Paul E. Johnson is a distinguished university professor and also, a social historian, who uses micro-history to tell the story of the famous jumper, Sam Patch. Johnson tries to shine a new light on overlooked aspects of the mainstream American society by giving the simple story of Sam Patch, the richness it deserved. Essentially, he is able to bring to life a brave American hero, which is an entire era in our past through fine literature and history. He provides a window into the 19th century where the reader learns about industrial revolution and social stratification. Additionally, Paul E. Johnson says fresh things about Jacksonian America and about the industrial revolution by incorporating broader themes related to Sam’s locations of his jumps. Johnson shows that he is the greatest artist writing history in the modern society. …show more content…
Through the life of Sam Patch, the story focuses on the effects of industrialization on American working class citizens.
It depicts how industrialization influenced the redefinition of the roles of American women within the larger society, alcohol use, and the rise of the middle class. The author seeks to enlighten the reader about the social stratification of that era; in addition, he makes reading history easy and enjoyable by writing in clear and lively prose. As a practitioner of micro-history, Johnson provides a window onto the early 19th century; in particular, the life of the American working class during that era. Since there is no much history on Sam Patch, Johnson uses his life to building an accessible and enjoyable narrative. The book served as a broader story to the rise of wage labor; the author explored the lives of entertainers, local politicians, and entrepreneurs. These aspects are developed throughout the book illustrating how it was now possible to rise to fame as a middle-class
person. During that period, America was in a transition into an industrial nation from an agricultural one. The book provides ideas on how America became dependent on the work of manufactories. Moreover, Sam transforms into a celebrity despite the fact that he was a middle-class fellow. During this period working-class people were lowly regarded in the society, and it was not possible for them to rise to fame. Johnson considers Sam Patch’s crowd-gathering jumps to be a critique because America was undergoing industrial revolution where activities such as jumping off falls were considered as leisure. To a transitioning nation, people would be focusing on more important issues of production and provision of labor rather than gather to watch jumps from a common man. However, Sam Patch brings a new concept where even the working-class can rise to fame through leisure activities instead of focusing on labor provision. Conquering nature and domesticating wilderness are important themes throughout the book by Paul E. Johnson. Conquering nature was a form of protest against industrial power where the likes of Sam worked; jumping was such excitement as it made them realize that a working-class man could become famous by democratizing America. The working-class became diversified in terms of ideas and activities that could earn them a living, breaking away from a norm of providing manual labor in industries. On the other hand, since Sam had made jumping off the falls a norm, he has succeeded in domesticating wilderness. He was able to find nature sublime within the accelerating modern machine time. The book outlines the life of Americans in the 18th and 19th century, through a work of history and art. He provides the reader with an incredible, fascinating scene by uncovering a man who leaped to fame and then fell into obscurity. The author addresses important issues that are relevant in our society today like the rise of celebrities and wage labor for the middle-class Americans.
In the book, “The Devil in the White City,” Erik Larson tells the story of two formidable men and their activities during Chicago’s World Fair of 1893. Daniel Burnham is an architect and the fair’s brilliant director. The book takes the reader through the tremendous obstacles and tragedies that Burnham faces in an attempt to create a fair that will give America its fame. However, H.H Holmes is a young doctor, who uses the attraction of the great fair and his charms to lure dozens of young women to their inevitable and tragic deaths. Not only did Chicago’s World Fair of 1893 showcase Daniel Burnham’s success as an able director and H.H. Holmes cunning nature, it changed America as a whole, introduced some lasting inventions, and influenced many historical figures of both that time and our current time period.
Nineteenth century industrialism presented the United States with a unique and unprecedented set of problems, as illustrated through the works of Rebecca Harding Davis and Horatio Alger Jr. Although both authors felt compelled to address these problems in their writing, Rebecca Harding Davis’s grasp on the realities faced by the working poor and women was clearly stronger than Alger’s. Not only did Alger possess a naïve view on exactly how much control an individual has over their own circumstances, but he failed to address the struggles of women entirely. As a result, Alger conceived a rather romantic world where the old-fashioned American ideals of hard work, determination, and self-sacrifice enable a young boy to lift himself from poverty.
Review of Frederick Lewis Allen: Since Yesterday: the 1930’s America. (New York: Harper and Row, Publishers, Inc., 1939), 362 pp.
White, Richard. “Strike.” Railroaded: The Transcontinentals and the Making of Modern America. New York: W.W. Norton, 2011. N. pag. Print.
Benson, Alvin K. “Bo Jackson.” The Eighties in America. Ed. Berman Milton. 3 vols. Salem Press,
During the nineteenth century, America went through a number of social, economic and political changes. Revolutions in manufacturing and commerce led to substantial economic growth. Several cultural movements reformed American society. Mary Paul, once just a normal girl from Vermont, led a life that was shaped by the changes of the 1800's. The information gathered from Mary Paul's letters to her father make it clear that Mary's life experiences turned her into anything but an average woman. However, in the scope of the economic and cultural reforms of the nineteenth century, Mary Paul represents the average American.
As many women took on a domestic role during this era, by the turn of the century women were certainly not strangers to the work force. As the developing American nation altered the lives of its citizens, both men and women found themselves struggling economically and migrated into cities to find work in the emerging industrialized labor movement . Ho...
...is own. In an overall assessment of this book, Martin comes to the conclusion that “Campbell has succeeded in providing a thoughtful, very readable, and eminently useful survey of a fluid, exciting, and fascinating period of United States and Texas history through the lens of the life of the greatest Texas hero of them all” showing that Martin as well as Campbell seemed to be very fascinated by the heroism of Sam Houston (The Journal of Southern History, 60, November 1994, 796).
The social and economic developments of the last quarter of the nineteenth century drastically changed the United States. The business world changed once industrialization was introduced to the world. Opportunities grew as people heard about the boundless American opportunities. Immigrants from all races flooded the cities which doubled in population from 1860-1900 (Barnes and Bowles, 2014, p. 34). However, as industries grew, owners prospered off the hard work of others. People started to feel they were not being treated fairly. People had to work harder and longer for their money. Barnes and Bowles (2014) noted “In the era of industrialization, millions of workers fought to simply have the right to work in safe conditions, and earn a fair wage” (p. 45). Many Americans feared that giant corporations would one day seek to restrict the ability of common people to get ahead and curtail individual freedoms. These fears were particularly strong among farmers, laborers, an...
During the industrializing era in the United States in the late 19th century and early 20th century, unskilled laborers and skilled blue-collar men struggled to even put food on their tables; the emerging middle class struggled greatly as well, but had little trouble feeding themselves in this time period. It was the wealthy elite who prospered in this period, dining and living lavishly. Labor leaders and reformers tried to used many tactics to persuade prosperous Americans to concern themselves with the issues of the day; the main tactic used was the manipulation of emotion to get others to join the reformers’ cause. This trend was part of a greater global pattern of economic insecurity in the United States, which only heightened during the Great Depression in the decades to come.
Royal Melendy writes about a rising social culture taking place at the turn of the twentieth century. He depicts this culture as the ambiance emitted in early Chicago saloons. “Saloons served many roles for the working-class during this period of American history, and were labeled as the poor man’s social clubs” (summary of saloon culture, pg. 76).
The literature of the nineteenth century cataloged the social, economical and political changes during its period. Through it many new concerns and ideologies were proposed and made their journeys through intellectual spheres that have endured and kept their relevance in our own period today. The literature, sometimes quite overtly, introduced the issues arising with the changes in society specifically due to the industrial revolution. In this mixture of new ideas was the question of women's labor and functions among this rapidly changing society. American authors as well as Victorian authors, like George Gissing and Mabel Wotton, explored these issues somewhat explicitly during this period. In America, Louisa May Alcott and Charlotte Perkins Gilman expressed these issues in short stories with strong implications of the dangers of unfulfilled or unsatisfying labor available to women.
During the second half of the 19th century, the United States underwent its Industrial Revolution. This massive industrialization was characterized by the substitution of the agrarian style economy and the introduction of the industrial machine based economy. In the novel A Fierce Discontent, Michael McGerr discusses the negative effects of the Industrial Revolution as it examines large-scale poverty, urbanization, monopolies, and submissive gender roles that resulted from the shift of economic system. Consequently, these new deplorable conditions became the basis for the Progressive Movement. The movement was composed of middle class reformers who had grown displeased with the negative externalities that emerged from industrialization. The large inflow of people into large industrial cities seeking new opportunities cause the
In “ A Description of New England ”, Smith starts by describing the pleasure and content that risking your life for getting your own piece of land brings to men. On the other hand, Bradford reminds us how harsh and difficult the trip to the New World was for the p...
In writing this book, commonly refered to as the “Great American Novel”, F. Scott Fitzgerald achieved in showing future generations what the early twenties were like, and the kinds of people that lived then. He did this in a beautifully written novel with in-depth characters, a captivating plot, and a wonderful sense of the time period.