132 THE RETROSPECT OF THE YEAR. 



the household, including the dairy. The men were en- 

 grossed in the outside cares of the farm and home, yet 

 maintained high intelligence and character. The lecturer 

 said the Quakers of Adams maintained the first successful 

 cotton factory in America. The Arkwright invention , now 

 about 100 years old, was brought to America in Samuel 

 Slater's brain in 1789. Hearing that a firm in Rhode 

 Island had made some attempts at cotton spinning, he 

 wrote from New York, and received the following as part 

 of his answer : " If thou canst do this thing, I invite thee 

 to come to Rhode Island and have the honor and the profit 

 of introducing cotton manufacturing in America." Slater 

 did enter the firm of Win. Almy and Smith Brown and 

 with them began the successful era. The Quakers of Ad- 

 ams were the first to set up successful cotton manufacture 

 outside of Rhode Island. Their social life was simple and 

 pure. 



Monday, March 24, 1890. Sidney Perley, Esq., of 

 this city, delivered a lecture on " Old-time winters in Es- 

 sex County," a subject to which he had given special 

 'attention, and had gathered a large fund of information 

 from old diaries, records and newspapers. The lecturer 

 spoke of the watch, church services, dress, food and schools 

 of the early winter seasons ; how the people spent their 

 evenings, the winter employment of the people in cutting 

 off the forests, sledding timber and wood, making pipe 

 staves and barrel hoops, and most interesting of all, the in- 

 stitution of the old-fashioned shoemakers' shops, of which 

 nearly every farm had one a century ago. Women in 

 those days engaged in spinning and weaving. The holi- 

 days were referred to Thanksgiving, Christmas and New 

 Year's, and the winter pleasures, such assleighrides, danc- 

 ing, spinning and quilting parties, and games, shufile- 



