Family Time and Industrial Time: The Relationship between the Family and Work in a New England Industrial Community

by Tamara K. Hareven

The myth that industrialization broke down traditional family ties has long pervaded American society. Professor Hareven, a leading social historian, dispels this myth and illustrates how the family survived and became an active force in the modern factory. In this book, Hareven examines the multiple roles that the workers' families fulfilled in facilitating their adaptation to the pressures of changing work patterns and new modes of life in an industrial city. She reconstructs family and work patterns among immigrants as well as native textile laborers over two generations during a crucial period in the transformation of American industry from the late nineteenth century.
A case study based on what was the world's largest textile plantóthe Amoskeag Manufacturing Company in Manchester, New Hampshireóthe book integrates a wide array of documentary evidence with oral testimony. It examines the lives of real peopleóthe way they acted, the way they perceived their lives, and the kinds of decisions they made when pacing their lives in relation to the demands of the industrial system. Originally published in 1982 by Cambridge University Press.

490 pages, Paperback

First published April 30, 1982

Reviews

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this when I was an under-grad, ages ago. I was so happy to "meet" a group of scholars and a field of studies that fit so closely with my own way of seeing the world.
There are little nuggets of insight throughout. This book introduced me to "chain-migration"

This work still informs how I question and how I structure my research questions.

Serious, but seriously good.

[Mark Bowles · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tamara Hareven, Family Time and Industrial Time: The Relationship Between the Family and Work in a New England Industrial Community (1982)
1. Focus on the Amoskeag textile mills in New Hampshire 50 years prior to 1930
2. Family was important for getting each other jobs and covering for kin at work
3. The essential ingredient was cooperation for the entire household