Family limitation and age at marriage: Fertility decline in Sturbridge, Massachusetts 1730–1850

Abstract

Summary This paper examines fertility behaviour in Sturbridge, Massachusetts between 1730 and 1850. The substantial decline in fertility over the period resulted from a combination of a rising female age at marriage and declining fertility within marriage. The authors suggest that declining marital fertility represents the onset of deliberate family limitation and put forward the hypothesis that it is related to the interaction of the culmination of the settlement process and the commercialization of economic life in the early nineteenth century. The change in fertility in Sturbridge, then, is explained by the combination of traditional controls over family formation and new means of fertility control.