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Chapter Summary Of Scraping By By Seth Rockman

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Scraping By written by Seth Rockman is a powerful book that focuses on three points. First the book is richly researched on multiply account of poor, and unskilled laborers in the city of Baltimore. Baltimore at this time is an economic Atlantic port city powerhouse. Second Rockman exemplifies the labor history through race, gender, and class. By using this point of view Rockman has given us a unique look at the artisan labor in early America. Third and final point is that the book has a political and moral ideology of America that many of us see the nation and its history. The book beginning talks about the labor of literally “scraping” crap off the streets of Baltimore in 1829. Rockman uses the background of four men who believe that they …show more content…

Chapter two “A Job for the Working Man” focuses on the working men experience in the city of Baltimore. Rockman does a good job of illustrates the variety of jobs and experiences within the city. Rockman also begins to explain the difference between the low wage labors and hired-out slaves. Chapter 3 “Dredging and Drudgery” goes in to detail about busy harbor of Baltimore and how it operates off of the wage labors, and how harsh life was working on the …show more content…

Many of these stores are heartbreaking, and came to a shock to me on the conditions, in which these people endured. For an example: Zachariah Stallings life was reduced by the overseer of the almshouse. Teenager Equillo was enslaved young men who work at the pumps of Jones Falls. A runway Irish man Michael Gorman was an indentured servant turned into a “Mud machine” worker. All of these characters that Rockman uses in his book face unimaginable odds and challenges during these interesting times in

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