INHABITING SPACES, MAKING PLACES:

CREATING A SPATIAL AND MATERIAL BIOGRAPHY OF DAVID RUGGLES

W
IE
A Dissertation Presented
EV
by

LINDA M. ZIEGENBEIN
PR

Submitted to the Graduate School of the

University of Massachusetts Amherst in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for the degree of

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY

May 2013

Anthropology
 UMI Number: 3589230

All rights reserved

INFORMATION TO ALL USERS

The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted.

In the unlikely event that the author did not send a complete manuscript
and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed,
a note will indicate the deletion.

W
IE
UMI 3589230
Published by ProQuest LLC (2013). Copyright in the Dissertation held by the Author.
EV
Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC.
All rights reserved. This work is protected against
unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code
PR

ProQuest LLC.
789 East Eisenhower Parkway
P.O. Box 1346
Ann Arbor, MI 48106 - 1346
 W
IE
EV
PR

© Copyright by Linda M. Ziegenbein 2013

All Rights Reserved
 INHABITING SPACES, MAKING PLACES:
CREATING A MATERIAL AND SPATIAL BIOGRAPHY OF DAVID RUGGLES

A Dissertation Presented

W
by

LINDA M. ZIEGENBEIN
IE
EV

Approved as to style and content by:

PR

_______________________________________
Robert Paynter, Chair

_______________________________________
Marla R. Miller, Member

_______________________________________
H. Martin Wobst, Member

____________________________________
Thomas Leatherman, Department Chair
Anthropology Department
 DEDICATION

To the wonderful women I have lost

Margaret Ziegenbein “Grandma”

Marjorie Geery “Gram”
Xu Bi-cun “Waipo”

and gained

Mary Elizabeth
Lila Beckwith

during the course of this degree.

W
IE
EV
PR
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would first like to thank Stephen Silliman and the Petaluma Abode

Archaeological Project fieldcrew from so many years ago. It was through my

interactions with Valerie Andrushko, Julie Bernard, Jonathan Goodrich, Tania Stellini,

Barb Voss and, of course, Steve, that I was able to envision a career in academia and how

I might belong there. They are a wonderful group of people and I am honored to still

consider them friends. Steve has also been a mentor to me since that summer and has

helped me navigate the strange waters of academia. Kent Lightfoot, who was Steve’s

W
dissertation advisor and who I also first met that summer, impressed me with his
IE
willingness to advise and teach a student who was not his own. Steve, Barb, and Kent

exemplify that generosity and kindness are not antithetical to academia. They set a high
EV
bar and have inspired my approach to my colleagues, my students, and my work.

My committee, Bob Paynter, Marla Miller, and H. Martin Wobst, provided

PR

interesting discussions and useful feedback throughout the writing of the dissertation.

The following document is a reflection of our on-going dialogue. Bob, my advisor and

chair, inspires me with the breadth of his knowledge and his commitment to the legacy of

W.E.B. Du Bois. His work on power and spatiality drew me to the University of

Massachusetts and I am appreciative to have had the opportunity to study with him. He

is also a careful reader and editor, and my dissertation is much better for his involvement.

Marla helped me hone my argument and encouraged me to think broadly about my

research. Martin specializes in “out-of-the-box” thinking and has taught me to attend to

what is not, or cannot, be seen. I am grateful to them all.

v
 Many, many thanks go to my fellow committee members of the David Ruggles

Center. Steve Strimer has an encyclopedic knowledge and a passion for local history that

is catching. He selflessly shares his research with others; the fruits of his efforts have

informed many published analyses of Florence and David Ruggles. It is from Steve that I

first learned of David Ruggles and the Northampton Association. Steve, Lisa Baskin,

Mark Wamsley, Faith Deering, Tris Metcalfe, David Rosenberger, Emikan Sudan, Marie

Panik, Terry O’Toole, Craig Della Penna, Reynolds Winslow, Bob Romer, Amy

Bookbinder, Nancy Capron, and Kris Thompson have helped me think through and about

the good work of introducing David Ruggles to the public. More important, they are my

W
friends as well as co-workers.
IE
I spent countless hours in various archives and I would like to thank the staff of

those institutions for their hospitality. Elise Bernier-Feeley and Julie Bartlett Nelson of
EV
the Forbes Library in Northampton made me feel welcome and were very helpful during

the time I spent reading Sylvester Judd’s notebooks. The staff at the American
PR

Antiquarian Society in Worcester were gracious and helped me navigate their impressive

collections. Edwards Church in Northampton allowed me access to their church records;

I am thankful for their generosity. Finally, Kerry Buckley and Marie Panik of Historic

Northampton helped me better understand Northampton and Florence during the mid-19th

century. I am especially thankful that Historic Northampton offers digital copies of many

primary sources online, which allowed me to conduct research from home.

I would like to thank William C. Poe of Sonoma State University who invited me

to dinner after I received my Bachelor’s degree to talk about “making an archaeologist

vi
out of you.” The generosity of that dinner and the interest you took in my career have

stayed with, and sustained me, for many years.

Two other professors from Sonoma State University helped set me on the path

that culminates in this dissertation. Margie Purser first introduced me to historical

archaeology and the interesting questions that can be asked about the past, the landscape,

and the people who inhabited it. From Bruce Owen, I gained a solid grounding in

archaeological field methods. He also told me that the characteristic that would

determine success in graduate school was tenacity, not intelligence. I have stood in good

stead for remembering his advice.

W
The faculty at the University of South Carolina provided me with an excellent
IE
education and helped me make the transition from student to scholar. Leland Ferguson,

who was my advisor for my master’s degree, is a true “gentleman scholar” in all the best
EV
meanings of the term. It was Leland who first encouraged me to think critically of space

and place. It was an honor to work with him. Ken Kelly, Joanna Casey, and Ann
PR

Kingsolver gave me a solid grounding in anthropological and archaeological theory and

method. Kasey Grier, of the History Department, showed me how fun the study of

material culture can be and how much we can know about people and culture from

everyday items that are used. It is also from Kasey that I learned effective ways of

communicating with the public and that short is better in exhibit writing.

The transition from a master’s program to a doctoral program was on the order of

magnitude, not degrees. There are many people to thank at the University of

Massachusetts for helping me make this transition. I knew Tom Leatherman, Chair of the

department of anthropology, when I was a student in South Carolina. While I may have

vii
made Tom rue his open-door policy, his presence here has been a gift to me. Lynette

Leidy Sievert, Ventura Perez, Eric Johnson, Elizabeth Chilton, Julie Hemment, Jackie

Urla, and Michael Sugerman have been free with their support and generous with their

counsel. Shelley Bellor, Debbie Averill, Grace Rock, and Lisa Wegiel are the engine that

keeps the department running and I am thankful for the kindness and support they have

extended to me over the years.

By far my greatest source of support has been my friends and fellow graduate

students. When I first met Mary Hannah Henderson, we were new mothers and I was

new to the program. Numerous cups of tea and frequent visits later, we both have two

W
children and an enduring friendship. Liz Braun inspires me with her ability to do so
IE
many things well. I am fortunate to count her, and her husband Randy, as close friends.

Lisa Modenos, Broughton Anderson, Heidi Bauer-Clapp, Andriana Foiles, and Lyzann
EV
Harlow always kept me laughing and helped me maintain perspective. I have also

benefitted from interactions with Roderick Anderson, Christopher Douyard, Nicole Falk-
PR

Smith, Julia Fan, Evelyn Jeffers, Daniel Habtemichael, Kimberly Kasper, Deborah

Keisch Polin, Angela Labrador, Quentin Lewis, Dan Lynch, Milena Marchesi, Anthony

Martin, Vanessa Martinez, Donna Moody, Alanna Rudzik, Ashley Sherry, Christopher

Sweetapple, Tom Taaffe, and Angelina Zontine. I am lucky to have been a part of such

an intelligent, committed cohort of graduate students. Adelia and Daniel Pope, Rebecca

Spencer, and Jim Chambers are wonderful friends and camping buddies. They have

helped me attend to the important work of living while also writing.

Rebecca Shrum is more like a sister than a friend. I am grateful for innumerable

phone conversations, editorial advice, and moral support. I count on Rebecca to help me

viii
find the humor in seemingly stark situations and to be brutal in her honesty when needed.

We have leaned on each other, encouraged each other, and needled each other for many

years. Everyone should have a friend like Rebecca and I am a better person and scholar

because of our relationship.

I would like to thank my family for their encouragement over the years. My

mother and father, Lin King and Donal Ziegenbein, are very proud to now have a doctor

in the family. My sister, Mary Ziegenbein, is also a close friend. I am grateful for her

strength, wisdom, and generosity. My sincerest hope is that my girls have a relationship

like ours. My brother, James King, Jr., reminds me that the good fight is always worth

W
undertaking, and that the best fight is for one’s own life. Ann and Bill Geery, my
IE
mother- and father-in-law, are wonderful role models and I am blessed to have their

unconditional support. My daughters, Malie and Lila, have brought immeasurable joy to
EV
my life. From them I have learned that it is possible to function on little sleep, the best

kind of work is play, and it is always a good time for a dance party.
PR

My final acknowledgement goes, as it should, to Andrew Geery for innumerable

and unquantifiable reasons. We have built a life, a family, and, now, a dissertation

together. Thank you for your abiding love and steadfast belief in me.

ix
 ABSTRACT

INHABITING SPACES, MAKING PLACES:

CREATING A SPATIAL AND MATERIAL BIOGRAPHY OF DAVID RUGGLES

MAY 2013

LINDA M. ZIEGENBEIN, B.A., SONOMA STATE UNIVERSITY

M.A., UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA

Ph.D., UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS AMHERST

Directed by: Professor Robert Paynter

This dissertation considers the role biography can play in analyses of past

W
landscapes and, conversely, how those landscapes can help us better understand the lives
IE
of individuals. It focuses on one person, David Ruggles – a blind, African American,

journalist, doctor, businessman, and antislavery activist – and a specific landscape, that of
EV
western Massachusetts during the mid-19th century. The questions that guide this

dissertation concern the extent to which understanding past landscapes can reveal the
PR

previously unconsidered dimensions of the lives of people who experienced them.

The landscape is considered through multiple scales in this dissertation. It draws

on historical research as well as the modern-day Florence, Massachusetts landscape to

reveal how Ruggles’ experience was mediated by his race, physical ability, and social

position. It also incorporates ethnographic data obtained from questionnaires and in-

depth interviews to interrogate the role knowledge of local history plays in contemporary

life.

This research makes important methodological contributions to the field of

historical archaeology. First, it demonstrates the utility of a biographical approach to

x
analyses of the landscape and the past. Second, it highlights a dimension of the human

past that is often overlooked in historical archaeology: the lives of people with

disabilities. Third, in considering the life of a blind man, it recognizes that the landscape

is experienced multi-sensorily and, furthermore, that the experience of walking through

the landscape implicates one in a multitude of socio-historical processes that alter the

landscape and influence the circumstances in which people interact. Finally, the

ethnographic data reveal how knowledge about historical landscapes and the people who

inhabited them come to be combined with contemporary experiences and interests to

create new meanings and understandings.

W
IE
EV
PR

xi
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................................v

ABSTRACT .........................................................................................................................x

LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................... xvi

LIST OF FIGURES ........................................................................................................ xvii

CHAPTER

I. INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................1

Walking the Florence Landscape .............................................................................1

W
Thinking About Spaces and Places ..........................................................................3
Research Goals.........................................................................................................7
IE
Ideology and the Landscape.........................................................................8
The Body and the Landscape .......................................................................8
Communicating with the Public through the Landscape .............................9
EV
Discussion ......................................................................................10

Organization of the Dissertation ............................................................................11

PR

II. HISTORICAL BACKGROUND ..........................................................................13

Introduction ............................................................................................................13
David Ruggles, a Brief Biography .........................................................................14
Capitalism and Slavery ..........................................................................................22
Demarcating the Color Line in the North ..............................................................24

Integrated Seas? .........................................................................................28

Segregated Railroads .................................................................................31

Utopianism .............................................................................................................33
Black Abolitionism ................................................................................................36
The Black Press......................................................................................................40
Mid-19th Century Health Reform ...........................................................................44
Conclusion .............................................................................................................48

xii
III. LITERATURE REVIEW ......................................................................................50

Introduction ............................................................................................................50
African American Archaeology .............................................................................52
Utopian Community Studies in Archaeology ........................................................61
Landscape Archaeology .........................................................................................69
Disability Studies in Archaeology .........................................................................73
Public Archaeology................................................................................................78
Conclusion .............................................................................................................82

IV. METHODS: CREATING THE MATERIAL AND SPATIAL BIOGRAPHY ....83

Introduction ............................................................................................................83
Phenomenological Approaches to the Landscape..................................................85

Phenomenological Approaches in Archaeology ........................................87

W
Probate Inventories as Data Sources ......................................................................91
IE
Uses of Probate Inventories in Historical Archaeology.............................93

Research Themes ...................................................................................................94

EV
Being Black in New England .....................................................................95
Being Blind in New England .....................................................................95

Creating a Spatial and Material Biography of David Ruggles ..............................97

PR

Conclusion ...........................................................................................................100

V. FRIENDS AND CREDITORS ............................................................................101

Introduction ..........................................................................................................101
Race in Northampton ...........................................................................................102

Northampton’s Black Community ...........................................................109

Marking the Color Line in Northampton .................................................114

West Indies Day ...........................................................................115

Ruggles and the Underground Railroad Movement in Northampton ......120

Ruggles’ Social Milieu ........................................................................................122

The Friends ..............................................................................................123

xiii
 The Creditors ...........................................................................................126
The Family ...............................................................................................129

Conclusion ...........................................................................................................130

VI. THE WATER-CURE...........................................................................................131

Introduction ..........................................................................................................131
Hydropathy ..........................................................................................................132
The Northampton Water-Cure .............................................................................135

Treatment at the Northampton Water-Cure .............................................139

Those Who Helped at the Water-Cure .....................................................140

The Materiality of the Northampton Water-Cure ................................................142

Room Twelve .......................................................................................................147

W
What is Omitted ...................................................................................................155
Conclusion ...........................................................................................................157

VII.
IE
THE FENCE ........................................................................................................158
EV
Introduction ..........................................................................................................158
The Northampton and Florence Landscapes........................................................159

Spatial Segregation in Florence ...............................................................162

PR

Walking as Social Action.....................................................................................164

Sensing the Landscape .........................................................................................167

Northampton and Florence Soundscapes .................................................168

The Sounds of Modernity ............................................................168

Northampton and Florence Touchscapes .............................................................174

Florence and Northampton Scentscapes ..............................................................175
Conclusion: Senses of Space ...............................................................................176

VIII. RECLAIMING THE HISTORIC LANDSCAPE ................................................178

Introduction ..........................................................................................................178
Forming the David Ruggles Committee ..............................................................179
Collaborative Archaeology ..................................................................................183

xiv
 Collaborative Archaeology and the David Ruggles Center .....................187

Reclaiming the Past Landscape ...........................................................................192

Conclusion ...........................................................................................................195

IX. CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................197

Walking the Historical Landscape .......................................................................197

Being Black in New England ...............................................................................199
Impairment to Disability ......................................................................................202
Biography and Landscape ....................................................................................203
Linking the Past to the Present: Public Archaeology in Florence .......................204
Future Research Questions ..................................................................................205
Concluding Thoughts ...........................................................................................207

APPENDICES

W
A. RUGGLES CREDITORS ....................................................................................208
B. LANDSCAPE STUDY QUESTIONNAIRE ......................................................219
IE
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................221
EV
PR

xv
 LIST OF TABLES

Table Page

1. Northampton African American Households in 1840 ...................................... 111

2. Change in African American Population, 1840-1860....................................... 113

3. Clothing in Room 12........................................................................................ 148

4. Books in Room 12 ............................................................................................ 150

5. Question Prompts for Ethnographic Interviews ................................................ 188

W
IE
EV
PR

xvi
 LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Page

1. Image of David Ruggles ..................................................................................... 77

2 The Northampton Water-Cure .......................................................................... 138

3. 1831 Map of Northampton Showing Broughton’s Meadow ............................ 160

4. 1854 Map of Florence ....................................................................................... 163

W
IE
EV
PR

xvii
 CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION

Walking the Florence Landscape

Florence is a stereotypical New England village. There is a congregational

church, complete with white steeple, near the historical center of town, and a downtown

that spans only a few blocks. If you were to visit Florence and walk Main Street, you

would see a post office, the neon sign for Miss Flo’s Diner, a Friendly’s restaurant, and

W
no fewer than four places to buy pizza.
IE
I walk the Florence landscape every day. From my home near the current center

of town, I can walk past the Florence Casket Company (in operation since 1873), and
EV
walk along a former railroad bed that has been repurposed into a bike path, to reach the

downtown. In the summer, my family and I take this route to get to the ice cream stand
PR

where we might stand in line behind a Little League team. We will sit on the picnic

benches just outside the stand and watch cars driving down Main Street towards the other

small villages to the north of Florence. My daughters, who are seven and four years-old,

like to walk along the low brick wall that encloses Florence Savings Bank, in operation at

the same location since 1873, while they eat.

After, or while we eat our ice cream, we might walk down to visit the Sojourner

Truth Memorial Statue, erected in 2002 across the street from the congregational church.

To get there, we need to cross Main Street, where flashing lights and the sound of

electronic chirping let us know it is safe to cross. If we continue further along Pine

1
Street, we also pass the Hill Institute, the nation’s first public kindergarten. It was

founded in 1876 by a former member of a utopian community located in Florence, and

my eldest daughter attended school there. We can look at the windows and see the

children’s artwork on display. There is a fence surrounding the playground in back of the

school and my daughter will most likely try to climb it.

If, rather than walk down Pine Street, we continue down Maple Street and then

turn right on Nonotuck Street, we pass the David Ruggles Center for Early Florence

History and Underground Railroad Studies. Continuing down Nonotuck Street takes us

to the former Pro-Brush factory, which is now the Arts and Industry building housing

W
various artists’ studios. On the second floor of the building is a studio where art classes
IE
are held and where my daughter and twelve of her friends celebrated her birthday. She

can tell you about navigating the narrow stairway, running along the wooden floors and
EV
peeking out the windows overlooking the Mill River.

If it is a balmy night and we want to continue our walk, we could cross the bridge
PR

over the river. Taking a right onto Spring Street would take us to the Elks Lodge,

constructed at the site of a 19th-century water-cure hospital. A short distance after the

lodge, we would pass the new Florence Community Gardens and the Crimson and Clover

farm, both the recent result of a grassroots effort to purchase and preserve farmland. If

we take a left, we would continue down Florence Road, which would take us past the

current location of David Ruggles’ house.

I rarely walk as far as Ruggles’ house, though, so on this night, we turn from the

Elks Lodge and continue back into town. We walk up Pine Street, as far as Park Street

and then turn back towards the center of town. Passing the house once owned by

2
Sojourner Truth and the Park Street cemetery, we see the gravestones for many of

Florence’s notable residents, including the founder of the Hill Institute and several

members of the utopian community. We also pass the Lilly Library, founded in 1890,

and returning to Main Street, pass the Florence Civic Center and perhaps look at the large

bell mounted in its yard. The engraving on the bell’s pedestal notes that the bell was

once part of Cosmian Hall, a gathering spot and community meeting house that was

demolished in 1948. As we pause, I mention that on January 1, 2013 at 2:00 p.m.,

members of the community rang this bell, and many others throughout Massachusetts to

mark the 150th anniversary of the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation. Continuing

W
down Main Street, we would return to my home.
IE
Thinking About Spaces and Places
EV
As my walk through town demonstrates, the landscape is individually

experienced, but created socially. This foray yields evidence of large social processes
PR

that have resulted in the construction of houses, roads, and fences and which have altered

the landscape and influence the ability to move through it. There are also micro-level

social processes at work here, which relate to my emotional attachment to Florence. My

fondness for the landscape is a consequence of my research about it, but also because of

the powerful personal memories embedded in it — taking walks with my daughters as

newborn infants, then toddlers, and now preschool and elementary-aged along the

bikepath; walking with my husband alone and then with children to nearby parks, leading

and taking walking tours of Florence’s abolitionist past. Walking these paths releases

3
those memories and those relationships to me; through experience, the landscape has

become a container for my memories (Basso 1996:55).

There are many things I discuss in this walk- the history of the town, the routes I

commonly take, my family, and my relationship to the features on the landscape.

However, there are also aspects I do not discuss which are equally as important. I do not

mention that I am biracial and my husband is White. I do not mention my class position

nor do I mention the steep grade of the hill that takes us from Main Street to Nonotuck

Street. These omissions reflect how we all live our lives. Like everyone, my life is

guided by my commonsense understanding of the world; my race is only foregrounded in

W
those instances when it is brought up in interactions with others. As an able-bodied
IE
woman, that hill is notable to me only because there is a brick wall my daughters like to

climb. When I was pregnant, or when I was pushing a stroller, I would alter my walk to
EV
avoid having to walk back up the hill.

My experience of the landscape is dependent upon my physical ability, my

PR

personal history and knowledge, and my social relationships. Walking is not simply

about traversing space, and the paths I walk are not based on expedience. It is an act of

meaning creation that relies on the objective landscape and my subjective knowledge of

it.

The field of archaeology has also recognized that the past can be distinctively

probed by first recognizing that memory, identity, and action are all predicated on

individual bodies moving through space. This phenomenological turn in the archaeology

of space is marked in the theoretical literature by archaeologists’ tendency to talk about

the experience of landscapes rather than settlement patterns or settlement systems. And

4
though it is commonplace to use the term landscape, it has rarely been linked to the

project of understanding the dialectical relationship between an individual’s identity and

their surroundings; something more akin to the brief autobiographical sketch with which I

began.

The dissertation takes on the challenges of such an investigation of an historically

known figure, David Ruggles. But by focusing on Ruggles, I have the chance to also

address other matters that have engaged contemporary historical archaeology namely

how the growth of the market and the fight against slavery in North America have shaped

the American experience. Ruggles, who was born in Connecticut in 1810 and died in

W
Northampton Massachusetts’s village of Florence in 1839, lived a remarkable life as a
IE
very active agent in these two processes. He was born Black and free in a state that

passed its emancipation law only one generation before he was born. He was one of the
EV
foremost abolitionists of the 1830s North. He was also an entrepreneur, an author,

publisher, and hydropathist. At the end of his life he was blind, which raises a question
PR

rarely addressed by archaeologists, namely the matter of disability. These issues were the

foci for some of the most important social movements of the antebellum period:

abolitionism, utopianism, and the health movement. The dissertation considers how these

mechanisms impacted Ruggles’ everyday life: To what extent can we see their traces in

the way he organized his life? What were their material traces?

Understanding Ruggles through interrogating the materiality of his landscape is

thus a project that raises matters of theoretical, historical and methodological significance

for the field. That I have been able to conduct this research in collaboration with a

5
community-based history collective has also assured that my work has an important

connection with the general public.

Thus, this dissertation is about the landscape and the multiple levels through

which it is experienced. This perspective, of the landscape as a multivalent artifact, is not

unique in anthropology. What this dissertation adds to this discussion is the

foregrounding of race and ability in the inquiry. This dissertation demonstrates how

archaeologists can gain a broader understanding of macro-level processes — issues

surrounding racism and social networks, for example — through a careful consideration

at the micro-level. This analysis problematizes models of the landscape that imply, or

W
assume, homogeneous understandings of the landscape and suggests that the fullness of
IE
the past cannot be appreciated unless there is a robust consideration of the people who

inhabited it. To this end, this dissertation focuses on the last seven years of David
EV
Ruggles’ life when he lived in Florence and asks what we can learn about his life

through the landscape in which he moved and how his race and blindness impacted that
PR

mobility.

The utility of biography in historical archaeological research has been little

considered, primarily because of the limitations of our data. The sites that historical

archaeologists are overwhelmingly those whose occupants are anonymous, or for whom

there is little information. Another reason for the underutilization of this approach is the

concern that consideration of micro-scale processes, i.e., the life of an individual, fails to

yield conclusions that can be generalized. This dissertation demonstrates how this is a

false premise. Through the careful interrogation of Ruggles’ life and landscape, the

relationship between individuals, society, and landscape is brought to light. A