6 William Gately, “Wealth Distribution in Berkhamsted, Weyhill, Sudbury, and Marlboro” (unpublished paper, Brandeis, 1971).

7 The distribution of wealth in New England has been measured by many different methods. The only statistical indicator common to most inquiries is the size share of the top tenth (SSTT). This appears as follows, in taxable wealth and estate inventories.

image

image

Note: t = total taxable wealth including polls; p = total taxable wealth excluding polls; m = rates to pay a minister or build a meetinghouse; c = commons division lists; r = real estate valuations or taxes; 1 = acreage of land owned in the town; i = inventories of estates in probate. Sources include Edward M. Cook, Jr., The Fathers of the Towns: Leadership and Community Structure in Eighteenth-Century New England (Baltimore, 1976); unpublished data assembled by the Brandeis Concord, Brookline and Waltham projects; Smith, “Hingham”; Allen, In English Ways.