A Vindication of the Character and Condition of the Females Employed in the Lowell Mills, Against the Charges Contained in the Boston Times, and the Boston Quarterly Review.
Lowell: Leonard Huntress, Printer, 1841. First edition. Unbound stitched pamphlet, 9 x 5.63 inches, 24 pages. Stitching nearly perished, title page loose; somewhat browned and a little foxed and soiled, with some light wear and chipping; in good condition. Item #19819
The former mayor of Lowell answers attacks on the labor and social conditions of the factory girls in the mills in Lowell, with much on the systems and laws in place to insure education for child laborers, moral guidance from boardinghouse keepers, and the availability to the women operatives of churches and savings banks both. (Bartlett in part seems to address the issues faced by nearly any community in a period of sudden population growth and economic recovery.) With reference to the Lowell Offering, the literary magazine run by mill operatives. This copy with an inscription, “[Recipient trimmed], With the respects of John Aiken.” Aiken, a Lowell attorney, was an agent for the Tremont Mills and an important figure in the development of the textile industry in New England, and presumably had an interest in promoting the economic and social benefits of employing women in the mills. (See the finding aid for the Appleton-Aiken Family Papers at the Clements Library.) Evidently trimmed along the upper edge.
Price: $150.00