The Pennsylvania State University The Graduate School College of the Liberal Arts CHILDREN’S MITE: JUVENILE PHILANTHROPY IN AMERICA, 1815-1865 A Dissertation in History by David Michael Greenspoon © 2012 David Michael Greenspoon Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2012 ii The dissertation of David Michael Greenspoon was reviewed and approved* by the following: Lori D. Ginzberg Professor or History and Women’s Studies Dissertation Adviser Chair of Committee Anthony Kaye Associate Professor of History Gary Cross Distinguished Professor of Modern History Hester Blum Associate Professor of English Michael Kulikowski Professor of History and Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies Head of the Department of History *Signatures are on file in the Graduate School. iii ABSTRACT My research examines juvenile benevolence in early nineteenth-century America to better explain how the northern middle class – especially Christian activists among them – culturally negotiated the developing capitalist economy, and the place of children within it. “Children’s Mite” considers children’s books, records left by juvenile benevolent societies, parenting guides, and the writing of children themselves. I argue that as reformers who espoused middle-class values, as well as members of the middle class, taught children virtuous ways to use their money, they immersed girls and boys in the world of finance, and thus legitimized juvenile participation in a capitalist economy. Therefore, I contend that the then newly-popularized middle-class ideal of a sheltered, innocent childhood removed from the marketplace, represented, at least in part, an ideological construct. My findings help explain the rise of juvenile consumerism in the nineteenth century, a significant field of study given the importance of conspicuous consumption to current-day childhood, as well as the role of children’s merchandise in the modern-day economy. Furthermore, my dissertation sheds light on the complex relationships among nineteenth-century philanthropy, religion, and a burgeoning consumer economy. “Children’s Mite” suggests that consumerist and philanthropic impulses are not mutually exclusive. This project also considers how antebellum reform organizations, Sunday schools, and parents trained a rising generation to be entrepreneurs and consumers. “Children’s Mite” suggests that antebellum juvenile philanthropic associations, commonly organized out of Sunday schools, acted as spaces where children learned to reproduce their parents’ spending habits: an important indicator of class. In perhaps no arena were anxieties regarding the relationship between children and the economy so explicitly negotiated than reform and benevolent organizations. Reformers mobilized youngsters to participate in these causes as donors, producers of merchandise for fundraising, and members of juvenile societies. In most reform and benevolent causes in antebellum America, reformers recruited children to assume an active and distinct function. However, academics looking closely at the relationship between reform and the economy, including a developing consumer culture, have not extensively considered the role children played. This project examines three popular nineteenth-century causes into which girls and boys were recruited: Christian missions, temperance, and aid for Union soldiers during the American Civil War. These endeavors together highlight the diverse ways children were taught to engage in philanthropic campaigns. Indeed, some juvenile reform societies stressed self-sacrifice, while others emphasized a material culture, by which members could identify each other. Moreover, an examination of these three causes offers a valuable perspective by which to see how the relationship between children and philanthropy developed and expanded. This project was completed under the supervision of Professor Lori D. Ginzberg. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Abbreviations v Acknowledgements vi Introduction 1 Chapter 1. Shaping Young Desire: The Material World of 24 Childhood Through the Eyes of Reformers Chapter 2. A Penny Saves: American Children, Missionary Campaigns, 75 and Lessons in Money Management Chapter 3. “With banner and with badge we come:” Making 121 Antebellum Children Sober and Respectable Chapter 4. “Tempt the Eye and Please the Taste:” Juvenile Fairs and the 161 American Civil War Conclusion 205 Bibliography 213 v LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AAS American Antiquarian Society ABCFM American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions AHS Andover Historical Society ASSU American Sunday School Union BPL Boston Public Library HUL Harvard University Library MTU Massachusetts Temperance Union PUL Princeton University Library USSC United States Sanitary Commission vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS It is with great pleasure that I thank those who have made this project possible. While completing this dissertation, the faculty at the Pennsylvania State University have been extraordinarily supportive. In particular, I wish to thank my adviser, Lori Ginzberg, for her generosity, advice, and feedback. She has devoted a lot of time questioning every word and pushing this project much further than it would have gone otherwise. I would also like to thank the other members of my committee for their encouragement and helpful questions and suggestions, namely: Hester Blum, Gary Cross, and Anthony Kaye. I would also like to thank the staff members of the George and Ann Richards Civil War Era Center and the Department of History, who have been helpful over the course of my doctorate, in particular: Jennifer Gilbert, Toni Mooney, Barby Singer, and Lindsay Wells. For their financial support, as well as their assistance in my research, I am indebted to the Congregational Library; the Friends of the Princeton University Library and the Cotsen Children’s Library at Princeton University; the de Grummond Children’s Literature Collection at the University of Southern Mississippi. I have also received support from my institution, in particular from: the College of the Liberal Arts, the Department of History, and the George and Ann Richards Civil War Era Center. They provided assistance that funded my research and gave me the time necessary to write. I would also like to thank the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic and the Society for the History of Children and Youth, whose financial support allowed me to present portions of my dissertation at their respective conferences. I would also like to acknowledge the institutions that generously shared materials: the American Antiquarian Society, the Andover-Harvard Theological Library and the Houghton Library at Harvard University, the Andover Historical Society, Boston Public Library, the Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature at the University of Florida, Hamilton College Library Special Collections, the Massachusetts Historical Society, the Scudder Association, and the Special Collections Research Center at Syracuse University Library. Additionally the Pennsylvania State University Libraries have provided materials that proved invaluable for this project. While earning my doctorate a number of graduate students have made the process more rewarding and enjoyable. In particular, I wish to thank Andrew Prymak for his friendship and support. I also wish to thank Lynn Teichman, who, though not a graduate student, has been a constant source of encouragement, captivating conversations, and delicious meals. My family has been supportive through my life, and this is no less true while I pursued my doctorate. I would like to thank my mother and father, Ellen and Stan Greenspoon, for their encouragement and love. I would like to recognize my father for repeatedly reading through dissertation drafts and offering innumerable suggestions. I also wish to express my appreciation to my mother, who has worked hard to keep me connected in a process that can be lonely, with phone calls, greeting cards, and birthday cakes in the mail. I would also like to thank my brother Philip; my grandparents Mitzi Muenz, the late Sigi Muenz, and the late Anne Greenspoon; and my in-laws Janet, Mike, and Sam Abrams, and Davina and Micah Kleid. Finally, I would like to thank my wife, Marni Greenspoon, for her love, support, and advice. She has been in my life for as long as I have been writing this, and in that vii time has shown extraordinary patience. It is hard to imagine how this project would have been completed without her encouragement, and her feedback on numerous drafts. I love you so much. 1 Introduction In 1816 the Religious Rembrancer, a theological periodical, encouraged children to organize and financially support juvenile tract societies. “If you begin when you are young to give away a few cents monthly for some kind and religious purpose, you will soon find more delight in this use of money than in buying cakes and trifles.”1 Similar appeals appeared regularly in the Early Republic; such sentiments characterized both the hopes and fears of middle-class Americans who wrestled with the moral ramifications of children engaging the marketplace. Many adults believed girls and boys would use their money wastefully and immorally if they were not taught to devote it to benevolent causes. For these Americans, instilling proper financial values in children was essential for protecting their family’s socioeconomic status and preserving the religious integrity of the nation. “Children’s Mite: Juvenile Philanthropy in America, 1815-1865,”