In this study, Betsy Hunter Bradley sets forth the terms of the type of analysis that industrial architecture demands. She explores the rationale behind the pragmatic design and functional beauty of American factory buildings and "the works" complexes in which they often stand. While tracing the important developments in industrial architecture over a one-hundred-year period, she demonstrates that as the United States became an industrialized nation, the goals pursued in industrial architecture remained straightforward and constant even as the means to achieve them changed. Generously illustrated with historic views, The Works will be a valuable resource for historians, architects, and historic preservationists, as well as for anyone interested in industrial architecture generally.