In this New Hampshire Humanities Council grant funded program, presenter Carrie Brown explores the technological triumph that helped save the Union and then transformed the nation.  During the Civil War, northern industry produced a million and a half rifles, along with tens of thousands of pistols and carbines.  How did the North produce all of those weapons?  The answer lies in new machinery and methods for producing  guns with interchangeable parts.  Once the system of mass production had been tested and perfected, what happened after the war?  In the period from 1870 to 1910 new factory technology and new print media fueled the development of mass consumerism.  While this program tells a broad, national history, it focuses on the critical and somewhat surprising role of Vermont and New Hampshire in producing industrial technology that won the war and changed American life.

Carrie Brown holds a PhD in American Literature and Folklore from the University of Virginia.  She is an independent scholar who also works as a freelance history curator for museums in New England.  She has curated two exhibitions on the Civil War for the American Precision Museum, as well as exhibitions on the history of aviation, the early years of the automobile, and the bicycle.  The author of two books and many articles and exhibit catalogs, Brown delights in finding connections between changing technology and the evolution of popular culture.

The Captain Josiah Crosby Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution in partnership with the Amherst Town Library thanks the New Hampshire Humanities Council for the funding for this event.

Open to all, Nourishing Traditions meetings are informal, interactive and focused on nutrient-dense foods, cooking techniques and resources. We are the Amherst-Nashua Chapter, and the first chapter, of the non-profit Weston A. Price Foundation.

WAPF is named for Dr. Price, a dentist whose research demonstrated that humans achieve perfect physical form and perfect health generation after generation only when they consume nutrient-dense whole foods and the vital fat-soluble activators found exclusively in animal fats. The Foundation is dedicated to restoring nurtrient dense foods to the human diet through education, research, and activism. Tour WAPF & learn more.