Everyday Nature

"In Everyday Mature, Sara Gronim shows how scientific advances were received in the early modern world, from the time Europeans settled in America until just before the American Revolution. Settlers approached a wide range of innovations, such as smallpox inoculation, maps and surveys, Copernican cosmology, and Ben Franklin's experiments with electricity, with great skepticism. New Yorkers in particular were distrustful because of the chronic political and religious factionalism in the colony. Those discoveries that could be easily reconciled with existing beliefs about healing the sick, agricultural practices, and the revolution of the planets were more readily embraced." "A portrait of colonial life, this book traces a series of innovations that were disseminated through-out the Atlantic world during the Enlightenment, and shows how colonial New Yorkers integrated new knowledge into their lives."--BOOK JACKET.