ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the early nineteenth-century businesswoman and manager Marie Hackman. It demonstrates what it meant to be a female manager in a nineteenth-century family firm in Finland, in the eastern parts of the Baltic region. The chapter explores both how and why a female manager of a family firm manifested her status in her consumption choices. It argues that Marie Hackman made consumption choices like any other merchant house owner, even though they were typically men. The aspects of material culture and consumption have been emphasised for specific reasons. First, they allow approaching societal conditions and illustrating what it meant to be an entrepreneur. Second, when studying early modern entrepreneurs, typically there are no documents which include self-reflections, or in this case others reflecting on Marie Hackman as an entrepreneur. The chapter explains the term "family business" or "family firm" is used to describe the enterprising activities of a family.
