Manuscript account book of a Pennsylvania weaver.
York, PA: 1799-1836.
Price: $1,500.00
About the item
182 pp plus blanks, in ink. Folio (327 x 195 mm). Contemporary sheep, titled in manuscript "John Beale's Book 1811" on upper board. Spine chipped, covers worn, internally very good.
Item #313308
A manuscript ledger covering 38 years of the work of York, Pennsylvania weaver John Beale, an excellent account of an American cottage industry in the early 19th century. Details client names, types of cloth used, and amounts paid, with the bulk of the entries dating from 1820s and 1830s. Beale worked with a wide variety of materials, including check, shirting, tow, tick, blanket, table linen, flannel, linsy, flax, striping, huckaback, sheeting, etc. The first two pages are affair bonds involving John Beale and three other men, possibly a record of monies borrowed by Beale to start his business. Though Pennsylvania led the U.S. in textile production at the time, the industry was centered around Philadelphia and Germantown, making Beale's business an outlier. The ledger also includes Beale's overhead and personal expenses, including rent, tobacco, shoes, powder and shot.
