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The Carpenter's Wife Analysis

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Somewhere Between Discord and Solidarity: Industrialization, Conventions and Change in 1840-1890 America. Martha Hodes writes about a historic character, Eunice L. Richardson Stone who experiences challenges to her eternal desire to finally be a conventional woman in the pre-civil war North. A place that is industrializing at a rapid pace starting around the time Eunice was born, and continuing to well after the Civil War. Within this landscape, Hodes examines economic and social institutions, while simultaneously describing Eunice’s experiences. Weaving Eunice’s story, gleaned from letter correspondence and other sources, into these aspects of life, Hodes shows how each affected Eunice in a chapter called The Carpenter’s Wife, in her longer …show more content…

Changing from an agrarian to an urban society encompassed changing perceptions of time, economic systems and family values. Time, on the farm was dictated by the length of the day. Work was done as long as the sun was in the sky, and everyone in the family was involved in some form that contributed to the success and survival of the family. This was disrupted when families moved to urban centers. They were no longer self-sufficient and their barter-based economy was replaced by a cash-based system. Cash was earned at wage-paying jobs, made readily available by cotton mills and other manufactories. Typically, in the 1840s and 1850s, women went off to the cotton mills to earn wages, while men either worked as artisans or traveled far (with the increased reach of railroad) to find work.4 Hodes paints a number of scenes in which she demonstrates fractures; Eunice’s father abandoning the family; her mother going away to marry someone else, her husband leaving for the South to find work and finally the fracture between North and South regarding different ideas about slavery.5 On the other hand, English claims that it was because women spent so much time together in the cotton mills, that they were able to create networks that enabled the support and bonding between

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