The Nineteenth Century Industrialization of America, the Development of the Middle Class

ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: RESPECTABLE HOLIDAYS: THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF CAPITALISM AND IDENTITIES AT THE CROSBYSIDE HOTEL (c. 1870-1902) AND WIAWAKA HOLIDAY HOUSE (mid-1910s-1929), LAKE GEORGE, NEW YORK Megan E. Springate, 2017 Dissertation directed by: Professor Paul A. Shackel Department of Anthropology The nineteenth century industrialization of America, the development of the middle class, anxiety about social belonging, and industrial capitalism are deeply intertwined. As America industrialized, people moved from rural communities, where people were known and support systems ran deep, to the cities to find work. Managers, who acted as proxies for owners, became so prevalent that they formed a new class. Middle class identity, rooted in a particular performance of respectability, whiteness, gender, distinguished its members from untrustworthy capitalist business owners and from the rough lives of the working classes. Middle class values became synonymous with American values. This essentialization of middle class respectability is a manifestation of capitalist ideology wielded to create new markets under consumer capitalism. Archaeological excavations at Wiawaka on Lake George, New York provided a material window on these processes. From 1857 to 1902, the Crosbyside Hotel served as a middle- class, mixed gender resort on the grounds of what is now Wiawaka. Vacationers performed middle class respectability and belonging while enjoying the benefits of nature. In 1903, Wiawaka moved in to the former Crosbyside, a single-gender, mixed- class moral reform vacation house for respectable working women and their middle-class benefactors. These women also performed middle class respectability and belonging while enjoying the benefits of nature. In both cases, people worked to make these vacations possible. This dissertation is one of a very few archaeological investigations of late nineteenth century hotels, and the first to examine women’s holiday houses. Using Third Space and performativity, artifacts from the Crosbyside and from the mid-1910s to 1929 associated with Wiawaka were used to explore interrelated facets of identity including gender, class, race, and respectability. Differences between how people negotiated identity in the era of industrial capitalism (Crosbyside) and consumer capitalism (Wiawaka) were identified, as were the ways that identities were shaped and confined by capitalism through powerful ideas of respectability. Also identified were material examples of the labor of leisure – of those who did the work that made vacations possible. Artifacts recovered make clear that it is, indeed, possible to see the labor of leisure in the archaeological record. RESPECTABLE HOLIDAYS: THE ARCHAEOLOGY OF CAPITALISM AND IDENTITIES AT THE CROSBYSIDE HOTEL (c. 1870-1902) AND WIAWAKA HOLIDAY HOUSE (mid-1910s-1929), LAKE GEORGE, NEW YORK By Megan E. Springate Dissertation submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Maryland, College Park in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 2017 Advisory Committee: Professor Paul Shackel, Chair Professor A. Lynn Bolles Professor Mark Leone Dr. Barbara Little Professor Robyn Muncy © Copyright Megan E. Springate 2017 Prologue The series of events that led me to excavate at Wiawaka Holiday House on Lake George, New York began in spring of 2010, when I traveled from my home in central New Jersey to the site to help them open for the season. We hung drapes, washed floors, made beds, and generally freshened up the guestrooms after being closed up for the winter. During this visit, I learned a bit about the history of the place by talking to other volunteers, looking through albums and albums of photographs, and reading the histories displayed on the walls of the common rooms. Also during this visit, then-Director of Wiawaka Holiday House, Christine Dixon, learned that I was an archaeologist. That October, I received an email from Christine asking about the options for doing archaeology on Wiawaka property; the long-time volunteer gardener, Gail Oakes, had discovered a porcelain room number in one of the garden beds (Figure 1). In my response, I noted that I was applying for PhD studies in historical archaeology, and had an interest in doing feminist archaeology, particularly around women’s history and gender. After several conversations and a presentation to the Wiawaka Board of Directors, I was invited to conduct my dissertation research at the site. It was important to me that excavating at Wiawaka be about more than just getting my data. I wanted it to be a collaborative project, with the site and with the public. One of the first questions I had for the Director was, what do you want to get out of this project? Her response came quickly: publicity. At many points during its history, Wiawaka had struggled to bring in enough guests to be able to survive. Past boards had entertained ii Figure 1: Hotel room recovered from one of the Wiawaka gardens. Photograph by Megan E. Springate. allowing men throughout the season; of extending or shortening the season; of allowing children; of modernizing to be more like the hotels and motels in Lake George, with telephones and televisions in each of the rooms (Wiawaka Holiday House Archives). The struggle to survive was a real one; in the early twentieth century, there were scores of women’s holiday houses across the country. These were very similar to Wiawaka: places where working women could take an affordable vacation in a natural setting. Indeed, there were over 30 Girls’ Friendly Society holiday houses alone in the early twentieth century (Wiawaka was originally founded under the auspices of the Girls’ Friendly Society, an Episcopalian organization), as well as those run by unions, companies, other religious organizations, groups of like-minded women, and social welfare organizations like the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA). They had names like Camp Moodna, Cromwell Manor, Fernside, French Point Camp, Rockport Lodge, iii Winnecunnet, Seashore Cottages, and the Union Vacation House (see Chapter 3). All struggled with declining visitation as the twentieth century progressed, and by the third quarter of the 1900s, most were gone. Publicity would help bring awareness and hopefully new visitors to Wiawaka. Over eighty volunteers helped with the excavation, research, and processing of artifacts. They were recruited via announcements on national and regional archaeology, history, and women’s history email lists, via Facebook posts, and press releases that I sent out as well as announcements distributed by Wiawaka Holiday House, previous volunteers, and local organizations including historical societies. Volunteers ranged in age from 18 to 80; they were undergraduate and graduate students and professors in history, archaeology, science, political science, and other fields. They were artists, writers, librarians, school teachers, corporate workers and executives, spiritual mediums, reporters, and government employees. Few of them knew about Wiawaka before volunteering; all of them left with an appreciation of the site and its history. Excavations (and therefore Wiawaka) received extensive press coverage, including multiple instances of full- and front page coverage in local papers, national coverage via the Associated Press that was published in newspapers as far-flung as New Mexico and California, and television coverage by local news outlets. Volunteers took away hands-on experience in archaeological excavation and interpretation both at Wiawaka, but several also had the opportunity to work on a cannon documentation project at nearby Fort William Henry. Several volunteers have used their iv time at Wiawaka as professional development, and have gone on to work for cultural resource management companies as field crew and as Principal Investigators. Others are pursuing education in archaeology or other branches of anthropology. Perhaps more importantly, however, volunteers left the site with the experience of working with and learning from each other – across generations, across educational and occupational divides, and across other social boundaries that usually serve to keep people apart. Structure The first chapter, this introduction, introduces the broad scope of the dissertation and presents the theoretical framework that will shape the interpretation. Chapter 2 provides a history of the vacation habit in general, with a focus on the Lake George region in particular. Against this backdrop, Chapter 3 provides a history of the Wiawaka Holiday House history, from pre-contact times through the present. Chapter 4 presents the fieldwork, including field methodology and descriptive results. Chapter 5 brings the archaeological evidence to bear in exploring the research questions outlined here. Chapter 6, the conclusion, summarizes the work done and outlines both how these results address larger research questions in archaeology and other disciplines, and also outlines directions for future work. Acknowledgements I am so grateful to my committee, Chair Paul Shackel, A. Lynne Bolles, Mark Leone, Barbara Little, and Robyn Muncy, for pushing me intellectually throughout the dissertation process. Each and every one of them challenged what I thought I knew, and v pointed me in directions I didn’t know I needed to take. Not only is this dissertation a product of their mentorship and guidance, but I am a better person for it. Thank you, all of you. A special thank you to Chris Dixon, former

Load more