American Silk 1830-1930: Entrepreneurs and Artifacts

At one time America's silk industry was the largest in the world. Silk was late to be industrialized, well after cotton and wool. Nonetheless, nineteenth-century American entrepreneurs rapidly built a silk industry with levels of production once unimaginable. American Silk, 1830-1930 traces the evolution of the American silk industry through three compelling and very different case studies: the Nonotuck Silk Company of Northampton, Massachusetts; the Haskell Silk Company of Westbrook, Maine; and the Mallinson Silk Company of New York and Pennsylvania. The case studies span the development of the U.S. silk industry from its beginnings in the 1830s to its decline in the 1930s, when synthetic imitators such as rayon began to dominate the market. Authors: Jacqueline Field, Marjorie Senechal, and Madelyn Shaw. Hardcover; 320 pages.