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America's First Great Depression: Economic Crisis and Political Disorder after the Panic of 1837

Alasdair Roberts

For a while, it seemed impossible to lose money on real estate. But then the bubble burst. The financial sector was paralyzed and the economy contracted. State and federal governments struggled to ... More

For a while, it seemed impossible to lose money on real estate. But then the bubble burst. The financial sector was paralyzed and the economy contracted. State and federal governments struggled to pay their domestic and foreign creditors. Washington was incapable of decisive action. The country seethed with political and social unrest. This book describes how the United States dealt with the economic and political crisis that followed the Panic of 1837. As the book shows, the two decades that preceded the Panic had marked a democratic surge in the United States. However, the nation’s commitment to democracy was tested severely during this crisis. Foreign lenders questioned whether American politicians could make the unpopular decisions needed on spending and taxing. State and local officials struggled to put down riots and rebellion. A few wondered whether this was the end of America’s democratic experiment. The book explains how the country’s woes were complicated by its dependence on foreign trade and investment, particularly with Britain. Aware of the contemporary relevance of this story, the book examines how the country responded to the political and cultural aftershocks of 1837, transforming its political institutions to strike a new balance between liberty and social order, and uneasily coming to terms with its place in the global economy.Less

The Angola Horror: The 1867 Train Wreck That Shocked the Nation and Transformed American Railroads

Charity Vogel

On December 18, 1867, an eastbound New York Express train derailed as it approached the high truss bridge over Big Sister Creek, just east of the small settlement of Angola, New York. The last two ... More

On December 18, 1867, an eastbound New York Express train derailed as it approached the high truss bridge over Big Sister Creek, just east of the small settlement of Angola, New York. The last two cars of the express train were pitched completely off the tracks and plummeted into the creek bed below. When they struck bottom, one of the wrecked cars was immediately engulfed in flames as the heating stoves in the coach spilled out coals and ignited its wooden timbers. The other car was badly smashed. About fifty people died at the bottom of the gorge or shortly thereafter, and dozens more were injured. The next day and in the weeks that followed, newspapers across the country carried news of the “Angola Horror,” one of the deadliest railroad accidents to that point in U.S. history. This book tells the gripping story of the train crash and the characters involved in the tragedy. It weaves together the stories of the people caught up in the disaster, the facts of the New York Express's fateful run, the fiery scenes in the creek ravine, and the subsequent legal, legislative, and journalistic search for answers to the question: what had happened at Angola, and why? The book sets the Angola Horror against a broader context of the developing technology of railroads, the culture of the nation's print media, the public policy legislation of the post-Civil War era, and the culture of death and mourning in the Victorian period.Less

Christian Imperialism: Converting the World in the Early American Republic

Emily Conroy-Krutz

In 1812, eight American missionaries, under the direction of the recently formed American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, sailed from the United States to South Asia. The reason for the ... More

In 1812, eight American missionaries, under the direction of the recently formed American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, sailed from the United States to South Asia. The reason for the voyage was to take part in the Protestant conversion of the entire world. Over the next several decades, these men and women were joined by hundreds more American missionaries at stations all over the globe. This book shows the surprising extent of the early missionary impulse and demonstrates that American evangelical Protestants of the early nineteenth century were motivated by Christian imperialism—an understanding of international relations that asserted the duty of supposedly Christian nations, such as the United States and Britain, to use their colonial and commercial power to spread Christianity. In describing how American missionaries interacted with a range of foreign locations and imperial contexts, the book provides a new perspective on how Americans thought of their country's role in the world. While in the early republican period many were engaged in territorial expansion in the west, missionary supporters looked east and across the seas toward Africa, Asia, and the Pacific. This history of the mission movement reveals that strong Anglo-American and global connections persisted through the early republic. Considering Britain and its empire to be models for their work, the missionaries of the American Board attempted to convert the globe into the image of Anglo-American civilization.Less

The Comstocks of Cornell-The Definitive Autobiography

Anna Botsford Comstock

Karen Penders St. Clair (ed.)

This book is the autobiography written by the naturalist educator Anna Botsford Comstock about her life and that of her husband, the entomologist John Henry Comstock—both prominent figures in the ... More

This book is the autobiography written by the naturalist educator Anna Botsford Comstock about her life and that of her husband, the entomologist John Henry Comstock—both prominent figures in the scientific community and in Cornell University history. A first edition was published in 1953, but it omitted key Cornellians, historical anecdotes, and personal insights. This twenty-first-century edition restores the author's voice by reconstructing the entire manuscript as Anna Comstock wrote it—and thereby preserves Comstock's memories of the personal and professional lives of the couple as she originally intended. The book includes an epilogue documenting the Comstocks' last years and fills in gaps from the 1953 edition. Described as serious legacy work, this book is an essential part of the history of both Cornell University and its press.Less

Engineering Philadelphia: The Sellers Family and the Industrial Metropolis

Domenic Vitiello

The Sellers brothers, Samuel and George, came to North America in 1682 as part of the Quaker migration to William Penn's new province on the shores of the Delaware River. Across more than two ... More

The Sellers brothers, Samuel and George, came to North America in 1682 as part of the Quaker migration to William Penn's new province on the shores of the Delaware River. Across more than two centuries, the Sellers family—especially Samuel's descendants Nathan, Escol, Coleman, and William—rose to prominence as manufacturers, engineers, social reformers, and urban and suburban developers, transforming Philadelphia into a center of industry and culture. They led a host of civic institutions including the Franklin Institute, Abolition Society, and University of Pennsylvania. At the same time, their vast network of relatives and associates became a leading force in the rise of American industry in Ohio, Georgia, Tennessee, New York, and elsewhere. This is a sweeping account of enterprise and ingenuity, economic development and urban planning, and the rise and fall of Philadelphia as an industrial metropolis. The book tells the story of the influential Sellers family, placing their experiences in the broader context of industrialization and urbanization in the United States from the colonial era through World War II. The story of the Sellers family illustrates how family and business networks shaped the social, financial, and technological processes of industrial capitalism. As the book documents, the Sellers family and their network profoundly influenced corporate and federal technology policy, manufacturing practice, infrastructure and building construction, and metropolitan development. The book also links the family's declining fortunes to the deindustrialization of Philadelphia—and the nation—over the course of the twentieth century.Less

Follies in America: A History of Garden and Park Architecture

Kerry Dean Carso

This book examines historicized garden buildings, known as “follies,” from the nation's founding through the American centennial celebration in 1876. In a period of increasing nationalism, follies — ... More

This book examines historicized garden buildings, known as “follies,” from the nation's founding through the American centennial celebration in 1876. In a period of increasing nationalism, follies — such as temples, summerhouses, towers, and ruins — brought a range of European architectural styles to the United States. By imprinting the land with symbols of European culture, landscape gardeners brought their idea of civilization to the American wilderness. The book examines both buildings and their counterparts in literature and art, demonstrating that follies provide a window into major themes in nineteenth-century American culture, including tensions between Jeffersonian agrarianism and urban life, the ascendancy of middle-class tourism, and gentility and social class aspirations.Less

Follow the Flag: A History of the Wabash Railroad Company

H. Roger Grant

This book offers a history of the Wabash Railroad Company, a once-vital interregional carrier. Like most major American carriers, the Wabash grew out of an assortment of small firms. Thanks in part ... More

This book offers a history of the Wabash Railroad Company, a once-vital interregional carrier. Like most major American carriers, the Wabash grew out of an assortment of small firms. Thanks in part to the genius of financier Jay Gould, by the early 1880s what was then known as the Wabash, St. Louis & Pacific Railway reached the principal gateways of Chicago, Des Moines, Detroit, Kansas City, and St. Louis. In the 1890s, the Wabash gained access to Buffalo and direct connections to Boston and New York City. One extension fizzled, and in 1904 entry into Pittsburgh caused financial turmoil, ultimately throwing the Wabash into receivership. A subsequent reorganization allowed the Wabash to become an important carrier during the go-go years of the 1920s and permitted the company to take control of a strategic “bridge” property, the Ann Arbor Railroad. The Great Depression forced the company into another receivership, but an effective reorganization during the early days of World War II gave rise to a generally robust road. In the 1960s, the Wabash, along with the Nickel Plate Road, joined the prosperous Norfolk & Western Railway, a merger that worked well for all three carriers. Immortalized in the popular folk song “Wabash Cannonball,” the midwestern railroad has left important legacies. Today, forty years after becoming a “fallen flag” carrier, key components of the former Wabash remain busy rail arteries and terminals, attesting to its historic value to American transportation.Less

For God and Globe: Christian Internationalism in the United States between the Great War and the Cold War

Michael G. Thompson

This book recovers the history of an important yet largely forgotten intellectual movement in interwar America. It explores the way radical-left and ecumenical Protestant internationalists ... More

This book recovers the history of an important yet largely forgotten intellectual movement in interwar America. It explores the way radical-left and ecumenical Protestant internationalists articulated new understandings of the ethics of international relations between the 1920s and the 1940s. Missionary leaders such as Sherwood Eddy and journalists such as Kirby Page, as well as realist theologians including Reinhold Niebuhr, developed new kinds of religious enterprises devoted to producing knowledge on international relations for public consumption. The book centers on the excavation of two such efforts—the leading left-wing Protestant interwar periodical, The World Tomorrow, and the landmark Oxford 1937 ecumenical world conference. It charts the simultaneous peak and decline of the movement in John Foster Dulles's ambitious efforts to link Christian internationalism to the cause of international organization after World War II. Concerned with far more than foreign policy, Christian internationalists developed critiques of racism, imperialism, and nationalism in world affairs. They rejected exceptionalist frameworks and eschewed the dominant “Christian nation” imaginary as a lens through which to view U.S. foreign relations. In the intellectual history of religion and American foreign relations, Protestantism most commonly appears as an ideological ancillary to expansionism and nationalism. The book challenges this account by recovering a movement that held Christian universalism to be a check against nationalism rather than a boon to it.Less

Freedom Incorporated: Anticommunism and Philippine Independence in the Age of Decolonization

Colleen Woods

This book demonstrates how anticommunist political projects were critical to the United States' expanding imperial power in the age of decolonization, and how anticommunism was essential to the ... More

This book demonstrates how anticommunist political projects were critical to the United States' expanding imperial power in the age of decolonization, and how anticommunism was essential to the growing global economy of imperial violence in the Cold War era. The book shows how, in the mid-twentieth-century Philippines, U.S. policymakers and Filipino elites promoted the islands as a model colony. In the wake of World War II, as the decolonization movement strengthened, those same political actors pivoted and, after Philippine independence in 1946, lauded the archipelago as a successful postcolonial democracy. Despite elite propaganda, from the early 1930s to late 1950s, radical movements in the Philippines highlighted U.S. hegemony over the new Republic of the Philippines and, in so doing, threatened American efforts to separate the US from sordid histories of empire, imperialism, and the colonial racial order. The book finds that in order to justify U.S. intervention in an ostensibly independent Philippine nation, anticommunist Filipinos and their American allies transformed local political struggles in the Philippines into sites of resistance against global communist revolution. By linking political struggles over local resources to a war against communism, American and Filipino anticommunists legitimized the use of violence as a means to capture and contain alternative forms of political, economic, and social organization. Placing the post-World War II history of anticommunism in the Philippines within a larger imperial framework, the book illustrates how American and Filipino intelligence agents, military officials, paramilitaries, state bureaucrats, academics, and entrepreneurs mobilized anticommunist politics to contain challenges to elite rule in the Philippines.Less

The Gathering Storm: Eduardo Frei's Revolution in Liberty and Chile's Cold War

Sebastián Hurtado-Torres

This novel take on diplomatic history examines the involvement of the United States in Chile during the Eduardo Frei administration (1964–1970) and shows how the engagement between the two nations ... More

This novel take on diplomatic history examines the involvement of the United States in Chile during the Eduardo Frei administration (1964–1970) and shows how the engagement between the two nations deepened the process of political polarization in Chile. At the heart of the book is a description of the partnership between Frei's government and that of Lyndon B. Johnson. Both leaders considered modernization to be integral to political and economic development, and the U.S. Embassy in Santiago was recognized by all parties to be the center of this modernizing agenda and the practical work of the Alliance for Progress (AFP). The book portrays the diplomatic and economic relationship between Chile and the United States in a manner that departs from the most militant and conservative interpretations of U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America. By focusing on the active participation of agents of U.S. foreign policy—particularly those associated with the AFP—and not secret operatives of the Central Intelligence Agency, the book offers a fresh narrative about a critical period in Chilean political history and a new understanding of the ways and means through which the foreign policy of the United States was carried out.Less

Memories of War: Visiting Battlegrounds and Bonefields in the Early American Republic

Thomas A. Chambers

Even in the midst of the Civil War, its battlefields were being dedicated as hallowed ground. Today, those sites are among the most visited places in the United States. In contrast, the battlegrounds ... More

Even in the midst of the Civil War, its battlefields were being dedicated as hallowed ground. Today, those sites are among the most visited places in the United States. In contrast, the battlegrounds of the Revolutionary War had seemingly been forgotten in the aftermath of the conflict in which the nation forged its independence. Decades after the signing of the Constitution, the battlefields of Yorktown, Saratoga, Fort Moultrie, Ticonderoga, Guilford Courthouse, Kings Mountain, and Cowpens, among others, were unmarked except for crumbling forts and overgrown ramparts. Not until the late 1820s did Americans begin to recognize the importance of these places. This book recounts America’s rediscovery of its early national history through the rise of battlefield tourism in the first half of the nineteenth century. Travelers in this period wanted more than recitations of regimental movements when they visited battlefields; they desired experiences that evoked strong emotions and leant meaning to the bleached bones and decaying fortifications of a past age. The book traces this impulse through efforts to commemorate Braddock’s Field and Ticonderoga, the cultivated landscapes masking the violent past of the Hudson River valley, the overgrown ramparts of Southern war sites, and the scenic vistas at War of 1812 battlefields along the Niagara River.Less

Mere Equals: The Paradox of Educated Women in the Early American Republic

Lucia McMahon

This book narrates a story about how a generation of young women who enjoyed access to new educational opportunities made sense of their individual and social identities in an American nation marked ... More

This book narrates a story about how a generation of young women who enjoyed access to new educational opportunities made sense of their individual and social identities in an American nation marked by stark political inequality between the sexes. The book reviews educated women's experiences with particular life stages and relationship arcs: friendship, family, courtship, marriage, and motherhood. In their personal and social relationships, educated women attempted to live as the “mere equals” of men. Their often frustrated efforts reveal how early national Americans grappled with the competing issues of women's intellectual equality and sexual difference. In the new nation, a pioneering society, pushing westward and unmooring itself from established institutions, often enlisted women's labor outside the home and in areas that we would deem public. Yet, as a matter of law, women lacked most rights of citizenship and this subordination was authorized by an ideology of sexual difference. What women and men said about education, how they valued it, and how they used it to place themselves and others within social hierarchies is a highly useful way to understand the ongoing negotiation between equality and difference. In public documents, “difference” overwhelmed “equality,” because the formal exclusion of women from political activity and from economic parity required justification. The book tracks the ways in which this public disparity took hold in private communications. By the 1830s, separate and gendered spheres were firmly in place. This was the social and political heritage with which women's rights activists would contend for the rest of the century.Less

Moral Commerce: Quakers and the Transatlantic Boycott of the Slave Labor Economy

Julie L. Holcomb

How can the simple choice of a men's suit be a moral statement and a political act? When the suit is made of free-labor wool rather than slave-grown cotton. This book traces the genealogy of the ... More

How can the simple choice of a men's suit be a moral statement and a political act? When the suit is made of free-labor wool rather than slave-grown cotton. This book traces the genealogy of the boycott of slave labor from its seventeenth-century Quaker origins through its late nineteenth-century decline. In their failures and in their successes, in their resilience and their persistence, antislavery consumers help us understand the possibilities and the limitations of moral commerce. The Quakers' antislavery rhetoric began with protests against the slave trade before expanding to include boycotts of the use and products of slave labor. For more than 100 years, British and American abolitionists highlighted consumers' complicity in sustaining slavery. The boycott of slave labor was the first consumer movement to transcend the boundaries of nation, gender, and race in an effort by reformers to change the conditions of production. The movement attracted a broad cross-section of abolitionists. The men and women who boycotted slave labor created diverse, biracial networks that worked to reorganize the transatlantic economy on an ethical basis. Even when they acted locally, supporters embraced a global vision, mobilizing the boycott as a powerful force that could transform the marketplace. For supporters of the boycott, the abolition of slavery was a step toward a broader goal of a just and humane economy. The boycott failed to overcome the power structures that kept slave labor in place; nonetheless, the movement's historic successes and failures have important implications for modern consumers.Less

A New Moral Vision: Gender, Religion, and the Changing Purposes of American Higher Education, 1837-1917

Andrea L. Turpin

This book explores how the entrance of women into US colleges and universities shaped changing ideas about the moral and religious purposes of higher education in unexpected ways, and in turn shaped ... More

This book explores how the entrance of women into US colleges and universities shaped changing ideas about the moral and religious purposes of higher education in unexpected ways, and in turn shaped American culture. In the decades before the Civil War, evangelical Protestantism provided the main impetus for opening the highest levels of American education to women. Between the Civil War and World War I, however, shifting theological beliefs, a growing cultural pluralism, and a new emphasis on university research led educators to re-evaluate how colleges should inculcate an ethical outlook in students—just as the proportion of female collegians swelled. In this environment, the book argues, educational leaders articulated a new moral vision for their institutions by positioning them within the new landscape of competing men's, women's, and coeducational colleges and universities. Religiously liberal educators sought to foster in students a gendered ideal of character and service than had earlier evangelical educators. Because of this moral reorientation, the widespread entrance of women into higher education did not shift the social order in as egalitarian a direction as we might expect. Instead, college graduates—who formed a disproportionate number of the leaders and reformers of the Progressive Era—contributed to the creation of separate male and female cultures within Progressive Era public life and beyond. The book illuminates the historical intersection of gender ideals, religious beliefs, educational theories, and social change in ways that offer insight into the nature—and cultural consequences—of the moral messages communicated by institutions of higher education today.Less

Northern Men with Southern Loyalties: The Democratic Party and the Sectional Crisis

Michael Todd Landis

In the decade before the Civil War, Northern Democrats, although they ostensibly represented antislavery and free-state constituencies, made possible the passage of such proslavery legislation as the ... More

In the decade before the Civil War, Northern Democrats, although they ostensibly represented antislavery and free-state constituencies, made possible the passage of such proslavery legislation as the Compromise of 1850 and Fugitive Slave Law of the same year, the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854, and the Lecompton Constitution of 1858. This book contends that a full understanding of the Civil War and its causes is impossible without a careful examination of the Northern wing of the Democratic Party and its proslavery sentiments and activities. It focuses on a variety of key Democratic politicians, such as Stephen Douglas, William Marcy, and Jesse Bright, to unravel the puzzle of Northern Democratic political allegiance to the South. As congressmen, state party bosses, convention wire-pullers, cabinet officials, and presidents, these men produced the legislation and policies that led to the fragmentation of the party and catastrophic disunion. The book lays bare the desires and designs of Northern Democrats. It ventures into the complex realm of state politics and party mechanics, drawing connections between national events and district and state activity as well as between partisan dynamics and national policy. Northern Democrats had to walk a perilously thin line between loyalty to the Southern party leaders and answering to their free-state constituents. If Northern Democrats sought high office, they would have to cater to the “Slave Power.” Yet, if they hoped for election at home, they had to convince voters that they were not mere lackeys of the Southern grandees.Less

Principles in Power: Latin America and the Politics of U.S. Human Rights Diplomacy

Vanessa Walker

This book explores the relationship between policy makers and nongovernment advocates in Latin America and the U.S. government in order to explain the rise of anti-interventionist human rights ... More

This book explores the relationship between policy makers and nongovernment advocates in Latin America and the U.S. government in order to explain the rise of anti-interventionist human rights policies uniquely critical of U.S. power during the Cold War. The book shows that the new human rights policies of the 1970s were based on a complex dynamic of domestic and foreign considerations that was rife with tensions between the seats of power in the United States and Latin America, and the growing activist movement that sought to reform them. By addressing the development of U.S. diplomacy and politics alongside that of activist networks, especially in Chile and Argentina, the book shows that Latin America was central to the policy assumptions that shaped the Carter administration's foreign policy agenda. The coup that ousted the socialist president of Chile, Salvador Allende, sparked new human rights advocacy as a direct result of U.S. policies that supported authoritarian regimes in the name of Cold War security interests. From 1973 onward, the attention of Washington and capitals around the globe turned to Latin America as the testing ground for the viability of a new paradigm for U.S. power. This approach, oriented around human rights, required collaboration among activists and state officials in diverse places. The book tells the complicated story of the potentials and limits of partnership between government and nongovernment actors. Analyzing how different groups deployed human rights language to reform domestic and international power, it explores the multiple and often conflicting purposes of U.S. human rights policy.Less

Pursuing Respect in the Cannibal Isles: Americans in Nineteenth-Century Fiji

Nancy Shoemaker

This book shows that the aspirations of individual Americans to be recognized as people worthy of others' respect was a driving force in the global extension of U.S. influence shortly after the ... More

This book shows that the aspirations of individual Americans to be recognized as people worthy of others' respect was a driving force in the global extension of U.S. influence shortly after the nation's founding. The book contends that extraterritorial Americans constituted the vanguard of a vast, early U.S. global expansion. Using nineteenth-century Fiji, the “cannibal isles” of American popular culture, as a site of historical investigation, the book uncovers stories of Americans looking for opportunities to rise in social status and enhance their sense of self. Prior to British colonization in 1874, extraterritorial Americans had, the book argues, as much impact on Fiji as did the British. While the American economy invested in the extraction of sandalwood and sea slugs as resources to sell in China, individuals who went to Fiji had more complicated, personal objectives. The book considers these motivations through the lives of the three Americans who left the deepest imprint on Fiji: a runaway whaleman who settled in the islands, a sea captain's wife, and a merchant. It shows how ordinary Americans living or working overseas found unusual venues where they could show themselves worthy of others' respect—others' approval, admiration, or deference.Less

Sanctified Landscape: Writers, Artists, and the Hudson River Valley, 1820-1909

David Schuyler

The Hudson River Valley was the first iconic American landscape. Beginning as early as the 1820s, artists and writers found new ways of thinking about the human relationship with the natural world ... More

The Hudson River Valley was the first iconic American landscape. Beginning as early as the 1820s, artists and writers found new ways of thinking about the human relationship with the natural world along the Hudson. As the century advanced and as landscape and history became increasingly intertwined in the national consciousness, an aesthetic identity took shape in the region through literature, art, memory, and folklore—even gardens and domestic architecture. This book recounts this story of America's idealization of the Hudson Valley during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The story unfolds during a time of great change in American history. At the very moment when artists and writers were exploring the aesthetic potential of the Hudson Valley, the transportation revolution and the rise of industrial capitalism were transforming the region. The first generation of American tourists traveled from New York City to Cozzens Hotel and the Catskill Mountain House in search of the picturesque. Those who could afford to live some distance from jobs in the city built suburban homes or country estates. Given these momentous changes, it is not surprising that historic preservation emerged in the Hudson Valley: the first building in the United States preserved for its historic significance is Washington's Headquarters in Newburgh. The book also finds the seeds of the modern environmental movement in the transformation of the Hudson Valley landscape. The book ties local history to national developments, revealing why the Hudson River Valley was so important to nineteenth-century Americans—and why it is still beloved today.Less

Scientific Americans: Invention, Technology, and National Identity

Susan Branson

This book explores the place of science and technology in American efforts to achieve cultural independence from Europe and America's nation building in the early republic and antebellum eras. This ... More

This book explores the place of science and technology in American efforts to achieve cultural independence from Europe and America's nation building in the early republic and antebellum eras. This engaging tour of scientific education and practices among ordinary citizens charts the development of nationalism and national identity alongside roads, rails, and machines. The book shows how informal scientific education provided by almanacs, public lectures, and demonstrations, along with the financial encouragement of early scientific societies, generated an enthusiasm for the application of science and technology to civic, commercial, and domestic improvements. Not only that: Americans were excited, awed, and intrigued with the practicality of inventions. Bringing together scientific research and popular wonder, the book charts how everything from mechanical clocks to steam engines informed the creation and expansion of the American nation. From the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations to the fate of the Amistad captives, the book shows how the promotion and celebration of discoveries, inventions, and technologies articulated Americans' earliest ambitions, as well as prejudices, throughout the first American century.Less

The Soul of Pleasure: Sentiment and Sensation in Nineteenth-Century American Mass Entertainment

David Monod

Show business is today so essential to American culture it's hard to imagine a time when it was marginal. But as this book demonstrates, the appetite for amusements outside the home was not ... More

Show business is today so essential to American culture it's hard to imagine a time when it was marginal. But as this book demonstrates, the appetite for amusements outside the home was not “natural:” it developed slowly over the course of the nineteenth century. The book offers a new interpretation of how the taste for entertainment was cultivated. It focuses on the shifting connection between the people who built successful popular entertainments and the public who consumed them. Show people discovered that they had to adapt entertainment to the moral outlook of Americans, which they did by appealing to sentiment. The book explores several controversial forms of popular culture and places them in the context of changing values and perceptions. Far from challenging respectability, the book argues that entertainments reflected and transformed the audience's ideals. In the mid-nineteenth century, sentimentality not only infused performance styles and the content of shows but also altered the expectations of the theatre-going public. Sentimental entertainment depended on sensational effects that produced surprise, horror, and even gales of laughter. After the Civil War the sensational charge became more important than the sentimental bond, and new forms of entertainment gained in popularity and provided the foundations for vaudeville, America's first mass entertainment. Ultimately, it was American entertainment's variety that would provide the true soul of pleasure.Less