The Beekmans of New York: material possession and social progression
Date
1996
Authors
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
James and Jane Beekman were eighteenth-century New Yorkers of Dutch descent Success in the dry goods business enabled them to take part in the growing market for consumer goods, as both suppliers and consumers. They lived in several distinctive domestic settings including a Dutch working class neighborhood, the Dock Ward or commercial center of New York, and an secluded country seat. These architectural settings, along with purchases recorded in the family’s "Household Account Books" serve as the documents that detine their social position as it changed in tandem with their material surroundings. ☐ In order to explore the Beekmans' social and material development, three distinct persona have been identified. Each corresponds to a particular architectural setting, and a chronological phase of the family's evolution. First we see their provincial persona, characterized by ties to ethnic identity and religious traditions. Next, we see the family's urban persona exhibited in their desire to play a part in the society of New York City’s mercantile elite. Finally, we see the Beekmans' cosmopolitan persona, characterized by their emulation of the polite customs and fashions that had gained ascendancy among the wealthy elite of Britain, Europe and colonial America. ☐ Documented objects have been attached to each of these persona as a means of relating a concrete moment in the family's redefinition of their image to a phase of their evolutionary process. Corresponding to the provincial persona is a Dutch kas or cupboard, two commemorative William and Mary plates and a bible in three languages. Corresponding to the Beekmans' urban persona are a New York rococo card table, a tea table and a dining table. The final category of objects, which demonstrate the cosmopolitan persona, include a pair of globes, and a variety of instruments. ☐ These objects each came into the Beekman household at definite moments as the family defined and redefined itself, and they tell us about how that process unfolded In addition, the objects are observable in space, in this case the observable spaces are the domestic settings in which they were once located. It is in the exploration of the architectural settings that the Beekman family inhabited and the objects that punctuate these settings that one begins to understand the many facets of their public and private life.