The Workplace before the Factory

The collection of essays in this book ranges across a wide variety of crafts and industries to offer a unique perspective on the place of labor in the lives of
artisans and wage-earners in the era before large-scale mechanization.

The Workplace before the Factory addresses a common theme—the influence of the work process and technological innovation on labor and production before the Industrial Revolution. Covering a broad span of time, place, and enterprise, the authors discuss different kinds of industrial organizations—outwork, small shop, and centralized production. Among the activities they describe are papermaking in eighteenth-century France, linen weaving in Upper Swabia, unskilled labor in Paris, Saxon silver mining, printing in Antwerp, and artisanal crafts in rural New England.

Thomas Max Safley is Assistant Professor of History at the University of Pennsylvania. Leonard N. Rosenband is Associate Professor of History at Utah State University.