Pursuing "the things of this world": Mormon resistance and assimilation as seen in the furniture of the Brigham City Cooperative (1874-1888)
Date
1997
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
In response to the arrival of the transcontinental railroad in 1869, Mormon leaders in Utah began a campaign of resistance rhetoric promoting self-sufficiency to maintain cultural isolation from the eastern United States. The response included a drive for cooperative economic schemes and an emphasis on the consumption o f locally made products to assert religious loyalty. Within this atmosphere, the Brigham City Cooperative (founded in 1864) established a Cabinet Making Shop in 1874 as a response to the increasing availability of eastern furniture transported by the railroad. This paper examines the documents and furniture of the Cooperative Cabinet Making Shop as evidence of the consumption patterns of Brigham City Mormons. ☐ Despite the initial enthusiasm to resist eastern encroachment, my research reveals that cooperative craftsmen and customers were influenced by popular fashions in the East. An examination of the account books reveals that the shop was selling homemade versions of fashionable forms, and an examination of the extant furniture attributed to the Brigham City Cooperative suggests the craftsmen were taking visual cues from furniture available in trade catalogs from Chicago and St. Louis. In addition, evidence proves that the cooperative was actually purchasing and distributing eastern furniture at a lower price that the homemade products. ☐ The historical myth of a unified and loyal cooperative is revisited in light of these revelations to show a reality in which religious affirmations behind homemade products were not motivation enough to keep the residents from buying imported goods. With their home product cooperative, Brigham City resisted outside influence by trying to create local furniture, but failed in their efforts to convince people to demonstrate loyalty to their church in consumption habits. Instead, Brigham City consumers desired national fashions, perhaps attempting to promote a prosperous image using the visual vocabulary of the East. With the shrinking of the continent, the attempts to survive by the Brigham City Cabinet Making shop are discussed as a microcosm for the absorption of Mormon ideology into the national consciousness. ☐ In addition to a number of photographs of Brigham City Cooperative furniture, the paper also includes an catalog (appendix) that provides detailed examinations of individual pieces included in the study.