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Visionary Calculations Inventing the Mathematical Economy in Nineteenth-Century America

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Visionary Calculations Inventing the Mathematical Economy in Nineteenth-Century America Visionary Calculations Inventing the Mathematical Economy in Nineteenth-Century America By Rachel Knecht B.A., Tufts University, 2011 M.A., Brown University, 2014 Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of History at Brown University. Providence, Rhode Island May 2018 © Copyright 2018 by Rachel Knecht This dissertation of Rachel Knecht is accepted in its present form by the Department of History as satisfying the dissertation requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Date __________________ ______________________________________ Seth Rockman, Advisor Recommended to the Graduate Council Date __________________ ______________________________________ Joan Richards, Reader Date __________________ ______________________________________ Lukas Rieppel, Reader Approved by the Graduate Council Date __________________ ______________________________________ Andrew Campbell, Dean of the Graduate School iii Vitae Rachel Knecht received her B.A. in History from Tufts University, magna cum laude, in 2011 and her M.A. in History from Brown University in 2014. Her research has been supported by the Program in Early American Economy and Society at the Library Company of Philadelphia, the American Philosophical Society, the American Antiquarian Society, and the member institutions of the New England Regional Consortium, as well as the Department of History and Graduate School at Brown University. In 2017, she received a Deans’ Faculty Fellowship from Brown and joined the History Department as a Visiting Professor in 2018. iv Acknowledgements This dissertation is the product of many years of help, support, criticism, and inspiration. I am deeply indebted not only to the following people, but also to many others who have encouraged me to see this project to its completion. Thank you all, for everything. My dissertation committee members have been uniformly helpful and supportive along the way, even though I managed to drag each into a project beyond his or her immediate familiarity. I am particularly grateful to Seth Rockman, for taking a chance on me and on this project, despite neither of us knowing much at all about the history of mathematics at the start, and for six years of guidance in what it means to be a historian. An enormous thank-you as well to Joan Richards, for those hours spent patiently recovering my high school mathematics education and then teaching me to turn that into historical thinking, and for many good conversations along the way. Finally, a heartfelt thank-you as well to Lukas Rieppel, for letting me turn him into my personal STS tutor, and for somehow always being able to ask the right question at the right time. The History Department at Brown University is one of the best communities I have ever had the privilege to join. Thank you to Michael Vorenberg and Kerry Smith, for their comments on the earliest stages of this project; Robert Self, for everything from teaching me all of modern American history to fixing the radiator in my office; Lin Fisher, for organizing the Early American Studies workshop; Tara Nummedal and Rebecca Nedostup, for giving so much time to improving the graduate program; and to Mary Beth Bryson, Julissa Bautista, and Cherrie Guerzon, without whom I would have been lost to financial ruin or starvation long ago. In addition, I want to thank Dan Hirschman, for helping me think through the final chapter; Tamara Plakins Thornton, for her generous comments on various aspects of this project; Sharon Murphy, for seemingly always being v ready to advise and chat; and to all my conference co-panelists, commenters, and questioners along the way. I also owe an immense debt to Benjamin Carp, especially for not talking me out of this. I also want to thank Richard Kollen of Lexington High School, for introducing me to doing original historical research, and to the joy of rifling through forgotten boxes. This project would not have been feasible without the generous financial support of various institutions. At Brown, the Peter Green Doctoral Scholarship allowed me to research widely at the beginning of the project, and the Deans’ Faculty Fellowship got me to the finish line. I also thank the Program in Early American Economy and Society at the Library Company of Philadelphia, the American Philosophical Society, the American Antiquarian Society, and the members of the New England Regional Fellowship Consortium, particularly the Boston Public Library, Baker Library, the Schlesinger Library, the Rhode Island Historical Society, and Rauner Library, for helping me access their incredible collections. It would be impossible to name every person who made these archival visits as productive and encouraging as they were, but I would particularly like to thank Kathrine Fox at Baker Library and Nan Wolverton at American Antiquarian. I am also grateful for travel grants from the Hagley Library and the McNeil Center for Early American Studies, and to my fellow researchers, especially those in residence at LCP and AAS. I have learned the most from my fellow graduate students, and it would be impossible to capture in a few words every conversation, debate, comment, dinner, and drink that got me here. I especially want to thank Alicia Maggard, Daniel Platt, Lindsay Schakenbach, Jonathan Lande, Frances Tanzer, and Ann Daly, who have been invaluable as scholars and as friends. A huge thank you also to the rest of my cohort, all of whom helped me think through this project in its earliest days: Anne Gray-Fischer, Amy Kerner, Judith Smith, Andre Pagliarini, Abhilash Medhi, and Ayse vi Topaloglu. Thank you as well to the members of the Market Societies Mellon Workshop, Brooke Lamperd, Sam Franklin, Paul Guitierrez, Zach Dorner, and Kathrinne Duffy, for creating such an unreasonably intelligent group of scholars. Lastly, my thanks to the members of the Brown Early American Graduate Student Workshop and the Brown Dissertation Writing Group, for providing feedback, emotional support, and for simply getting me to produce pages. As much help as my fellow graduate students have been, I never would have made it this far without also having the friendship and support of civilians. Therefore, thank you to my running (and theater, and wine) buddy Robin Wetherill; the incredible ladies of the Fun Girls Book Club, Grace Cleary and Kate Bayer; my beloved “cousins” Lily Fesler, Sarah Baughman, and Katherine Mechling; and my real reason for making regular trips to Philadelphia, Emily Spooner. It would be impossible to properly thank you all for everything you’ve done for me over the last five, ten, or twenty-nine years, but this will have to be enough for now. My biggest thanks go to my family, for so many years of their unwavering love and support. Thank you to my sister Abby, for explaining science to me, joining me on therapeutic outlet mall trips, and sending Parks & Rec gifs at just the right time; to my dad, Bob, for explaining economics to me, lifting my spirits when they fell, and helping move my stuff even though I definitely misled him about the number of stairs; and to my mom, Sheera, for everything, but especially for driving down to Providence to ride the East Bay Bike Path and talk about math. Lastly, I want to thank Henk Isom, for being there for me since the beginning of this project. You are the best person I know, and I could not have done this without you. Providence, RI December 2017 vii Table of Contents Vitae ............................................................................................................................................... iv Acknowledgements ......................................................................................................................... v Table of Contents ......................................................................................................................... viii Table of Figures ............................................................................................................................. ix Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 1: The Useful Knowledge Economy ............................................................................... 28 Chapter 2: Commercial Arithmetic ............................................................................................... 76 Chapter 3: Men of Science .......................................................................................................... 124 Chapter 4: Corporate Calculators ................................................................................................ 177 Chapter 5: The Mathematical Economy ..................................................................................... 232 Epilogue ...................................................................................................................................... 282 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 290 viii Table of Figures Figure 1. Example of Rule of Three from Benjamin Workman, The American Accountant or, Schoolmasters’ New Assistant (Philadelphia: William Young, 1793) ................................. 92 Figure 2. Image from Charles Ellet, Jr., An Essay on the Laws of Trade, in Reference to the Works of Internal Improvement in the United States (New York: Augustus M. Kelley, 1966) ............................................................................................................................................
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