In 1895, a 27-year-old journalist named William Allen White returned to his home town of Emporia, Kansas, to edit a little down-at-the-heels newspaper he had just purchased for $3,000. "The new editor," he wrote in his first editorial, "hopes to live here until he is the old editor, until some of the visions which rise before him as he dreams shall have come true." White did become "the old editor," remaining with the Emporia Gazette until his death 50 years later. During his long tenure he gained nation-wide fame as an author, political leader, and social commentator. But more than anything else, he became the national embodiment of the small-town newspaperman and all the treasured virtues that small towns represented in the minds of Americans. Home Town News is both a fascinating biography and a compelling social history. As Sally Foreman Griffith shows, White's popular image--kindly yet crusading, fiercely independent yet deeply rooted in his community--doesn't do justice to the man's complexity. Shrewdly carving out a position of leadership in a faction-torn town, White carefully shaped his paper's vision of its community to promote local economic growth, Republican political control, and social harmony. With his emergence as a leader among Midwestern progressives, he carefully adapted the ideas and rhetoric of small-town boosterism to changing economic realities. The book uses White's career to help us understand the role of journalism--and the journalist--in turn-of-the-century American culture. Far from being a simple chronicler of daily events, the small-town newspaperman carried considerable weight in his community. He was a leading force in local business, a galvanizing influence in civic life, and a key political activist. As giant corporations came to dominate the national economy, the newspaperman played a pivotal yet ambivalent role in the resulting social transformation: he sought to preserve local autonomy even as his paper introduced his readers to mass-produced consumer goods. Home Town News also tells the story of Emporia, Kansas, during this period of social change. Its richly textured descriptions of small-town life take us beyond abstractions like "modernization," "progressivism," and "boosterism." As we observe the Emporia Street Fair of 1899, the heated controversy over the morality of a local doctor in 1902, and the elaborate campaign to build a Y.M.C.A. in 1914, we gain new insights into the processes that have shaped modern America.
Unto a Good Land offers a distinctive narrative history of the American people, from the first contacts between Europeans and North America's native inhabitants, through the creation of a modern nation, to the standing of the United States as a world power. Written by a team of distinguished historians led by David Edwin Harrell, Jr. and Edwin S. Gaustad, this textbook shows how grasping the uniqueness of the "American experiment" depends on understanding the role of religion as well as social, cultural, political, and economic factors in shaping U.S. history. A common shortcoming of most United States history textbooks is that while, in recent decades, they have expanded their coverage of social and cultural history, they still tend to shortchange the role of religious ideas, practices, and movements in the American past. Unto a Good Land addresses this shortcoming in a balanced way. The authors recognize that religion is only one of many factors that have influenced our past, one, however, that has often been neglected in textbook accounts. This volume gives religion its appropriate place in the story. - Publisher.
Introducing a New U.S. History Text That Takes Religion Seriously Unto a Good Land offers a distinctive narrative history of the American people -- from the first contacts between Europeans and North America's native inhabitants, through the creation of a modern nation, to the 2004 presidential election. Written by a team of highly regarded historians, this textbook shows how grasping the uniqueness of the "American experiment" depends on understanding not only social, cultural, political, and economic factors but also the role that religion has played in shaping U. S. history. While most United States history textbooks in recent decades have expanded their coverage of social and cultural history, they still tend to shortchange the role of religious ideas, practices, and movements in the American past. Unto a Good Land restores the balance by giving religion its appropriate place in the story. This readable and teachable text also features a full complement of maps, historical illustrations, and "In Their Own Words" sidebars with excerpts from primary source documents.
Abridged and edited for the modern reader and available in paperback for the first time ever, this second edition brings back into print a classic autobiography of Middle America--an immensely readable document that enriches our understanding of Progressivism and politics, journalism, and the social history of small-town America from Reconstruction into the Roaring Twenties. At the time of his death in 1944, William Allen White, editor of the Emporia Gazette, was a national celebrity, proclaimed one of the truly great Americans of his age. Life magazine called him "a living symbol of small-town simplicity and kindliness and common sense." During his career White had managed to expand his circle of influence far beyond Emporia Kansas to include most of the nation. By the end of his life he had become a nationally acclaimed journalist and author of biographies, novels, and short stories. He was also widely known for his shrewd commentary on contemporary events in the national media. An influential Republican political leader, he founded the Progressive party and was a longtime advocate of social reform and individual rights. But what endeared him most to his contemporaries was that, in spite of national fame, he remained first and foremost a small-town newspaperman. First published posthumously in 1946, White's Autobiography was immediately hailed as a classic portrait, not simply of White himself, but of the men and women who transformed America from an agrarian society to a powerful industrial nation in the years before World War I. A bestselling Book-of-the-Month Club selection, the Autobiography was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1947. This new edition, edited to eliminate repetitions and digressions, features an introduction by Sally Foreman Griffith, author of a recent biography of White. Griffith explores the background of the Autobiography and illuminates its place in the development of the autobiographical genre.
In 1895, a 27-year-old journalist named William Allen White returned to his home town of Emporia, Kansas, to edit a little down-at-the-heels newspaper he had just purchased for $3,000. "The new editor," he wrote in his first editorial, "hopes to live here until he is the old editor, until some of the visions which rise before him as he dreams shall have come true." White did become "the old editor," remaining with the Emporia Gazette until his death 50 years later. During his long tenure he gained nation-wide fame as an author, political leader, and social commentator. But more than anything else, he became the national embodiment of the small-town newspaperman and all the treasured virtues that small towns represented in the minds of Americans. Home Town News is both a fascinating biography and a compelling social history. As Sally Foreman Griffith shows, White's popular image--kindly yet crusading, fiercely independent yet deeply rooted in his community--doesn't do justice to the man's complexity. Shrewdly carving out a position of leadership in a faction-torn town, White carefully shaped his paper's vision of its community to promote local economic growth, Republican political control, and social harmony. With his emergence as a leader among Midwestern progressives, he carefully adapted the ideas and rhetoric of small-town boosterism to changing economic realities. The book uses White's career to help us understand the role of journalism--and the journalist--in turn-of-the-century American culture. Far from being a simple chronicler of daily events, the small-town newspaperman carried considerable weight in his community. He was a leading force in local business, a galvanizing influence in civic life, and a key political activist. As giant corporations came to dominate the national economy, the newspaperman played a pivotal yet ambivalent role in the resulting social transformation: he sought to preserve local autonomy even as his paper introduced his readers to mass-produced consumer goods. Home Town News also tells the story of Emporia, Kansas, during this period of social change. Its richly textured descriptions of small-town life take us beyond abstractions like "modernization," "progressivism," and "boosterism." As we observe the Emporia Street Fair of 1899, the heated controversy over the morality of a local doctor in 1902, and the elaborate campaign to build a Y.M.C.A. in 1914, we gain new insights into the processes that have shaped modern America.
Abridged and edited for the modern reader and available in paperback for the first time ever, this second edition brings back into print a classic autobiography of Middle America--an immensely readable document that enriches our understanding of Progressivism and politics, journalism, and the social history of small-town America from Reconstruction into the Roaring Twenties. At the time of his death in 1944, William Allen White, editor of the Emporia Gazette, was a national celebrity, proclaimed one of the truly great Americans of his age. Life magazine called him "a living symbol of small-town simplicity and kindliness and common sense." During his career White had managed to expand his circle of influence far beyond Emporia Kansas to include most of the nation. By the end of his life he had become a nationally acclaimed journalist and author of biographies, novels, and short stories. He was also widely known for his shrewd commentary on contemporary events in the national media. An influential Republican political leader, he founded the Progressive party and was a longtime advocate of social reform and individual rights. But what endeared him most to his contemporaries was that, in spite of national fame, he remained first and foremost a small-town newspaperman. First published posthumously in 1946, White's Autobiography was immediately hailed as a classic portrait, not simply of White himself, but of the men and women who transformed America from an agrarian society to a powerful industrial nation in the years before World War I. A bestselling Book-of-the-Month Club selection, the Autobiography was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1947. This new edition, edited to eliminate repetitions and digressions, features an introduction by Sally Foreman Griffith, author of a recent biography of White. Griffith explores the background of the Autobiography and illuminates its place in the development of the autobiographical genre.
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