Monroe, Elizabeth Brand, 1947-Retseck, Hilary A.Gantz, Richard A. (Richard Alan), 1946-Shrum, Rebecca K.2014-09-252014-09-252013https://hdl.handle.net/1805/5098http://dx.doi.org/10.7912/C2/229Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)A foreign concept to most twenty-first century individuals, a saddletree provides support and acts as the framework to saddles, giving saddlers a base on which to add cushioning, stretch leather, and create beautiful or functional saddles. Saddletree factories were an integral part of Madison, Indiana’s late nineteenth-century economy. As one of the Ohio River town’s leading industries, saddletree shops employed approximately 125 men during 1879, Madison’s peak saddletree production year, and made Madison a national center of saddletree production. However, the industry faded into oblivion as the beginning of the twentieth century, leaving the men drawn to these shops in the 1870s and 1880s to find new opportunities. While past historians contributed to the fields of industrial and economic history by studying large industries engaged in mass production in major urban areas, Madison’s saddletree workers represent a view of nineteenth-century specialized production. This thesis examines the saddletree industry’s place in Madison during the late nineteenth century and the lives of saddletree workers during and after the industry’s peak. My findings, based off extensive digital research and tools utilized in earlier social mobility studies, create a nuanced view of Madison’s relationship to the saddletree industry, saddletree makers, and what the industry’s collapse meant to saddletree factory employees.en-USsaddletreeMadison, Indianaspecialized industrybatch productiondigital reseachSaddlery -- History -- 19th century -- Research -- Indiana -- MadisonFactories -- Indiana -- Madison -- Employees -- 19th centuryIndustries -- Indiana -- Madison -- History -- 19th centuryFactories -- Indiana -- Madison -- History -- 19th centuryMadison (Ind.) -- History -- 19th centuryMadison (Ind.) -- Social conditions -- 19th centuryMadison (Ind.) -- Economic conditions -- 19th centuryJefferson County (Ind.) -- History -- 19th centuryUrbanization -- Indiana -- Madison -- History -- 19th centuryIndustrial districts -- Indiana -- Madison -- History -- 19th centuryForeign workers, German -- Indiana -- Madison -- History -- 19th centuryImmigrants -- Cultural assimilation -- Indiana -- MadisonSchroeder Saddletree Factory MuseumSchroeder familySchroeder, John Benedict -- MuseumsExcavations (Archaeology) -- Indiana -- MadisonIndiana magazine of historySocial mobility -- Indiana -- Madison -- History -- 19th centuryHistory -- Data processingQuantitative research -- Data processingThesis