In Wednesday’s links roundup, I mentioned a long article on the history of debt in America. Rian dropped me an e-mail to say that he liked the essay, too, but found a way to make it more accessible:
I have been in contact with the author of the long article about the history of debt in America that you posted recently. I cooked up a PDF version because I like to read long articles offline, and he has agreed to let me post it. He will also be posting it himself when he gets the time to do so. I’ve made it available, with permission, for public consumption.
I, too, prefer to read long articles on paper. Thanks to Rian’s work (and the work of Tom, the original author), I now have the 21-page document sitting on my nightstand. Peeking at the final page, I was struck by the following passage:
Money, again, is important but it is not the determining factor in true wealth. So when you get in debt make a plan to get out and stick to it. Let go of your past mistakes. Forgive yourself and forgive others who may have played a part in your debt.
[...]
Build your true wealth from the inside out. Be true to yourself and help others when you can. Learn to enjoy the experiences that come freely with life, embrace the people and natural beauty that surrounds you. When you do you will find that money takes it proper place. It will ebb and flow but the true wealth that is you is eternal.
I’ll consume the entire document over the next few evenings. Call me geeky, but I love reading about the history of money.
i really liked the passage you quoted, so i downloaded the pdf. i don’t have time to read that length of document in depth, but i will definitely take a look through it.
loading....
I actually tied myself to a chair and forced myself to read this. I realized that this was very important information that has affected my ancestors and stil haunt us today. It was a very interesting timeline of events. Who would have thought debtors were locked up and treated worse than criminals?
loading....
Thanks to you, Rian and Tom for making this available via pdf.
I started reading this the other day but had to leave it. I’ve downloaded the article and will be finishing it this weekend. I found it to be a fascinating read so far!
loading....
Too complicated I am trying to have everything directly from normal internet
Putting PDF is sign of Supersized American, if you can read PDF link, you are Supersized American living life of gigantic excess
Cancel the giant TV and internet and maybe you deserve to watch frugality on the internet without American excess
IMHO ..
loading....
I don’t know how accurate this Debt Clock is, but it’s memorizing to watch (you need java to run).
http://130.94.230.21/debtclock.html
loading....
and history continues on to today… here’s an article in NY Times Sunday July 20 edition – one woman’s history of debt:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/business/20debt.html
loading....
History of finance is awesome because they thought so differently about money back then. Also we can learn not to repeat mistakes which is always a good thing.
Heck I look back on my own history and learn from mistakes, imagine how much we could learn from by looking at ALL of history
loading....
This sounded promising, but the quality of the writing is poor and the author cites no references. Two pages of skimming convinced me I was wasting my time.
loading....
That’s because there are very few, if any, sources that are available to a non-paying audience. As someone who spent quite a bit of time writing about the American financial system between the Revolutionary War and 1900, for one of my economics classes, I can assure you that his facts jive with mine.
Had I not had an account through my University, I would not have been able to access *any* primary sources for this particular economic period without paying exorbitant sums of money to do so.
–
And as someone who is considered an “expert” on a few things, I often don’t cite my sources while talking about things in some of my blog entries. (Not the blog linked through my name.) Why? Because I’ve built up enough credibility over time that I don’t need to. That credibility is something that I guard very jealously, and I make sure that I DO cite my sources if I’m going to say something that a lot of people are going to raise their eyebrows over. Particularly my peers.
Credibility is one’s writing currency. Build it up jealously, and spend it judiciously. I suspect Tom has done the same thing here, only you don’t know it, because you don’t read him regularly.
loading....
It may be that I am not familiar with Tom’s blog that is causing me to raise an eyebrow at this, but the grammatical errors also grated. Also, the typo in his reference to Benjamin Franklin Bache “Benjamin Franklin Backe” as the publisher of Aurora might have been easy to ignore, but he then refers to Bache as “Bache” just a page later.
Rather choosy, I suppose– but if you are going to write historical essays, names are important.
loading....
Ditto Mike626. So are reference citations!!!!! You can get off your duff, go to the library and actually touch paper (yeah, I know…it has acid in it. Wear gloves!) if you object to paying to access information online.
loading....
…yet another armchair critic.
loading....