A False Sense Of Status?: The Ceramic And Glass Wares Of Lower Working Class Irish In The City Of Detroit During Rapid Industrialization

Andrew D. McKinney

A False Sense Of Status?: The Ceramic And Glass Wares Of Lower Working Class Irish In The City Of Detroit During Rapid Industrialization

Year: 2018

Summary

The immigrant population increased in the City of Detroit between 1840 and 1860 due to rapid industrialization. The Erie Canal and rail-road expansion made Detroit more accessible to the world and was the primary conduit for the influx. The timber and mining industry provided a wide range of employment opportunities. The Irish were the largest group of immigrants. Most of the Irish lived in the Corktown neighborhood. A tenement row-house in the Corktown neighborhood, the Workers Row House (WRH), was built in 1852 and still stands today. Archeologists excavated in the backyard of the WRH from 2006-2008. This poster presents artifact analysis on ceramic and glass wares from the WRH. My research explores whether employment opportunities in a rapidly industrializing city provided the lower working-class Irish with a false sense of financial security which in turn prompted them to purchase ornate wares more closely associated with middle or upper-class society.

Cite this Record

A False Sense Of Status?: The Ceramic And Glass Wares Of Lower Working Class Irish In The City Of Detroit During Rapid Industrialization. Andrew D. McKinney. Presented at Society for Historical Archaeology, New Orleans, Louisiana. 2018 ( tDAR id: 441713)