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Title: Multigenerational Families in Nineteenth-Century America

Citation Type: Conference Paper

Publication Year: 2003

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Abstract: Revisionist historians maintain that the aged in nineteenth-century America and north-western Europe usually preferred to reside alone or with only their spouse. According to this interpretation, the aged ordinarily resided with their adult children only out of necessity, especially in eases of poverty or infirmity. This article challenges that position, arguing that in mid-nineteenth-century America coresidence of the aged with their children was almost universal, and that the poor and sick aged were the group most likely to live alone. The article suggests that the decline of the multigenerational family in the twentieth century is connected to the rise of wage labour and the diminishing importance of agricultural and occupational inheritance.

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Authors: Ruggles, Steven

Conference Name: Workshop on Household and Family in Past Time

Publisher Location: Palma, Spain

Data Collections: IPUMS USA

Topics: Aging and Retirement, Family and Marriage, Other

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