The Fathers of the Towns: Leadership and Community Structure in Eighteenth-Century New England

Seeking to integrate recent literature on community life and on the political ethos in colonial New England, Edward M. Cook, Jr., examines elite recruitment and community structure in the four New England colonies between 1700 and 1785. In a massive sample of seventy widely dispersed towns, lists of towns, lists of town and provincial officeholders, biographical data, church records, town meeting records, and tax lists provide a core of material for analysis.