Summer, So Far

One of the challenges of academic life is the summer. A psychologist acquaintance of mine recently mentioned that she gets a lot of professorial types during the summer months coming to talk to her about depression. With the constant deadlines imposed on the working academic during the school term, it's often difficult to transition to a life of self-discipline. While I'm only an academic-in-training this is the first summer I haven't taken classes since the summer of 2001.

While I haven't slipped into depression I also haven't been diligently working on my scholarly pursuits. My excuses are two-fold. First, I've had plenty of housework to do to prepare for the sale. I spent today in the attic re-wrapping a duct. In the last couple of weeks I've dug up, seeded and watered the front lawn. I saw the first little grassling yesterday morning, and today it's everywhere. In another week or so it might actually start looking like a lawn. In addition to the cleaning and packing we've been doing, I've also replaced some of the asbestos tiles on the side of the house and caulked a flashing that was letting in the rain, as well as increased the size of a hole around the furnace vent, and replaced a hose sprayer on the kitchen sink.

The second half of my excuse is that I've been reading non-research material. I finally got around to reading Greil Marcus's Lipstick Traces after having it sit on my shelf for years. I read one book on contemporary politics, and the first volume of David W. Levy's 3-volume history of the University of Oklahoma (which was excellent). Plus some short stories, some essays, some internet and excerpts from a dozen books. I've also managed to watch a few foreign-language movies (which was one of the things I wanted to do this summer). I saw La Dolce Vita last night and enjoyed it tremendously. And, to be completely honest, I did manage to take a nap the other day and a few days ago I went the whole day without even turning on the computer.

So, it's not that I've spent all summer napping, only that my attention has been elsewhere, and just when I was asked to join a group blog!

My research hasn't been completely neglected, however. Just as I suspected, most of the American Medicine Show stuff covers the late 19th century. It's hard to pinpoint exactly when they started being noticed. By the 1730s they seem to be prevelant and by the 1770s they're a pain in the ass. Here is a Connecticut law from 1773:

Whereas the practice of mountebanks in dealing out and administering physick and medicine of unknown composition indiscriminately to any persons whom they can by fair words induce to purchase and receive them without duly consulting, or opportunity of duly consulting, and considering the nature and symptoms of the disorder for which, and the constitution and circumstances of the patient or receiver to whom they administer, has a tendency to injure and destroy the health, constitution and lives of those who receive and use such medicines: And whereas the practice of mountebanks in publickly advertising and giving notice of their skill and ability to cure diseases, and the erecting publick stages and places from whence to declaim to an harangue the people on the virtue and efficacy of their medicines, or to exhibit by themselves or their dependents any plays, tricks, juggling or unprofitable feats of uncommon dexterity and agility of body, tends to draw together great numbers of people, to the corruption of manners, promotion of idleness, and the detriment of good order and religion, as well as to tempt and ensnare them to purchase such unwhole and oftentimes dangerous drugs:

Be it therefore enacted by the Governor, Council and Representatives, in General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, That no mountebank, or preson whatsoever under him, shall exhibit or cause to be exhibited on any publick stage or place whatsoever within this Colony, any games, tricks, plays, juggling or geats of uncommon decsterity and agility of body, tending to no good and useful purposes, but tending to collect together numbers of spectators and gratify vain or useless curiosity. Nor shall any mountebank, or person whatsoever under him, at or any such stage or place offer, vend or otherwise dispose of, or invite any person so collected to purchase or receive any physick, drugs, or medicines, commended to be efficacious and useful in various disorders.

But, of course, my research isn't exactly about medicine shows and mountebanks, but about itinerancy. Here is an overly ambitious outline for research on itinerancy:

Itinerancy: A Pedestrian History

Intro – Beyond the Sound of a Bell

1. Indigenous Networks: Trade and Travel Among the 500 Nations
2. Patterns of Settlement: The European Colonization
3. American Mountebank: Medicine and Entertainment in the Western Hemisphere
4. Peddling: Commerce in the New World
5. Nowhere in America: Creating Intentional Communities and Utopias
6. Travelling Justice: The Audiencia and the Itinerant Judge
7. Roads, Ferries and Bridges: The Establishment of Routes of Travel
8. Preachers and Pilgrims: Itinerant Preachers and Pilgrimages
9. Long Hunters: Following Native Paths
10. Getting Mail: Creating a Colonial Postal Service
11. Tales of Adventure: Travel Narratives and Tourism
12. Art for Art’s Sake: Entertainers and Animal Shows
13. Ladies of the Army: The Unsung Support Traveling with the Army
14. Stand-Up Philosophers: Professing on Tour

Just glancing over this as I post it I recognize a few changes I need to make, but the polish will have to come later. ("Nowhere in America," for example, is someone else's title. I also had a better title for 13, but forgot it).

One of the interesting things about this research is how categorized everything is. Medical historians look only at the mountebank. Entertainment historians look primarily at the jugglers and clowns. Researchers of itinerant preaching look only at the religious sermonizing. It seems more likely that these travelling groups fulfilled many different roles. Not only did they provide a potential medicine for those at their wits end, but they also may have provided magical healing for devilish curses, as well as news and gossip (it seems possible there were also itinerant abortionists, but I've yet to uncover more than speculation). Joy Kenseth's The Age of the Marvelous mentions in passing at how widely information about the New World had spread only two years after Columbus's return. These bands of travelers helped spread the news of the world, as well as the gossip from neighboring towns. They probably didn't have just one strategy for making money, but engaged in a variety of tasks to earn enough to continue on their way.

A few of the next steps I need to take is to locate information on early roads and trails. I need to find a history of the colonial postal service, and a demographic analysis of early settlement patterns. One of the things I hope to do with this research is to keep all the European colonizers on the table. I'm not solely interested in the British invasion. I also want to show how the Spanish, French, Dutch, Portuguese, etc. interacted with each other and the various indigenous nations. One of my seminars next semester covers the first 250 years of European colonization, and I anticipate that to help me guide my research.

Another speculation I had turned out to be correct. Richardson Wright's Hawkers & Walkers in Early America covers a lot of the same terrain I hope to cover. As delightful as Wright's writing is, he is not a historian and there is a notable lack of references. Nonetheless, I could not ask for a more charming and engaging guide.

I also see that one of the current hot books on the internet is The Wealth of Networks by Yochai Benkler. Crooked Timber is doing a seminar on it, and I suppose I probably need to find time this summer to read it, and some other contemporary works on networks.

But, tonight I have some books on early denistry to work through!