Little Capitalists: The Social Economy of Saving in the United States, 1816-1941
246 Manhattan Avenue, #3C
New York, New York 10026
Eric Foner
"Little Capitalists" charts the transition from the private philanthropic savings banks of the early nineteenth century to the myriad commercial, cooperative, and public financial institutions for the working classes of the mid-twentieth century. It shows how conceptions of individual responsibility interacted with actual savings practices to integrate US workers into the national economy, building the financial apparatus that funded the expansion of wage-labor capitalism by harnessing the capital of wage laborers.
Taught:
"Capital City: An Economic History of New York," Summer 2010
Assisted:
"US Foreign Relations, 1890-1990," Prof. Anders Stephanson, Spring 2009
"The American Radical Tradition," Prof. Eric Foner, Fall 2008
"The American Presidency, 1898-2008," Prof. David Eisenbach, Spring 2008
"The History of the City of New York," Prof. Kenneth T. Jackson, Fall 2007
"The United States, 1900-1940," Prof. Sarah Phillips, Spring 2007
"The United States in the Era of Civil War & Reconstruction," Prof. Eric Foner, Fall 2006
"Teaching Thrift: The Small Finance Industry, Financial Literacy, and Industrial Labor in the Late Nineteenth Century United States," Business History Conference Annual Meeting, 1 April 2011
"The Political Economy of Poverty: Class, Capitalism, and Savings in the Mid-Nineteenth Century United States," American Society for Legal History Annual Meeting, 19 November 2010
"Saving the Race By Saving Its Money: The Freedmen's Savings Bank and the Meaning of Freedom after the Civil War," American Historical Association Annual Meeting, 4 January 2009
Research Fellow, New England Regional Fellowship Consortium (2010); Alred D. Chandler, Jr., Travel Fellowship in Business History and Institutional Economic History (2009); Research Fellow, The Program in Early American Economy and Society (2008)
Mellon Graduate Student Intern in Primary Sources (2007-08) and Research Assistant to the Lehman Curator (2009-11) at the Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Columbia University