WILLIAM H. ADAMS
Trade Networks and Interaction
Spheres-A View from Silcott
ABSTRACT
The people of Silcott, a small farming community
in southeastern Washington, participated in six
major trade networks: local, local-commercial,
area-commercial, regional, national, and international. These networks are examined through
the ethnographic, historical, and archaeological
data. Remarkably, the regional, national and
international networks are best studied through
the archaeology, whereas the local networks and
the area commercial networks are best examined
through the ethnography. These networks bound
Silcott into an integrated community. while at
the same time they linked Silcott to the national
economy via the various networks.
From family to community, from community
to nation, people are entwined in economic
networks eventually linking the individual
consumer to the products of the nation. This
paper explores the various networks linking
Silcott, Washington to the areal, regional, and
national economic networks, and examines
the various internal networks with Silcott
itself.
The network consists of a hierarchy of
central places towards which people are oriented for social, economic, and political reasons.
The “main street” of Silcott was the central
place there. The nearby towns of Lewiston
and Clarkston were the central places towards
which many other small communities like
Silcott were oriented. Lewiston and Clarkston
were in turn one of many towns oriented to
Spokane. Spokane’s interests were directed
toward Portland and Seattle. This hierarchy
linked the main street of Silcott to the main
street of Portland through the networks of
other main streets.
The interaction sphere is similar to the
network except that the individual linkages
are in themselves not as important as the fact
of their existence. Thus, it will be demon-
strated here that Silcott, as part of a national
interaction sphere, was linked to such places
as Hershey, Pennsylvania even though the
individual strands within the network are
not known. What is important is that Hershey
and Silcott interacted, albeit indirectly. Silcott
people bought Hershey’s Cocoa, thus stimulating Hershey to produce more cocoa in order
to provide Silcott with more cups of hot chocolate, and so on. Though this may seem trivial,
it is not. This was just one link which Silcott
shared with other communities; there were
many others. When all these links are considered we see the tremendous quantity of
shared links which provided the economic
and social fabric of the nation. By studying
one group of consumers, those in Silcott, we
see how successful the nation was.
Silcott is a small farming community in
southeastern Washington (Figure 1). Located
on the narrow floodplain of the Snake River
and in the steep tributary canyons, the patchwork of farms emphasized irrigated orchards
and gardens in the valleys, wheat and grazing
on the hillsides. The settlement began in the
early 1860’s and continues to the present.
The ethnographic and archaeological study of
the community concentrated on the 1900 to
1930 period. That research has been dealt
with elsewhere (Adams 1973, 1975, 1976;
Adams, Gaw, and Leonhardy 1975; Gaw
1975; Leonhardy and Day-Ames 1975; DayAmes n.d.; Riordan 1976, n.d.).
FIGURE 1 . Location of Silcott, Washington.
100
The manufacturers of an artifact found in
Silcott were identified wherever possible.
The manufacturers (and their products) are
presented in Table 1, along with their distance
from Silcott, their location, and the frequency
with which their products were found in Silcott.
We wrote to extant companies, seeking information on the product and its history. The
replies varied, but most were useful for identifying, dating, and locating the origin of the
product. Many products were embossed or
imprinted with both the name of the manufacturer and its location, thus simplifying
some of our work. The locations of these companies are shown in Figure 2. Two factors
skew the sample. First are the large but unknown numbers of home-made artifacts,
either unrecognized or not present in the
archzological inventory, but indicated by
the ethnography. Second, those artifacts which
show the brand name (and hence can be identified) are often intended for the national market.
Local brands are only rarely marked. These
problems will require consideration in the
interpretation of these data.
FIGURE 2. Locations and numbers of companies for products found in Silcott
The linear miles from Silcott to the place artifacts one exception to this is made: it is
of manufacture were plotted. These relative assumed the European products entered the
distance figures approximate the real distance United States via New York City, while the
the artifact travelled, though in all cases dis- Asian products entered via Portland or
tance would have been more than the figure Seattle. Linear measurement was made in a
given because of dog-legs in the routing. It is dog-leg fashion from the foreign port to the
axiomatic that the shortest route is generally entry port to Silcott. The American companies
the most economic one. For comparative and products were placed into five distance
purposes here it is assumed the items travelled groups according to the kind of product
directly to Silcott in a straight line. For foreign (Tables 2, 3 ) .
101
TRADE NETWORKS AND INTERACTION SPHERES-A VIEW FROM SILCOTT
TABLE 1
LOCATION OF MANUFACTURERS
OlStance
Location
Manufacturer
source
source
category
PlrodUCt
R71
821
E41A
"01c
y051
270
270
1
Renton W R
S e a t t l e w*
1
1
1
1
280
Portland 3 R
H
4.
"
I-
4,
E, G
&
603
640
680
Sacramento C i i
Stockton cI\
bar Franciiin CA
r a n n 1 n q Jar
01,ve olll
Uelro-Kola, Purola
Beer
B e e r . Liquor
E x p r t Beer
Coffee
I,
H
1
1
1
mrve 311 .mra
MJstard Jar
Mustard Jar
Beer M f t l f
Beer M t t l E
4
2
4
ilrclr1e , m a
/I
1
22
1
2
4
1
Whiskey
H.H.H. 8 0 1 5 8 Medicine
F
H
17
1
r41u
0130
0131
116Y
n03x
COI
d20r
E04
E33W
E33Y
e41m
1140
N138
D07D
A601
D2UR
A491
1.52
E?]", Y
E335 A080
E4lL R6bC
H
//
H
7. i
E
E
)?'
1
Ketchup Bottle
Medicine Bottle
Whiskey
Beer
1
6
1
I
P~ckles"
Extract
4
22
slllce
3ranqe Extrait
Rivet
:m'T
I
Rust $ e m
117w
E33N h66E
F41E
r60
025
1161, M
D30R
N07G
NOlV
5
002
5
U56
85
c01
1
E411
5
1
E15 &?OR
605C
13
I
5
2
24
008 E 0 9
6038
DO6 051
DllA
d02r
823A
D07P
d13t
A66K
E4IF. G
R 7 0 A . .'E
B e e r Bottle
C a n r i n g Jar
69
E413 1 7 5
E33
E14
8
c09
eeer
17
5
2
38
A73
15
1
151')
11760
a46H
0 1 4 02%
s t r e a r o r 11
Y
Elm. E
American B o t t l e carpany
1520
1530
1540
H i l l s b o r a I:
Bellevillr TL
C h i s a q o TL
H
I,
A
n
A
schram ~ u t o m a t l cs e a l e r compin.;
'idolphus 3usck :lass M f q . :owany
P e p s o d e n t Compani
P d e l b e r t M. ? o s f e r and omrany
Armur's
brnwur's
A.
Sa".ford
Sanforc
4artford
\, B
B
H
4
A
R
A
mttie
Toothpaste
Medlclnr Bottle
Top hotc',
Brand
C"ld cream
Llbrary Paste
'7)
Ink
E
E
E
E
4
seer Bottle
6
*
,,
R, H
8. C
A
Beer B o t t l e
Yedicine Bottlea
Wine of Beef and Irona
nrntment
saw s?.rpe"er
x(lnera1 water
O v e l m Cream
F
A.
R
h
'0-qh
Cyrup
Laxatlre
lhiiksy
821
105
G02D
7
4
5
Ink
Mustard
Pickles
Medicine
Velvet Tobacco
Dr. Price's
Baking Powder
2
B
1166H
Bll"
3
10
34
1
a18
A59
D42
A26A
R50
B D I 802 B O 3
d091
102E
0075
11611 1188
8
A70N a 6 6 F
R701 E 3 1 5
E06
E06
NllB
101a
R72
1191
D07P
OD'lR
E24F
Distance
1700
1750
1750
1790
182s
1850
1850
Locatlo"
F l l n f HN
Detroit HN
T o l e d o OH
K i n g s M i l l OH
CDhUMUS OH
Newark mi
Cleveland OH
source
R
Finck
F o r d Motor Company
Prni-cular Chemical Compan)
R
A
HLE Co.
I
B
H
Peters C a r t r i d g e Co.
Dr. SBH & Company
Amerlcan Bottle Company
R
R
*
Ashland OH
East LIV~TDOO
OH~
1900
New Orleans LA
1940
Whee1mg
1925
Beaver Fa115 PA
1960
*
MuSteTOle company
NFG CO.
Dlll V a l v e s t e m
F . E . nyers & 8110.
T a y l o r , S m l t h , and Taylor
Honer L a u q h l i n
Marker Pottery Company
Knaules. T a y l o r and X n w l e s
. . .
A
L.E.
H
FI~CCW
P i t t s b u r g h PP
H
B
2120
2200
Hershey FA
P h i l a d e l p h i a Pa
C
A
J6E Mdyer P o t t e r y Company
J6E m y e r p o t t e r y company
RLDH Chambers
DT. J. H o l t e t t e l
Hershey C h o c o l a t e Company
Henry K. Warnpole a n d Company
1940
1950
2010
W e S t f l e l d NY
B u f f a l o NY
R o c h e s t e r NY
c
2040
2090
2150
2160
2220
2250
2250
w
Welch Grape J U l C e Company
Mentholatum Company
F . E . Reed Glass Company
I\
???
Corninq Glass Works
Blnghanpton NY
U t l c a NY
Illon Gorge NY
D r . Kilmr a n d Campapy
savage RImS company
Remngron * I n s company
B r o o k l y n NY
New York NY
R
*
E
E
E
E
c
2250
New 'forkb NY
A
*
F
ii
A
R
A
h
A
2210
2230
2230
n. c
The BayeI Company
6 c h r a d c r V a l v e Company
Best Foods
U n i t e d S t a t e Tobacco Company
3-in-One 011 Company
The C e n t a u r Company
P h i l l i p s H l l k o f Maqnesia
C h e s e b r a u q h Hfg. Co.
E . R . Durke and Company
N a t l o n a l Remedy Company
~ a r r e r rand Company
. .t and Co. .
.gists
Colgare
Colgate
E . Weck
auto S t i o p S a f e t y Razor Company
.
Spark Plug
Overall
Vibrator ~ o i n t
Penslar
Panatells cigar
lmunltran
Peruna
Medlcrne B o t t l e a
Musterole
,?
EliR
C33
R
4
A
2
1
56
2
1
9
I
H
cocoa
L i q i i d Wheat
Grape I l l c e
Wentholarum
Medicine Bottle
Whiskey
Pyrex
c
BOW1
P
Rmunrtlon
R
A5"lrl"
2
a
Tire V a l v e
4
A
1
1
4
1
1
A,
E
nayonnalse?
Copenhaqen
A.
n
011
I
r l e r c ? e r ' s castorra
Medlcine
"aSell"e
Salad m e s s i n g
En-Ar-Co 0 1 1
" l r q l n l a Dare
Medlclne
Toothpowder
R
01ntment
D, E
li. c
R
A
n
R
R
n
S t l f f e n l n g clamp
n
" a l a Razor
Canning
2330
L o w e l l HA
E
A
R
C a n b r l d g e MA
Boston MA
C
A
*
A
1
R
U n i t e d States C a r t r r d g e Company
C.1. Hood a n d Company
i i y e r company
Carter's I n k Company
Hlrmny
nhltrenare
Hood Rubber Co.
George Frost Company
U . S . Fastener Company
5500
Japan
I\
???
71'
6050
Tunsfall ENG
R
A l f r e d Meakin
Hanley ENG
R
Johnson Brothers
John Haddock 6 Sons
Yedqwood and Company
J o h n Edwards and Company
J. b G. Meakin
C h a r l e s Heakln
Charles l e a k i n
Edward C l a r k e
Edward C l a r k e
N u t f a l l b Co.
B a l l Brothers
~ a v e y6 Moore, LTO
A
Jars
1
1
11
4
1
23
1
I
1
2
2
5030 5348
A02
6031
013G
E438
H07R
053
N170
N156
I l 8 Q N12C
W l R B Nl8H
117he
1165
R25 1 5 5
D07Q
GOhA
a12 NllO
h30
d070
A35 0308
0071
1171
NllC
N148
L04B LOlP
2
1
1
1
Prince Rlbert
86
R
BrORa-Seltler
4
R
Edgeworth
R.J. Reynolds Company
R
I
I
9
SWamii-Root
*""nitlo"
Bakrnq Powder?
GlaStOnbUrg CN
Waterbury CN
B r i d g e p o r t CN
80
9
1
R
A.
.us a n d B r o . Company
n18n
SOOG
5OOC 500s
SOCJ 5271
1
A.
W i n c h e s t e r Repeating A r m Company
The TE V l l l l a m Company
I n t e r n a t r o n a l SllYer conpany
union ~ e r a l l i cC a r t r i d g e Co.qany
N14Q
Steer's Head Canning Jar
R
A
1
H
Rumfard Chermcal Works
New Haven CN
n181
3
E
R i C h m n d VI\
6038 Nl2I
1
1
a w l . saucer
B o r a t e d Talcum
Charm Candy
2280
2290
2290
2290
132
E03
2
COlUmba Peptic Bitters
A
2200
i16k
N 1 5 N16 N l i
A
R
1
A. C
Emerson Drug Company
N03F
7
2
2
n
n
I
56
1
Gaynor Glass Works
G e r h a r d Hennen Chemical Company
C h a r m ' s Candy Company
B a l t r m r e MD
1
9
32
Cer*ml'
P l a t e . ceramc
C
2150
NIB*
d03
Ceramic
A
Providence RI
1
2
A
H
WmsLon-Salem NC
NlBD N18Q
a.
Salem NJ
2330
category
2
3
rz
R
A
.
Number
Valve stem
Lever
Newark NJ
B l o o m f i e l d NJ
1060
2350
2350
ii
Bras
Corning NY
Hudmn NY
A, C
Junq
C
H
Product
5ource
AC S p a r k P l u g Company
A
li
1850
1900
Ma"YfaCf"reI
c
3
620
102F
g01
1026
A
A
58
N15 N16 N l l
1
E
3
35
N22E
M02
N 1 5 N16 N i 7
A
*
4
N l b N17
G
F
IO
C
R
A. C
R
1
1
3
3
E
2
Y O 9 A Y09E
N04L NOlR
A
1
N"7H
1
POlA
2
p0411
6
SOOE
A.
A,
1
052C
D52H
1268
R41R
045
som, n
S17AS19RS7i.a
Burslen ENG
Tunstall ENG
A
F e n t o n ENG
A
R
Hanley ENG
A
BurSlem ENG
A
ii
T u n S t a l l ENG
St. H e l e n r ENG
S h e f f l e l d ENG
H l d d l e s e x ENG
6650
7050
Brenen GER
??? GER
Bavaria GER
Silesia POL
R
H
A
H
A
A
2
1
A
1
I
I
I
R
I
li
A
R
55411
sim
5861
1
GlOC
Lioa
a666
H
1
GlOA
1
A
A.
517d
S09A S O I A
H
H
A.
2
1
1
1
2
SOSF SOIA
A
H e m n n Heye G l a s f a b r i k
Orla I?)
1
p031
R
???
I
A
???
2
POOR
PO51 P39A
i??
1
p1711
A. H
I
A.
r?
103
TRADE NETWORKS AND INTERACTION SPHERES-A VIEW FROM SILCOTT
NOTE: The following indicate the sources of identification of location and manufacturer
embossed/ imprinted/raised letters indicating place, company
paper label
data from company
Periodical Publishers' Association of America (1934)
Brand Names Foundation (1 947)
White (1974)
Newspapers, city directories
Toulouse (1 971 )
Colcleaser (1 967)
a
Listed twice: by bottle maker and by bottle filler.
bProduct marked New York; ambiguous as to city or state.
TABLE 2
NUMBER OF AMERICAN COMPANIES BY DISTANCE
Company
a
0-500
5001000
10001500
15002000
20002500
Total
7
1
14
18
19
13
35
42
a
Condiment . . . . . . . . .
Liquor . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Medicine . . . . . . . . . . .
Other. . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4
5
2
4
3
2
1
2
0
0
3
1
5
5
15
17
TOTAL . . . . . . . . . .
15
8
4
42
40
PERCENTAGE . . . .
13.76
7.34
3.67
38.53
36.70
109
100.00
Includes extracts, spices, baking powder, etc.
TABLE 3
NUMBERS OF ARTIFACTS BY DISTANCE
5001000
10001500
15002000
20002500
Total
0-500
a
Condiment . . . . . . . .
Liquor . . . . . . . . . . . .
Medicine . . . . . . . . . . .
Other. . . . . . . . . . . . . .
7
7
24
21
41
12
8
8
0
0
23
85
171
129
142
68
32
1
46
218
25 1
149
243
400
TOTAL . . . . . . . . . .
59
69
108
5 10
297
1043
Artifact
PERCENTAGE . . . .
a
5.66
6.62
Includes extracts, spices, baking powder, etc.
10.35
48.90
28.47
100.00
104
Silcott participated in six different trade
networks or interaction spheres. Some of these
can be documented archaeologically, for example the regional and national networks,
whereas the others can be approached only
through ethnography. These six trade networks were: (1) local; (2) local-commercial;
(3) area-commercial; (4) regional; (5) national;
and (6) intemational.
The local network of Silcott was a barter
system called “neighboring”. It is familiar to
anthropologists as the dyadic and polyadic
contract. Neighboring was a social contract
between two individuals or two families in
which tasks too large for individuals were
tackled collectively. Neighboring was a phenomenon of frontier America and of a generally cashless economy. By sharing work as
harvest, barn building, and slaughtering, a
greater mutual wealth could be achieved.
The economic function of such ties created
social relationships. These invariably led to
greater social cohesiveness. Distribution of
social and economic ties was usually horizontal and single-stranded, that is, relationships developed among peers and the activities were generally task specific. Neighboring
can be many-stranded, a complex relationship based along several different lines. For
example, two families help each other at
harvest, at slaughtering, and at general gettogethers.
Horace Miner made a study of a farming
community in Iowa where he found that “a
farmer may ‘neighbor’ with some family a
mile down the road and ignore the farmer
next to him . . . simply because he follows the
dictates of personal preferences and congeniality’’ (Miner 1949:37). This held true
in Silcott as well (Day-Ames 1975). One might
neighbor with a half-dozen families at various
times during the year, each of whom in turn
neighbored with a slightly different set of
families. The multitude of single-stranded
and many-stranded relationships wove a
network of social alliances binding Silcott into
a single integrated community. On the geographcal fringes of Silcott relationships were
woven with families whose social and economic
ties were primarily oriented elsewhere. In
the upper reaches of Alpowa Creek, along
Knotgrass Ridge, people who were oriented
towards either Peola or Silcott usually neighbored with closer people.
If you interacted more with Silcott people
you identified with Silcott-you might live
nearer to Peola but consider yourself to be
“from” Silcott, whereas your neighbor a mile
further towards Silcott might be “from” Peola.
The distinction was made on the basis of
neighboring. The boundary of the community
was not a straight line on a map but instead
a zig-zag patchwork of farmsteads. Economic
ties of neighboring created social ties, which
in tum created social boundaries and resulted
in economic boundaries-a swing full circle.
Neighboring may be regarded from two
aspects: practical and economic. From a
practical standpoint it makes sense; some
things cannot be done efficiently with a small
number of people. Examples include major
construction projects such as road building
or barn building. With cooperation the work
can be done. Similarly, but for different reasons, was the slaughtering of livestock. By
alternating the slaughtering between several
families, fresh meat was available more frequently without the need for either greater
consumption or preservation. This is also a
form of insurance. Giving away meat when you
have it causes an indebtedness which can be
claimed at a later time when you do not have
any meat. The more persons indebted to you,
the greater your security if some calamity
descends upon your farm. Indeed, “many
superficially odd village practices make sense
as disguised forms of insurance” (Lipton 1968:
341). In later years farmers brought their own
hogs and shared only the labor, not the meat.
The economic factor of neighboring is an
important one, for in a society such as Silcott
where there was little cash, labor was traded,
not bought. Up until about 1910 labor was
often traded on par, that is, you worked a
day for someone and later he worked a day
for you. No consideration of wage rates was
TRADE NETWORKS AND INTERACTION SPHERES-A VIEW FROM SILCOTT
105
made. This resulted in capital gains without construct what these stores were like has been
the expenditure of hard-to-come-by cash. difficult because people remembered the
Once a cash equivalence for work was mea- stores from different time periods and the
sured, the reciprocal relationship was under- stores were changing throughout the time
mined. When work could be expressed in of occupation.
The country general store was the focal
dollars, people were more reluctant “to be so
beholden” to someone else. Wage labor was point for the entire community, but after
essentially limited to work in the big company about 1890 general stores began to decline
(Carson 1965:279-280). The reason for this
orchard or the grain warehouse.
Neighboring, as a socio-economic entity, decline was a shift in orientation, socially
binds families and binds the community. and economically.
Mail order houses such as Sears Roebuck
It is a local network for the distribution of
wealth in the form of goods and labor. Neigh- Company and Montgomery Ward Company
boring results in informal bartering disguised took an increasing amount of the country
as gift giving and helping-visit a neighbor store profit. This was particularly galling beand bring some garden produce, help him cause the storekeeper was usually the postbuild his barn. This relationship lasts, however, master as well. Even though Sears would
only if it is reciprocal. Reciprocity, whether sell merchandise in plain brown boxes, the
it is formal or informal, must occur if neigh- storekeeper/postmaster usually knew the
boring is to be continued, if the dyadic social source. But there was not much to be done
about it. Mail order houses offered much
contract is to be fulfilled.
Probably the only area where archieology lower prices and greater variety than the
can study this local network of neighboring country store could. Of course, the storekeeper
is in the sharing of slaughtered livestock. It is did have some advantages-he could offer
quite likely that certain families would ex- credit, something which the mail order places
change a given unit of meat each time, say could not do until C.O.D. came into being.
a quarter or side of beef, and that some pref- Mail orders were also subject to long delay,
erence might be formed regarding the side damage in transit, freight charges, and often
of the animal exchanged. This behavior would cheap merchandise. The storekeeper had the
largely be idiosyncratic, yet it might well be advantage of having the merchandise where
predictable. For example, each time Farmer it could be examined. The biggest problem
A butchers a hog he gives the right front the storekeeper faced was competing with
quarter to Farmer B. Farmer B returns the the tremendous variety to be found in mail
next time with a left front quarter for Farmer order catalogs. The country store could only
A. This kind of disparity should be revealed stock a small quantity and variety of merin the frequencies of the various bones in chandise.
the archaeological site. For the sites excavated
The customers of the old general store did not
in Silcott, there is not, however, any kind of
expect to find each article at various grades and
indication of this in the rather small faunal
prices. The volume of business would not support more than one kind of axe, one kind of
assemblage. The hypothesis is not negated;
rake, one quality of boot (Carson 1965:70).
we are simply not in a position to test it. For
some of the prehistoric sites in The Alpowa,
The problem of variety was the reason for
Richard Lee Lyman (1976) has been able to another competitor: the city store. Until the
document differential sharing on the basis advent of a good system of roads, the country
of faunal remains recovered.
dealer had little competition from city stores:
The local-commercial network in Silcott
Trading areas were established by the distance
consisted of the interaction between the cusa farm family could travel by horse back, oxcart,
tomers and the two general stores. Trying to
or wagon. A circle with a five-mile radius would
106
represent a fair estimate of the amount of geotake
graPhY in which a
a serious commercial interest (Carson 1965:23).
Because Silcott was so sparsely settled, the
distance
the
which customers were
to
was greater-fifteen to twenty
Interestingly enough, former residents
that five
was a pretty long ride
to visit someone. Even as late as the 1920’s,
using automobiles, “the farm
On the average six to eight
for
hardware, fourteen for furniture, and twenty
for women’s fashions”
1965:290)’
The advent Of good roads after
War I
brought new business t’ the
and it took business away as well; but it always
than it brought in.
took more business
Cliff Wilson built his general store about
1905; five years later, in 1910, his half-brother,
Bill Wilson, built a general store two hundred
yards to the north of CWs. Until about 1914 or
so both stores competed with general merchandise but there was hardly enough business
for one store much less both. Cliff was also the
postmaster so he had an additional Source of
income. Bill Wilson expanded his operations
to include a saloon and dance hall and gradually (though never completely) phased out
his general merchandise line. Both places
rented out rooms for the night, though properly
speaking they were only beds. Cliff also diversified by putting in gasoline pumps after World
War I, a sign of impending doom for Silcott
appearing under the .guise of progress. Both
for a new road stores eventually became only convenience
along the south side of the river to Clarkston. stores. ‘<Theold country trader found himself
The road would eliminate the two ferry trips between wind and water, left with a shrinking
Or the
Overland trip which was then business of low-profit necessities, the sugar,
It
the need for the salt, and the flour, and convenience goods
local general stores and
such as a pocket tin of smoking tobacco, a
eliminate many of the social ties binding the deck of Camels, cola drinks, and the overalls
community together. It would make it possible that did not get on the shopping list when the
for people to go to town
and
family last visited the city” (Carson 1965:286).
The ferry trip was so expensive that “farmers Judging from informants, descriptions of
from southern Asotin County frequently cl.
iffs from the early 1920’s until his death in
in
made a three-day journey to Pomeroy’ beto market
lieving it
to go the long
than to pay high ferry fees to nearby Lewiston”
(Anon. 1955:9).
Facility of transportation was the single
greatest factor in the dynamics of trading
networks. Distance was less of a factor than
topography because the steep canyons restricted and constricted travel. Initially, the
automobile did not necessarily make the trip
easier. It did make it faster, but the automobile required good roads. However, the trip
to town did, eventually, become easier:
What the railroad did to the buffalo, the automobile did to the country merchandiser. Going
to town meant riding to the nearest big community, twenty to forty miles away, where there
were full stocks of goods in all lines, better
prices for eggs and chickens, as well as movies,
barbers, dentists, lawyers, beauty shops, service
stations-not just one facility, but a]] the conveniences of urban life (Carson 1965:281).
1937 and the closing of the store, very few
sales were made. Cliff and Mollie Wilson had
very few needs and desires, They could get
by on next to nothing: food, and kerosene for
the lamp, were about all they needed. The store
was a shamble, the candy wormy, the food in
boxes either long since eaten by mice, or rotten.
One passerby stopped for gas and also bought
a box of crackers not opened for several milesone mouse, no crackers.
Cliffs role in the community was reinforced
by his role as postmaster. But even in its heyday people tried to avoid purchasing major
items at his general store because they were
shopworn and high-priced. Nevertheless, at
least in its first two decades, it was an important social and economic focal point for the
community. During the evening when Cliff
“disturbed” the mail, people would gather
around and gossip, and in the mid-1920’s
TRADE NETWORKS AND INTERACTION SPHERES-A VIEW FROM SILCOTT
listen to his radio. Both Cliff and Bill figure
greatly in local folklore, as culture hero and
anti-hero. They both fit the model of a storekeeper as described by Gerald Carson (1965).
Both sold goods which were not what they
were actually supposed to be. For example,
no matter what kind of motor oil you wanted,
Cliff kept it in stock. Of course, it all came
out of the one and only oil barrel. But in truth
it was that oil, for he would add a little of the
proper brands to keep from lying about it.
Bill Wilson’s was more of a convenience
store after its first few years. His saloon and
ice cream emporium provided income to
supplement his gambling winnings. Bill’s
Place was a male bastion. Women just did
not go there much, because of the liquor, gambling, and perhaps even worse, dancing. One
woman lived some thirty yards away but was
never inside the store. She preferred to bypass it for Cliffs. Bill oriented much of his
business towards the harvest workers in the
orchards and grain fields. He supplied them
with food and clothing as well as with an entertainment center.
Both stores offered credit, but very judiciously. Informants stated that neither place
offered credit, but continued to state that
both “carried” certain people, especially just
before harvest. Most likely their official policy
was one of no credit, but those persons they
were really familiar with could get credit.
Because offering credit is risky, the store owner
must either limit credit or limit business.
Barbara Ward wrote about two general stores
in a small Chinese fishing village which did not
seemingly have enough business for two stores.
The reason was the credit system: each storekeeper could know the personal finances of
only about half of the village well enough to
extend credit. This imposed a limit on the
amount of business each storekeeper could
safely maintain (Ward 1967:138). There is
not enough evidence on the internal dynamics
of Silcott to know if this was also a factor there.
We know that they gave credit, but we do
not know the limitations of it.
Another system for which there is only a
107
little evidence from Silcott is that of differential pricing. Country storekeepers marked
their stock with a code system so they could
offer a graduated price scale. This permitted
them to fleece the wealthy passerby and give
bargains to good customers and friends without blatantly advertising such to customers
standing nearby. Several coding systems were
used, some of the more popular ones are given
by Carson (1965:92). It is likely that both
Bill and Cliff used coding systems, but there
is no evidence. We do know that they gave a
better price or a greater measure to certain
people, probably favored customers. Said
one informant, “Bill gave more candy for
the penny”. The lowering of the price paid for
special customers or similarly the giving of
greater quantities for the same price insured
that customers continued business. The merchant gives up a little profit for increased
security. Of course, this is done only if there
is competition from other merchants. In a
monopoly it would be unnecessary.
Sidney Mintz’s study of i, marketplace in
Haiti gives us some insight into the relationship of preferential treatment (Mintz 1967).
The special treatment given to certain customers he called pratik. Pratik strengthens
the buyer-seller relationship and has a number
of advantages: the trade is more predictable
since the seller knows a certain part of the
stock will be purchased; and the buyer knows
the merchandise will be available at a good
price. In open competition the merchant
might receive more money but this would
increase competition and substantially decrease security. Furthermore, in hard times
without the pratik relationship the seller would
have less reliable income and the buyer no
reliable source to obtain materials from. In
other words, pratik is a means of increasing
security by decreasing competition.
While a system like pratik can be offered
as an explanation of how and why competition
between the two Wilsons’ stores was possible
it is probably not the explanation. Preferential
pricing and giving better measure has been
documented for American general stores by
108
Carson (1965) and has been inferred for Silcott
from informants’ comments.
Archaologically we cannot say which items
were purchased at a particular place. For example, we cannot tell if a medicine bottle
found at Weiss Ranch Dump came from either
of Silcott’s two stores. The reason for this is
that there were too many places available for
items to be purchased. Thus, we cannot examine internal versus external economic
factors through archxology. We cannot say
that a certain percentage of the material recovered was originally purchased in Bill
Wilson’s Store, a certain percentage from Cliff
Wilson’s and a certain percentage from Lewiston
merchants. We cannot approach it through
written records or the ethnography, either.
Area merchants no doubt did a considerable
business with people in Silcott. Merchants up
the Snake River in Lewiston and Clarkston
probably got most of the business, but merchants in the county seat, Asotin, surely received some trade. Occasional trips were made
to Colton and Uniontown to sell produce, but
that necessitated crossing the Snake and travelling about 15 miles up the meandering Steptoe
Canyon to the uplands on the north side. Infrequent trips to Wawawai by buggy, train,
or boat resulted in very little cash flow except,
perhaps, in wagers when the Silcott Reds
baseball team played Wawawai. For the people
living higher up The Alpowa the economic
orientation was directed somewhat towards
the settlement of Peola, but when real purchases would be made they would probably
go either to Pataha City or Pomeroy. Since
about a third of the area covered by the Silcott
community lies in Garfield county much of
those people’s business took them to Pomeroy,
the Garfield County seat, some twenty to
thirty miles away. The people in the higher
elevations of The Alpowa went to Pomeroy
much more frequently than to Clarkston or
Lewiston.
Only five artifacts were recovered in Silcott
that were demonstrably from area merchants:
three beer bottles from the Lewiston Bottling
Works and two medicine bottles from the
Lewiston Owl Drug Store, but even these
were made in the Midwest for those Lewiston
merchants. One must bear in mind in the
following sections that most items eventually
reached Silcott by way of the merchants in
Lewiston and Clarkston.
In terms of the archaeological evidence,
we are on firmest ground when we deal with
the regional and national networks from
which Silcott ultimately derived its consumer
goods. Just how did those networks appear
from the perspective of the consumen in Silcott?
Based upon the archaeological evidence,
the Northwest region produced little of the
merchandise consumed in Silcott. Only the
four primary nodes in the areal network are
represented: San Francisco, Portland, Seattle,
and Spokane. Spokane seems to be represented
rather poorly considering its distance (100
linear miles) and ex-officio status as “capital”
of the Inland Empire. Spokane was linked to
the East via railroad on September 8, 1883
but it was not until September 9, 1898 that
the Northem Pacific Railway reached Lewiston
from Spokane (Meinig 1968:370; Anon. 19555).
The Camas Prairie Railroad, built along the
north side of the Snake River between Lewiston
and Riparia, was finished in 1909 and completed Lewiston’s link to the Northwest rail
network (Meinig 1968:383).
Although railroads certainly facilitated
the flow of goods into, and the flow of produce
out of the region, the importance of water
transport cannot be ignored. Steamboats ran
the Lower Snake River between its confluence
with the Columbia River and Lewiston from
1861 until 1940. Because this eventually linked
Lewiston (and hence Silcott) to Portland,
Oregon, we should expect that economic orientation prior to 1898 should have been directed
towards Portland much more than Spokane
and Seattle. In other words, the primary node
for Silcott would have been Portland until
1898, but after that date Spokane increasingly
replaced Portland’s dominance. Seattle was
probably less important than Spokane in
terms of trade dynamics in the interior until
the turn of the century. Certainly it was sub-
TRADE NETWORKS AND INTERACTION SPHERES-A VIEW FROM SILCOTT
ordinate to Portland. Seattle’s base as a primary node was a result of trade with Alaska and
the Orient, not with the interior of Washington.
Very few artifacts were identified as coming
from the Pacific Northwest (Table 1). This is
somewhat surprising-intuitively it seems there
should be much more. The majority of artifacts from the four Northwest cities (Spokane,
Seattle, Portland, San Francisco) generally
are limited to extracts and spices, liquor, medicine, and work clothing. The place of manufacture for most artifacts was not determined;
many artifacts could have come from the
Northwest but since they were unmarked
it could not be substantiated.
The archaeological information from Silcott
provides valuable insight into purchase patterns. With Silcott we find goods produced in
the East were not only economical to ship to
Silcott but were also in demand there. Silcott
was obviously tied in with the national economy via a complex distribution network.
Although the degree of their interaction is
difficult to measure, it must have been great.
The distribution map (Figure 2 ) shows the
known location of each company which produced the artifacts found in Silcott, at the time
they manufactured those artifacts. Each symbol reflects the number of each kind of company. The companies are concentrated in a
broad belt reaching from the Midwest eastward through southern New England. This
concentration was, of course, the major
American industrial center of the early twentieth century. This is not in itself surprising.
Indeed, it should be expected. But, it is
encouraging to see reality actually reflected
in the archaeological record. What is surprising
are the numbers of products which eventually
reached Silcott.
Of the numbers of American products
recovered in Silcott, a total of 1043 artifacts
were identified to their place of manufacture.
This represents 15.3% of the artifacts (other
than nails) found in the excavations. This
appears to be a sufficiently large enough sample
to provide a view of Silcott’s participation in
the national network. Tables 2 and 3 show
109
that 78.9% of the companies (which produced
87.8% of the products) were located at a distance exceeding 1000 miles from Silcott, and
75.2% of the companies (representing 77.4%
of the products) were located at a distance
exceeding 1500 miles. Clearly the majority
of the identified products in Silcott originated
at a long-range distance from there (Figure 3).
These data suggest that the economic hypothesis put forth by Klein (1973) is probably
not applicable outside of the major industrial
region in the Northeast.
The evidence from Silcott shows that it
was very much a part of the national distribution network. However, we really do not
know all the links in that network. While
straight line distance gives a useful measurement for comparison, it does not indicate
the actual distance a product travelled.
Material from the East Coast may have come
to Portland by steamer, then to Lewiston by
the Columbia-Snake waterway, or by rail.
Products could also come from the east by
rail but the evidence is nonexistent. The
material from the Midwest likely came over
the Northern Pacific Railway. The consumers
in Silcott were no doubt affected by the transcontinental rad system, and later by the opening
of the Panama Canal in 1914. Without comparative data from elsewhere in the Northwest,
the relative impact of these events cannot be
determined archaeologically, nor can the data
from Silcott be seen in proper perspective.
We can surmise that most material came by
rail, but the exact route cannot be known.
The routing through jobber and wholesaler,
the hauling patterns, the warehousing, will
all remain unknown. All we can say is that
the system was successful in transporting the
artifacts from production in the East to ultimate consumption in Silcott.
Mail order houses probably accounted for
many of the cash purchases in Silcott. They
likely would have done even more business
except for their cash only policy. Cash was
a rare commodity in Silcott. Until the 1910’s
there was little cash in Silcott, but as commercial orchards developed and provided
110
jobs, and as homesteads were sold to the sheep
company, the barter economy changed into
a cash economy. Until that time people were
in the lengthy process of acquiring enough
land to survive on, for it took lots of land in
most of Silcott to be successful-Silcott was
nicknamed “Starvation Flat”, and for good
reason. With cash they were able to increase
their purchases from mail order houses such
as Sears Roebuck and Montgomery Ward.
While we know mail order was important,
there is no way to discover just how important
it actually was. The only definite mail order
artifacts recovered were a liquor bottle embossed with the name of a Portland mail order
house, and portions of three Sears catalogs.
Although many other artifacts undoubtedly
were mail order these could not be identified
because most kinds of items available from
mail order could be found in area stores as
well.
It is not known where the coffee in a tin
can in a Portland factory was grown. The tea
came from Ceylon and the ginger from Africa.
Companies
Products
SO
0
0
0
0
0
s g s s s
I
O
I
D
0
‘ U ( Y
I
0
0
I
0
0
l P ! :
I
0
0
FIGURE 3. Percentages of companies and products by distance.
Silcott participated as ultimate consumer in
a trade network which stretched around the
entire world. From an archzological standpoint we can never really investigate the complex international networks because so much
of the imported goods were raw materials.
The few dozen artifacts known to have been
imported to Silcott grossly under-represent
the actual figures for consumption of materials
derived from foreign sources. Many of the
identified ceramic vessels recovered in Silcott
were made in England, although some were
made in Germany, Poland, and Japan (Table
1). Three ale bottles were made in England,
while one was made in Germany. The only
other foreign artifact identified was an English
sheep shears.
Summary
The people of Silcott particpated in a hierarchy of economic and social networks linking
them eventually to the rest of the United
States and the rest of the world. Each level of
this network hierarchy affected Silcott differently and each level intermeshed with every
other level. The “neighboring” in Silcott made
possible a surplus of cash which could be used
to purchase items at the local stores or the
city stores. That cash eventually flowed outward from Silcott stimulating the economy
of the region and the nation. The national and
regional economy produced and distributed
the manufactured items which eventually
flowed inward to Silcott. This pendulum of
commerce swung from all the other farming
communities of the nation to the manufacturers and back to the communities creating
a rhythm, a metronome for the nation. What
happened in Silcott did affect the nation, because Silcott was linked through the social
and economic networks to all the other small
farming communities. For the same reason,
the flood or fire which destroyed some New
England mill town ultimately had an effect
upon Silcott.
This paper outlined the expanding interaction spheres in which Silcott participated
and the networks which bound those spheres
TRADE NETWORKS AND INTERACTION SPHERES-A VIEW FROM SILCOTT
111
together. While considered separately here, retailers. Silcutt provided grain for the sourthey are in fact so woven as t o be, in reality, dough bread in San Francisco, apples for
inseparable. The imported products found Denver, and the wool for Pendleton shirts.
their way through the national, regional, local,
and neighborhood networks. English shears
cut the wool in Silcott; Brazilian coffee was ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
sipped from Silesian cups, while Cuban sugar This paper is a slightly modified version of a chapter
was stirred into the coffee by a spoon made in from my dissertation (Adams 1976). I would like
Connecticut, and the cup set upon a cotton to thank my committee members for their comcloth made in India covering a table made in ments and criticisms: Frank C. Leonhardy, Robert
Ackerman, Roderick Sprague, James Goss, and
Indiana bought from Sears. In the return, Mary Elizabeth Shutler. I am also indebted to
Silcott grain, fruit, and wool flowed outward Kjerstie Nelson and Eric Blinman for their assisfrom the farmers to the middlemen to the tance in manuscript preparation.
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