The Eighteenth-Century Records of the Boston Overseers of the Poor constitutes the collection of the earliest and most complete set of records pertaining to poor relief in early America. In a substantial introduction, the editor Eric Nellis describes the process by which the Overseers of the Poor, a board made up of generally wealthy merchants elected by the town meeting, attempted to distinguish between the -deserving- poor, eligible for -outdoor- relief in their homes, and the -undeserving- poor, who were remanded to the rigors of the workhouse. Because each Overseer knew...