Description
Book SynopsisIn Yountsville: The Rise and Decline of an Indiana Mill Town , Ronald Morris and collaborators examine the history and context of a rural Midwestern town, including family labor, working women, immigrants, and competing visions of the future. Combing perspectives from history, economics, and archeology, this exploration of a pioneering Midwestern company town highlights how interdisciplinary approaches can help recover forgotten communities.
The Yount Woolen Mill was founded during the pioneer period by immigrants from Germany who employed workers from the surrounding area and from Great Britain who were seeking to start a life with their families. For three generations the mill prospered until it and its workers were faced with changing global trade and aging technology that could not keep pace with the rest of the world. Deindustrialization compelled some residents to use education to adapt, while others held on to their traditional skills and were forced to relocate.
Trade Review
“Yountsville: The Rise and Decline of an Indiana Mill Town will make a strong beginning to the Notre Dame regional archaeology line, providing a very rich and densely documented study of a rural Indiana community. The book has interesting primary data that has rarely received scholarly attention, and for the obsessive researcher interested in rural life in general and small-town Indiana in particular there are a lot of fascinating details.”—Paul R. Mullins, Indiana University–Purdue University, Indianapolis
"Ronald Morris’s study of Yountsville presents the fascinating and complicated interplay of the rapidly changing forces of industrialization and education and how they shaped the life and economy of rural communities. Quite importantly, Morris also builds a strong argument that extant historic places—such as Yount’s Mill—are more than adjunct to the written historical narrative in understanding our past." —Marsh Davis, Indiana Landmarks Center
"In the Midwest, many stories exist about German immigrants working in urban areas, but there are few stories of immigrants as capitalists in rural areas. The story of the Yount family is one of an immigrant family who built an industry with talent, labor, and advantage. Unfortunately, deindustrialization, dislocation, adaptation, and reuse were familiar problems in the Midwest." —Midwest Book Review
Table of ContentsIntroduction
1. Education by Ronald V. Morris
2. The Growth of Industry by Ronald V. Morris and J.B. Bilbrey
3. Production History by Ronald V. Morris
4. The Yount Family by Ronald V. Morris
5. Lives of the Workers by Ronald V. Morris, J.B. Bilbrey, Jessica L. Clark, and Mark D. Groover
6. Landscape Reconstruction at Yount’s Mill by Ronald V. Morris, J.B. Bilbrey, Mark D. Groover, Colin Macleod, and Steven Lacey
7. Conclusions by Ronald V. Morris
