Summary

Aligned with the national high school history standards, the Handbook to Life in America set offers students, researchers, and general readers a fascinating glimpse into the social history of the nation. While most American history sources focus mainly on national events and historic figures, this comprehensive set delves into the way ordinary Americans lived.

Each of the nine volumes examines a single time period in American history and presents a remarkable array of valuable information gathered by historians, archaeologists, scientists, and other scholars. Covering everything from the foods people ate and how they dressed to entertainment and popular pastimes, the text in each volume is written in a narrative format, with the same topics acting as chapters in each of the nine volumes. Black-and-white illustrations and boxed features throughout complete this user-friendly and accessible set.

The set is arranged in nine chronological eras:

• Volume 1: The Colonial and Revolutionary Era: Beginnings to 1783
• Volume 2: The Early National Period and Expansion: 1783 to 1859
• Volume 3: The Civil War and Reconstruction: 1860 to 1876
• Volume 4: The Gilded Age: 1870 to 1900
• Volume 5: The Age of Reform: 1890 to 1920
• Volume 6: The Roaring Twenties: 1920 to 1929
• Volume 7: The Great Depression and World War II: 1929 to 1949
• Volume 8: Postwar America: 1950 to 1969
• Volume 9: Contemporary America: 1970 to Present.

Coverage includes:

• Cities and urban life
• Crime and violence
• Education
• Entertainment and sports
• Family and daily life
• Labor and employment
• Material culture
• Military and wars
• Population trends and migration
• Religion
• Rural life
• Science and technology
• Social attitudes.

Specifications

Black-and-white photographs and illustrations. Maps. Index. Further reading lists. Box features. In nine volumes.

About the Author(s)

Series editor Rodney P. Carlisle earned his B.A. in history from Harvard and both his M.A. and Ph.D. in history from the University of California in Berkeley. He is a former chair of the history department at Rutgers University in Camden, where he taught for more than 30 years, specializing in 20th-century history. Carlisle is now professor emeritus there. He has written and edited many articles and more than 10 books on history, including The Thirties in Facts On File’s Day by Day series.