Description
The handbook explains how money and exchange functioned as elements of the American economy in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; it also provides sufficient technical and statistical information to allow the reader to convert a sum recorded in one currency into its equivalent in another. McCusker combines this with a compilation of exhaustive tables that give the commercial rate of exchange between London and the major cities of Europe and the British colonies.
About The Author
John J. McCusker, currently the Halsell Distinguished Professor of American History and Professor of Economics at Trinity University, is the author of several books, including Rum and the American Revolution and How Much Is That In Real Money?, and coauthor of The Economy of British America, 1607-1789.
Reviews
“[A] remarkably clear, yet brief, guide through the murky complexities of the money of some sixty to seventy colonies. . . . A superb piece of work.”–Journal of American History