Essay Questions for Thinking through Sources 4

Celebrate the Growth of Commerce and Culture in North America: In the relatively short period between 1630 and 1730, Boston evolved from an isolated colonial settlement in which the inhabitants were often deprived of sufficient food to a bustling seaport in which residents had the possibility of purchasing both necessities and luxuries from around the world. What do these documents reveal about the ways in which Bostonians’ lives were improved by the economic and cultural developments that took place in the early eighteenth century? Use specific evidence from the documents to support an argument that frames eighteenth-century commerce and culture as a positive development.

Criticize the Growth of Commerce and Culture in North America: In the relatively short period between 1630 and 1730, Boston evolved from a colonial settlement that emphasized equality and community among its residents to an economically diverse city in which the lives and experiences of wealthy and poor inhabitants were drastically different. What do these documents reveal about the ways in which Bostonians suffered from the economic and cultural developments that took place in the early eighteenth century? Use specific evidence from the documents to support an argument that frames eighteenth-century commerce and culture as a problematic development.

Consider What Is Missing: These sources, which were collected to illustrate the ways commercial and cultural growth changed Bostonians’ lives in the early 1700s, consist of four documents (4.1, 4.2, 4.3, and 4.4) that pertain to the emergence and development of trade and the merchant class, and only two documents that pertain directly to the lives and experiences of Boston’s non-elites (4.5 and 4.6). What does this grouping suggest about the nature of the historical sources that are available to historians studying North American cities in the early eighteenth century? What are some of the reasons that there are so fewer sources documenting the lives and experiences of the poor and their thoughts about changing society, and how can people interested in their history find out more about it?

Read between the Lines: Documents 4.1, 4.2, 4.3, and 4.4 are included in this grouping to illustrate the emergence of international commerce in Boston in the early eighteenth century and its impact on the living standards and influence of the city’s elite. But a careful study of these documents can also shed light on information about the city’s non-elite residents and their contributions to the economic changes that remade Boston in the 1800s. What can you glean from these documents about who participated in the creation of the new wealth that transformed Boston in this era, and what do the documents reveal about who benefitted from that wealth?