The institution of apprenticeship "had its origins in the guilds of medieval times". During America's colonial period, the apprenticeship system "provided instruction in the rudiments of education and vocational training" and "an opportunity to rise above the level of laborers and tenant farmers" for those who were bound out. "Many of these apprenticeship records contain vital information: the name and age of the child, the name of one or both the parents, the name of the person to whom the child (was) apprenticed, and the trade to be learned." This collection of court records, for the most part, have been transcribed as they were written; in some cases, punctuation and abbreviations have been added for clarity and brevity, respectively. "There is a wide variety in the spelling of names, because, at this point in history, the clerk of the court wrote what he thought he heard the person say or how he thought the name was spelled"; these variations have been retained. Apprenticeship records are a source often overlooked by genealogists but such records may be useful in finding that missing link in the family tree.
W. Preston Haynie
(1993), 2007, 5.5" x 8.5", paper, index, 130 pp.
ISBN: 9781556137839
101-H3783
