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Book Synopsis

A comparative history of single women''s independent migration to the textile cities of Preston, England; Lowell, Massachusetts; and Paisley, Scotland.

In the nineteenth-century mill towns of Preston, England; Lowell, Massachusetts; and Paisley, Scotland, there were specific demands for migrant and female labor, and potential employers provided the necessary respectable conditions in order to attract them. Using individual accounts, this innovative and comparative study examines the migrants'' lives by addressing their reasons for migration, their relationship to their families, the roles they played in the cities to which they moved, and the dangers they met as a result of their youth, gender, and separation from family. Gordon details both the similarities and differences in the women''s migration experiences, and somewhat surprisingly concludes that they became financially independent, rather than primarily contributors to a family economy.

Mill Girls and Strangers Single Womens

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    A Paperback / softback by Wendy M. Gordon

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      Publisher: State University of New York Press
      Publication Date: Publication Date: 10/10/2002
      ISBN13: 9780791455265, 978-0791455265
      ISBN10: 791455262

      Description

      Book Synopsis

      A comparative history of single women''s independent migration to the textile cities of Preston, England; Lowell, Massachusetts; and Paisley, Scotland.

      In the nineteenth-century mill towns of Preston, England; Lowell, Massachusetts; and Paisley, Scotland, there were specific demands for migrant and female labor, and potential employers provided the necessary respectable conditions in order to attract them. Using individual accounts, this innovative and comparative study examines the migrants'' lives by addressing their reasons for migration, their relationship to their families, the roles they played in the cities to which they moved, and the dangers they met as a result of their youth, gender, and separation from family. Gordon details both the similarities and differences in the women''s migration experiences, and somewhat surprisingly concludes that they became financially independent, rather than primarily contributors to a family economy.

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