Carl Bridenbaugh (August 10, 1903 – January 6, 1992) was an American historian of Colonial America.[1][2] He wrote fourteen books and edited or co-edited five more, becoming acclaimed as a historian and teacher.[3]
Career
Born in Philadelphia and raised in its rural suburbs, he received his bachelor's degree from Dartmouth College in 1925, studied at the University of Pennsylvania for two years, and completed his master's and doctoral degrees at Harvard University in 1930 and 1936, respectively. At Harvard he worked closely with urban historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Sr. He taught at MIT from 1927–1938, Harvard in 1929–1930, and Brown University from 1938–1942 before leaving for wartime service in the Navy.[2][4]
Bridenbaugh is best known for his two major books on colonial cities: Cities in the Wilderness-The First Century of Urban Life in America 1625–1742 (1938) and Cities in Revolt: Urban Life in America, 1743–1776 (1955). In them he examined in depth five key cities: Boston (population 16,000 in 1760), Newport Rhode Island (population 7500), New York City (population 18,000), Philadelphia (population 23,000), and Charles Town (Charlestown, South Carolina), (population 8000). He argues they grew from small villages to take major leadership roles in promoting trade, land speculation, immigration, and prosperity, and in disseminating the ideas of the Enlightenment, and new methods in medicine and technology. Furthermore, they sponsored a consumer taste for English amenities, developed a distinctly American educational system, and began systems for care of people meeting welfare. The cities were not remarkable by European standards, but they did display certain distinctly American characteristics, according to Bridenbaugh. There was no aristocracy or established church, there was no long tradition of powerful guilds. The colonial governments were much less powerful and intrusive and corresponding national governments in Europe. They experimented with new methods to raise revenue, build infrastructure and to solve urban problems.[7] They were more democratic than European cities, in that a large fraction of the men could vote, and class lines were more fluid. Contrasted to Europe, printers (especially as newspaper editors) had a much larger role in shaping public opinion, and lawyers moved easily back and forth between politics and their profession. Bridenbaugh argues that by the mid-18th century, the middle-class businessmen, professionals, and skilled artisans dominated the cities. He characterizes them as "sensible, shrewd, frugal, ostentatiously moral, generally honest," public spirited, and upwardly mobile, and argues their economic strivings led to "democratic yearnings" for political power.[8][9]
Personal life
Bridenbaugh married twice, first in 1931 to Jessica Hill, who died in 1943, and then a short time later to Roberta Haines Herriott (1902–1996). He died of cancer in Rhode Island Hospital, Providence.
^Alden, John R. (1953). "Review of Myths and Realities: Societies of the Colonial South". The Journal of Southern History. 19 (1): 77–79. doi:10.2307/2954315. JSTOR2954315.