Josiah White: Quaker Entrepreneur (review)

62Quaker History mentioned, Ingle's amazing book is packed with unusual insights and helpful information. One insight I am particularly grateful for is my gaining a real sense from Ingle's careful research why it was that George Fox and the Quaker movement posed such a fearful threat to the social, economic, political and religious fabric of Commonwealth and Restoration England. Every serious student of early Quakerism must encounter, do battle with, and learn much from this study of George Fox and his Children ofthe Light. Wilmington CollegeT. Canby Jones Josiah White: Quaker Entrepreneur. By Norris Hansell. Easton, Pa.: Canal History and Technology Press, 1992. 172 pp. Illustrations, notes, and index. $19.95. Josiah White was a Philadelphia Yearly Meeting Friend who was bom at Mount Holly, New Jersey in 1781, just too late to have clambered on John Woolman's knee. Though he did not personally come to the Delaware Valley to do good, he is certainly one ofthose who did well, and this book is a very readable account of his various doings taken from his letters and other contemporary sources. On his decease in 1 850, Josiah White had lived through one ofthe most significant phases of the industrial revolution in America. White was apprenticed into the hardware trade in Philadelphia at fifteen. In 1802, when he had completed his time, he sold some inherited land for $5000 and set up on his own account. He kept ajournai, and before 1 803 was speaking, either pompously or naively, ofa desire for wealth, a desire to keep it within reason, to ease up on his efforts by about thirty, and to do "as much as is in my power to ameliorate the condition of my fellow creatures." He began his career much as he continued it, engaging in a scheme to develop the water power potential of the Falls of Schuylkill. He tried to develop the manufacturing and transportation potential of the site in various ways and built what may have been the first wire suspension bridge in the world. The venture was not entirely successful in a financial sense, but we observe a shrewd mind at work. White grasped the importance of transportation in industrial development, and subsequently undertook a variety ofenterprises connected in one way or another with this idea. He pioneered the use of anthracite, built bridges, innovative locks and navigation systems and railroads. He was always on the look-out. This book is a splendid portrait of a man and an era. Many of the letters in it contain fascinating detail ofboth ordinary and business life. White's eye provides us with a clear picture of his times and surroundings. His life was adventurous, though he was not uniformly successful. He had a practical vision, and though very different from the more renowned Friend from Mount Holly, he seems to have managed to live up to his early principles. Heretical though it is to say so, they might actually be of wider application and more general use in the long run. Whitewasprobably an ordinary Friend, quietlyreflectivebutnotdemonstrative in his religion. He belonged to the Orthodox branch, but one hopes his sentiments were more characteristic ofthe ordinary Friends than their quarrelsome leaders. "I have relatives, friends, and acquaintances who have left us and joined these separations. Most ofthem say afterwards their views are not changed. They are the same as those termed orthodox. I talk to many of them and know there are few Book Reviews63 differences, mainly separations." A most interesting man. We should be grateful to Norris Hansell for both the text and the many excellent illustrations. Earlham School of ReligionJohn Punshon Deborah Darby of Coalbrookdale, 1754-1810: Her Visits to America, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, England and the Channel Islands. By Rachel Labouchere. York, Eng.: William Sessions, 1993. xxx + 438 pp. Maps, illustrations, charts, appendixes, bibliography, and indexes. Paper £6.50. Between 1750 and 1810, Friends in North America and in Britain faced quite different social and political conditions. Developments on both continents raise intriguing questions for historians: What were the relationships and influences between English Friends and those Friends who lived in the United States? To address these questions Rachel Labouchere has published...