Jack Larkin, The Shaping of Everyday Life 
Discussion Questions

1. a.Why did the Indian population drop for two centuries?--Was it primarily because of white attacks?  b.By 1790, did Indians still live in tepees? 4-5

2. a.Were American families big or small in 1800? 11  b.Why did families often contain more members than just parents and children? 13

3. Why were almanacs so popular with farmers and others? 18

4. a.Why was food preparation more time consuming than today? b.What other work did (especially poorer) women have to do? 30-31

5. a.Why did children go to school in the winter?  b.Who tended to be teachers in the early 1880s? c.What about schooling for girls? 34-35

6. What everyday problems did Americans face with money? 38

7. Why did saw and gristmills sometimes run 24 hours a day and sometimes not at all?

8. a.In America, unlike Europe, did a woodworking artisan just engage in carving objects? b. What was “family government”?  45

9. Who made brooms? b. Who made tools (especially in the countryside) before America built factories to manufacture them? c.Who invented mechanized tools like the thresher? 49

10. a.How did people cook food before the stove was invented? b.What were the benefits of the cook stove? 52

11. a.Who worked in the new textile factories? b.Where did they live? 55  c.Did young workers receive their pay in cash? d.Did they receive it personally at all? 56

12. a.How did the growth of factories change the old master-journeyman-apprentice system? b.How did some “country blacksmiths” adjust to the changes? 60

13. a.Were American marriages small affairs? 63  b.Did the bride wear white and go on a honeymoon? 64  c.Why did couples in the rural North marry only in the early spring or late November? 65

14. How did weddings and marriage change as the nineteenth century wore on? 71

15. a.Why did New Englanders live longer than Virginians? 73  b.How about blacks?  c.Did rich people live longer than poor people?  73-74

16. Why did white and especially black women have a lot of children? 75

17. a.What were “miasmas”?  b.Why was this theory so dangerous? c.What was the danger of accidents? 77

18. a.Why was tuberculosis not a threat to farmers? b.Why were cities so prone to typhoid? 80-81

19. a.Why did yellow fever mostly strike seaports? b.Why did Asiatic cholera make it to America in the 1800s? 84

20. a.How did “modern medicine” treat many diseases in the early 1800s? 88 b.Why was surgery so dangerous? 92  c.Why did the toothbrush become popular? 92

21. a.Why did physicians begin to replace midwives after 1800?  b.What about male obstetricians? 97

22. a.Had Americans always buried their dead in coffins? b.Who made coffins? c.Before the advent of funeral homes and undertakers, who prepared corpses for the wake and burial? 99

23. a.Were wakes sad affairs? 100, 103  b.Where were they held? 100  c.What about slave wakes? 101

24. a.Prior to 1820, what was it like in the yards and gardens outside of a rural house? b.How did cities and even villages influence a change? 130

25. a.Were candles used by most Americans to light their homes? b.What did Americans put on the walls of their homes? 137, 139

26. a.How did lighting improve as the nineteenth century wore on? b.Why did carpets and curtains become so commonplace?  143

27. a.Why did Americans begin to greet each other with the familiar handshake by 1790? 155

28. a.What was a “chamber pot”? 160  b.What was the housewife’s job with them? c.Why were tavern and hotel beds so dangerous to sleep in? 162

29. a.Did Americans wash with soap and use deodorant? 163  b.How did the bathroom evolve? 164

30. a.Did lower-class women smoke more or less as the 1800 wore on? 168  b. What about spitting and snuff? 169  c.Why were blacks generally an inch shorter than whites? 170

31. How did the Industrial Revolution change the way Americans dressed? 188-189

32. a.Why did prostitution grow after 1800? 197  b.Why did men like to go to “city theaters”? c.Was abortion a crime in the early 1800s in America?  199

33. Did Americans become more or less sexually liberated after 1800? 199

34. Why was May 1st considered “moving day” in New York City in the early 1800s? 205