MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry Arthur J. Pulos Published on: Apr 22, 2021 License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC-BY-NC-ND 4.0) MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry If we once grant the principle of the division of labour, then it follows that one man can live only by finding out what other men want. Arnold Toynbee, 1884 ([87], 56) There is a persistent tendency to romanticize the colonial era as a period when unique objects were fabricated by humble craftsmen employing quaint methods rooted in antiquity. It is more accurate to note that the colonial artisans were as determined to put the most recent technological discoveries to practical use as they were to adopt the latest styles for their products. They were generally aware that the knowledge acquired from the emerging sciences, if applied to their craft, could increase their capacity for production and allow time to improve their methods of work in order to produce better products more economically and to search for those new products to manufacture that promised a greater return on their investment of energy and resources. When Sir Francis Bacon stated in 1620 that the object of knowledge was to change the shape of man’s world, he gave form to the central theme of the industrial revolution. Within two years Bacon’s followers had founded the Royal Society of London, “to promote the welfare of the Arts and Sciences,” and had established a distinction between the acquisition and ordering of knowledge and the application of that knowledge to industry. The impact of that revolution was not lost on the colonies, despite British generalizations that American technology depended but little upon the sober reasoning of science. As early as 1690, private evening schools had been established in New York to teach the apprentices for whom the masters were obligated to provide an elemental education. These schools multiplied as an increasing artisan population sought additional learning, not only in reading, writing, and arithmetic but also in geometry, trigonometry, and many of the more specialized trades. Most of the master craftsmen of the time were literate and were avid readers of general newspapers and pamphlets. They also sought to further themselves by reading on such subjects as architecture and building, cabinetmaking, ironwork, and the other useful arts. Those who could not afford to build libraries of their own became members of subscription libraries such as those organized by the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia and the Baltimore Mechanics Company. In contrast to the closely guarded mysteries of the European guilds, the American artisans realized that if they shared knowledge freely with one another the general state of industry would be advanced. 2 MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry Even though the practical application of knowledge was essential for their success, the colonial artisans and gentlemen derived particular gratification from tinkering with machines and other ingenious devices. The challenge of making the forces of nature work for him awakened the restless spirit of the designer, who is forever dissatisfied with things as they are and driven to make them better. In the process, the colonial artisan was transformed into a “mechanick” preoccupied with the methods and processes by whose improvement his energy might be expanded, his security guaranteed, and his prosperity ensured. Moreover, by assigning an increasing percentage of the work through machines to lesser employees, he found time to devote himself to more learning, to experiment with new concepts for products, and to improve his merchandising capabilities. The gentleman “mechanick” also realized that, if he could apply his knowledge of the sciences and his financial resources to the support and development of manufactures to satisfy human needs and promote comfort and happiness, he could expect a high economic return. One outstanding organization, established in Philadelphia in 1750 for this purpose, was the American Society for Promoting and Propagating Useful Knowledge. Through it and other organizations like it, churchmen, artisans, and wealthy laymen pooled their resources and combined their education, experience, and sense of product potential to refine processes and establish manufactories. Shipbuilding companies were formed to build sloops, privateers, schooners, and, in particular, “topsail” ships for transatlantic trade. Although at first most of their ancillary parts such as cordage, sails, and metal fittings were imported from England, gradually all of these came to be made in the colonies. By the time of the Revolution almost a third of the British merchant ships were American-built, as were the majority of the ships owned and sailed by the Americans in competition with the British. The craft of coachmaking serves as an excellent barometer of colonial affluence. The financial and human resources necessary to bring together the artisans in wood and metal needed to construct a carriage and the skilled upholsterers, leatherworkers, painters, and decorators needed to finish it only became available after the middle of the eighteenth century. In short order, however, Americans were building coaches, chariots, landaus, phaetons, post-chaises, curricles, chairs, sedans, and sleighs of all types. Since they could be sold at a lower price than the imported products, they captured a market that had been the special reserve of English coachmakers. The promise of a ready market for ingenious devices encouraged the invention of many products for manufacture. Surveying instruments and mariner’s compasses were 3 MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry developed by such men as Isaac Doolittle, a New Haven clockmaker. Benjamin Gale was awarded a gold medal by the Royal Society of London for a seeder, drawn by oxen, that could open a furrow, deposit seed and manure, and close it up again in one operation. And Benjamin Thompson, the English loyalist later to become Count Rumford of Bavaria, invented the modern fireplace, the drip coffeepot, and the kitchen range. Thomas Jefferson was fascinated by ingenious products and developed several for his home at Monticello, including a seven-day clock, simultaneously acting double doors, dumbwaiters, and a swivel chair. Benjamin Franklin stands out as America’s first scientist. While most of his countrymen were preoccupied with acquiring knowledge from abroad, Franklin was generating his own by conducting the definitive experiments with electricity that would bring him international fame. One of his most popular inventions was the “Pennsylvania fireplace” (now known as the Franklin stove), which was manufactured to his specifications by Robert Grace at Warwick Furnace in Chester County. The primary significance of this invention is that it pulled the fireplace out of the chimney, where it had been part of the architecture, and treated it as a portable and therefore marketable appliance. In addition, it employed scientific principles to control the fire and to direct the heated air in a manner that increased fuel efficiency. When the Pennsylvania fireplace was first offered for sale in the Pennsylvania Gazette on December 3, 1741 and promoted with a brochure that might have been America’s first promotional flyer, Governor Thomas offered to give Franklin a colonial patent to guarantee his profit from the invention for a number of years. However, Franklin declined it “from a Principle that has ever weigh’d with me on such Occasions, viz. That as we enjoy great Advantages from the Inventions of others, we should be glad of an Opportunity to serve others by any Invention of ours, and this we should do freely and generously.” ([56], 419) In a short time, others were manufacturing stoves, as they still do today, according to the design that Franklin refused to patent. 4 MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry Beniamin Thompson’s experiments with heat and convection currents resulted in the “drip” or percolator method of making coffee. Sanborn C. Brown, Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1979). 5 MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry Thomas Jefferson’s restless imagination led him to develop this swivel chair by modifying a Windsor. His interest in convenience presaged the contemporary designer’s commitment to comfort. American Philosophical Society. At first glance, it would seem that the expanding interest in devices that saved labor and made life more pleasant was in contradiction to the Puritan ethic that glorified labor almost as an end in itself. In fact, there still seems to be an undercurrent of guilt in the American mind at the easy life that has been made possible by technology. 6 MIT Press Open Architecture and Urban Studies • American Design Ethic The Arts of Industry However, toward the end of the colonial era such reservations were set aside in the fervent desire of the colonists to establish a self-sustaining economy in the face of British restrictions. This challenge in the name of patriotism provided the industrial momentum that helped the colonies sever their political ties to England. At first England was proud of the success of her colonies. Sir Joseph Child, a director and governor of the East India Company, praised the emigrants as a people “whose frugality, industry and temperance, and the happiness of whose laws and institutions, promise to them a long life and a wonderful increase of people, riches and power.” However, within a century the success of the colonists was beginning to attract to America talent and intelligence that could not expand or find free expression in the Old World. In response to such threats, England began to place increasingly severe restrictions on the trade and manufacturing practices of her colonies.