!
Winner of the Bancroft Prize
The Minutemen and Their World, first published in 1976, is reissued now in a twenty-fifth anniversary edition with a new Foreword by Alan Taylor and a new Afterword by the author.
On April 19, 1775, the American Revolution began at the Old North Bridge in Concord, Massachusetts. The "shot heard round the world" catapulted this sleepy New England town into the midst of revolutionary fervor, and Concord went on to become the intellectual capital of the new republic. The town--future home to Emerson, Thoreau, and Hawthorne--soon came to symbolize devotion to liberty, intellectual freedom, and the stubborn integrity of rural life. In The Minutemen and Their World, Robert Gross has written a remarkably subtle and detailed reconstruction of the lives and community of this special place, and a compelling interpretation of the American Revolution as a social movement.
- Sales Rank: #44132 in Books
- Brand: Brand: Hill and Wang
- Published on: 2001-04-30
- Released on: 2001-04-30
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: 8.50" h x .63" w x 5.50" l, .57 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 242 pages
Features
- Used Book in Good Condition
Review
“In this eloquent book, Robert Gross gives us a Concord that we have not encountered before, a surprising place that turns out to be not the quaint community of myth and legend, but a lively society, deeply engaged in the great issues of its revolutionary time--with all the tensions, anxieties, and aspirations that human being share.” ―Linda K. Kerber
“The Minutemen and Their World makes the American Revolution live--a vivid, compelling book that dramatizes the political consciousness and armed conflict in the very birthplace of the Revolutionary War. Few books have so brilliantly stood the test of time.” ―Jon Butler
“For historians, The Minutemen and Their World was a shot heard round the world. It taught us that fine history combines good scholarlship with good writing. Its reverberations are still being heard.” ―Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
“The Minutemen and Their World is a classic in--well, the classic sense of the world: a book of such enduring elegance and interest that it will find a readership in every generation.” ―Joyce Appleby
“A richly detailed picture of social life and social divisions in Concord, and a lively narrative of the coming of the Revolution there.” ―Edmund S. Morgan, The New York Review of Books
“This lovely little book captures, intimately and authentically, the life of an eighteenth century New England town . . . gloriously good.” ―Michael Zuckerman, University of Pennsylvania
About the Author
Robert A. Gross is the James L. and Shirley A. Draper Professor of Early American History at the University of Connecticut. He is the author of Books and Libraries in Thoreau's Concord (1988) and editor of In Debt to Shays: The Bicentennial of an Agrian Rebellion (1993).
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
The Minutemen and Their World
1“Do Not Be Divided for So Small Matters”CONCORD arrived at its strategic position in 1775 only after a good deal of foot-dragging. While Bostonians fulminated against British policies in the 1760s and early 1770s, the yeomen of Concord were squabbling among themselves in a series of increasingly bitter quarrels that threatened ultimately to divide the town into two warring parties. The local contentions had no relation to the colonial dispute with Britain; that subject came before the town only occasionally until 1774 and elicited only a mild response. Let others warm to arguments over the rights of the colonies and sound the alarm against a corrupt ministry in London and its lackeys at home. Concordians were more concerned over their roads and schools and meetinghouse.
When the eighteenth-century Yankee reflected on government, he thought first of his town. Through town meetings, he elected his officials, voted his taxes, and provided for the well-ordering of community affairs. The main business of the town concerned roads and bridges, schools, and the poor—the staples of local government even today. But the colonial New England town claimed authority over anything that happened within its borders. It hired a minister to preach in the town-built meetinghouse and compelled attendance at his sermons. It controlled public uses of private property, from the location of slaughterhouses and tanneries to the quality of bread sold at market. And it gave equal care to the moral conduct of its inhabitants, as Concord’s William Hunt regretfully learned in 1764 when the selectmen took notice of his public tippling and idle “Loytring about from House to House Wasteing his time in a Sinfull maner” and advised innkeepers to shut their doors to his trade. No issue was in theory exempt from a town’s action, even if in practice the provincial government occasionally intervened in local disputes and told the inhabitants how to run their lives.1A remarkably broad segment of the population could join in this exercise of local power. To vote in Massachusetts town elections, one had to be a male, at least twenty-one years old, an inhabitant of a town for the past year, and owner of an estate that would rent for £3:6:8 a year in the local assessors’ view. In a country town like Concord, most men could meet the property-holding requirement, which was the equivalent of a month’s wages for a common laborer. In 1771 seven out of ten Concordians qualified. Those who could not were farmers’ sons, only recently come of age, and day laborers and servants, dependent on others for their bread. In eighteenth-century Massachusetts, a citizen mattered politically only when his judgment was subject to no one else’s whim and untempted by the financial inducements of designing men.2With town government affecting so much of daily life, no New England community could escape political conflict. A road urgently needed by a man at the outskirts was often a wasteful expense to an inhabitant near the center, while one churchgoer’s learned preacher was another’s prideful sinner on the way to hell. Politics was, as ever, a contest over who got what of a community’s scarce resources and whose values would prevail in local life. But provincial Yankees labored under a set of beliefs that made political activity as we know it impossible.Eighteenth-century New Englanders demanded a great deal of their leaders. A magistrate, they held, was not a hired agent but a “father” to his people. He was raised up to rule as another Moses, a model of wisdom and righteousness, a lover of justice and champion of the people’s rights. Like a good father, he was patient and gentle in guiding his subjects, but he could also be stern when necessary. He neither courted popular favor nor consulted private interest. He was ever-solicitous of the common good.3The people of Concord sought such leaders among the well-born and the rich. Democracy and equality played no part in their view of the world. New Englanders believed that society was composed of “ranks and degrees,” that just as the earth “has Mountains and Plains, Hills and Vallies,” so “there are the Distinctions of Superiours and Inferiours, Rulers and Ruled, publick and private Orders of Men … .” The upper orders were to rule, the lower to follow. To place men of “low degree” in the council chamber would bring government into contempt. Magistrates must be distinguished men, known and respected by all. All authority—political, social, economic, and moral—was of a piece.4By aristocratic English standards, Concord’s governing class cut a minor figure in the world. A few leaders were country squires like Colonel John Cuming, a Harvard- and Edinburgh-trained doctor who oversaw a 250-acre farm in Concord and speculated in frontier lands in Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. As a young man in his twenties, Cuming had fought in the old colonial wars against the French, in the course of which he received a musket ball in his hip—where it remained till his death—and was taken captive by Indians, beaten, and removed to Canada. He eventually won over his captors and gained release in a prisoner exchange. He returned home to build an extensive medical practice throughout Middlesex County and to become one of the town’s leading men—the moderator of no fewer than ninety town meetings, justice of the peace, president-judge of the county Court of General Sessions. Concord often called on him to serve as its ambassador to the world. Cuming practiced the philanthropy his worldly status prescribed. It is said that he never charged for treating patients on the Sabbath. When Harvard Hall burned, he donated “two handsome brass branches for the use of the College chapel”; in 1771, he was awarded an honorary M.A. At his death in 1788, he left the College £300 sterling to establish a professorship of medicine. Together with other money, the bequest was used to start the Harvard School of Medicine.5But most of Concord’s leaders were substantial yeomen and tradesmen with seventy-five to one hundred acres of land—twice the holding of the ordinary farmer. And while they engaged in trade more often than most inhabitants, it was business on the scale of Honest John Beatton, parceling out pins for change, and that of farmer-shoemaker Jonas Heywood, who every winter went from house to house in the countryside “whipping the cat”—boarding with his customers while he made and repaired enough shoes to last each family for the season. Still, hard-working, substantial men like Beatton and Heywood did stand out in a largely rural society, and they could afford to spend the typical selectman’s four or five years in the public service. In the eyes of their neighbors, such men could rise to the standard of the public service.6Ephraim Wood was another shoemaker-farmer who won the trust of the town. Born in 1733 and bred to his father’s trade, Wood was a natural candidate for town leadership: he was the son of a selectman—as were nearly half the men Concord chose for this post. But Wood also commanded respect in his own right. At 250 pounds, he was an imposing figure; the calf of his leg was said to measure twenty-four inches around. He had a reputation for “a calm, considerate mind and sound judgment,” and he so thrived in business that his name became synonymous with success. Once another shoemaker was complaining to a Scotsman about his bad luck and poor trade. “Oh,” the Scotsman replied, “you have a very poor trade, but Ephraim Wood have a very good trade.” In 1771, Wood succeeded Jonas Heywood as selectman and town clerk, and he served in these posts for the next twenty-five years. When he died in 1814, it was said that
In him were united those qualities and virtues, which formed a character at once amiable, useful, respectable, and religious. Early in life he engaged in civil and public business, and by a judicious and faithful discharge of duty acquired confidence and reputation with his fellow citizens and the public … . The rights and liberties of his country were near his heart, and he was a warm and zealous defender of these against all encroachments. He was a true disciple of the great Washington, a friend to ‘liberty with order.’ …In domestic life, his disposition and example were highly amiable and worthy. As a Christian, he was devout and humble, sincere and ardent. Having lived the life, he died the death of the righteous.7
In the model commonwealth, public recognition flowed naturally to an Ephraim Wood. As he established himself in society and did his turns in a town’s burdensome minor offices—posts like constable and surveyor of highways—men would notice his merits and soon elevate him to community-wide leadership. In Concord, high positions would normally come to a man by his mid-forties; the community desired leaders in their prime, not after retirement from active life. Ideally, a potential leader neither sought nor clung to office; were he to campaign openly, he would simply demonstrate his unfitness for public trust. Once elected, he would continue on the same conscientious course for the public good, heedless of his own popularity, the partial interests of powerful constituents, or the momentary wishes of a majority. Men would listen when he spoke and, whether they agreed or not, respectfully accept his judgments. So long as the magistrate upheld the fundamental liberties and interests of his community, no one questioned his fitness to rule.8The ordinary citizen in this vision of politics had an equally virtuous code of conduct. W...
Most helpful customer reviews
35 of 36 people found the following review helpful.
Book Review
By Jess M
The following is my book review for a history class. It is far from perfect but perhaps can help you start your own critical analysis.
The book tells an unconventional story of the American Revolution by analyzing the ordinary city of Concord, Massachusetts as a microcosm of colonial America. Gross argues that the struggle for independence from Britain was not a revolution but a conservative social struggle - a struggle with patriarchal control, religious zealotry, individualism, and localized control of government.
The first point of contention in Concord was unequal representation attributed to citizen's proximity to the town meeting hall - those who were physically closer dominated public opinion and policy. The town would also struggle with church and state - ministers were subsidized by the town and it was not possible to keep each citizen happy with the majority's choice. Local representation was another source of disagreement - the mid-eighteenth century government was influenced by (if not controlled from) England, an ocean away. Representation was worsened when the British levied heavy taxes to finance the Seven Years War. The popular majority fought against the colonial government who favored the hand that empowered them, if not fed them. Primary documents note the latter: "there is no greater...corruption...than when...executive officers depend...on a power independent of the people".
In the afterword, Gross explains his left-leaning ideological influences and how they shaped the topic of his research, his approach, and conclusions. Gross uses historical public records to tell a story, attributing emotion and motivation to statistical trends. Personalizing quantitative data will naturally have a bias, but Gross manages to keep from overwhelming the reader with his own conclusions by letting the reader draw his own. Academics have used Gross's work to compare Vietnam to the American Revolution - Gross acknowledges the idea but leaves it out of the main text.
The most compelling argument Gross makes demonstrates the loss of patriarchal control in Concord, and presumably across the colonies. He describes how sons rely on fathers for land, and daughters rely on fathers for dowries. As the economic climate changes, dowries are reduced, local fertile land becomes scarce and grown children have incentives to leave the family to pursue the frontier. This costs the father his source of labor (as slavery was not the dominant labor in Massachusetts) and costs the children the source of inheritance and stability.
Gross approaches each argument in a similar manner - he tells a personal story backed by quantitative research. In the patriarchy argument he tells of the emigration of Purchase Brown, unable to sustain himself on his father's meager farm. Quantitatively, Gross notes that 1 in every 4 taxpayers moved away from Concord in every decade from the 1740s onward.
The Minutemen and Their World was revolutionary in personalizing a Revolution. The author stretched historical records and statistics into a compelling narrative of people both average and great. The arguments are solid because of the heavy quantitative research, but even the author wonders "if the Minutemen would recognize themselves in my mirror". The author added to the understanding of the Revolution by adding intricate personal detail and motivations to all of Concord's citizens - memorable men, but also poor men, widows, spinsters, ministers, blacks, farmers, blacksmiths, intellectuals, substitutes, and dissenters.
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful.
Review by An Intellectually Curious Adult
By Sally G. Knight
It's too bad that Minutemen has received so many reviews on Amazon written by intellectually lazy, immature undergraduates, who apparently aren't interested in people unless they appear on the covers of Sports Illustrated or People. Robert A. Gross, in 1977, received the prestigious Bancroft Prize awarded by Columbia University for outstanding work in the field of American history but, alas, no MTV award. This is a 25th anniversary re-issue of his book which is highly readable, engrossing, thought-provoking and entertaining.
We know that history is really made by ordinary people, that history is far more than wars, dates, treaties, and big-name leaders. But the stories of ordinary people are seldom available to us, especially 200 years (or more) after the fact. Using the techniques of social history research, Gross brings to life the real people who lived in Concord before, during, and after the events that started the actual fighting that was the Revolutionary War. I've always believed that no fiction can be as juicy as real life. Gross certainly gives us a juicy story of the lives and concerns of early Concordians. Conflict, sex, hope and failure. It's all here. And more. Gross also gives us a personal, moment-by-moment description of the events of April 18-19, 1975 in Lexington and Concord from the time British Redcoats left Boston, through the massacre in Lexington and the confrontation -- and first shots by the Patriots -- at the North Bridge in Concord, through the British retreat. And what about afterwards? What impact did these events have on the citizens in the years following? Gross lets us know.
What was special for me was discovering that Rev. William Emerson, the pastor who lived right next to the North Bridge and encouraged the Minutemen throughout their struggles, is the grandfather of Ralph Waldo Emerson who was friend to Hawthorne, supporter of Thoreau, and influence on Alcott. All this from one small town!
14 of 15 people found the following review helpful.
Village history at it's best
By John Elsegood
Robert Gross has produced a work that is a pleasure to read in examining the town of Concord, through the lives of ordinary townspeople, before and after that memorable day of the 19 April 1775.This indeed is 'bottom-up' history but Gross ensures the interest never wanes through his sensitive and vibrant narrative.There were only some 1500 persons(about 265 families) in this very special town that witnessed the first battle of the American Revolution(although the first shots were fired in neighbouring Lexington, that was hardly a battle).Gross produces some interesting social 'gems' such as magistrates being regarded as 'fathers' to the people. Modern western society has long since ceased to have such faith in the judiciary-in fact they are often regarded as the enemy within! Church politics also had a larger significance in the life of 18th century Concordians than today.The aftermath of the Great Awakening (the huge spiritual revivals that swept the American colonies between the late 1730s and early 1740s) is also covered well by Gross in discussing the stuggles between the Old and New Lights. The battles of Dr Joseph Lee, for church membership, are particularly interesting. Gross also highlights the strains of war and the decrease in military enlistments from Concord as the war progresses. As a study of a community in an important era of America's history this social history is highly recommended.
See all 32 customer reviews...
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross PDF
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross EPub
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Doc
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross iBooks
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross rtf
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Mobipocket
The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Kindle
# Download The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Doc
# Download The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Doc
# Download The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Doc
# Download The Minutemen and Their World (American Century), by Robert A. Gross Doc
