Overview
Here is a summary of the economic chaos that followed the 1929 stock market crash and gripped America and Europe throughout the 1930s. Included are accounts of the Roosevelt Administration’s social programs, the plight of “Dust Bowl” migrants to California, the social disorder in Europe that fueled the rise of fascism, and much more.
• Lives in Crisis books are vividly written historical accounts of momentous historical events and movements, supplemented with photographs, illustrations, maps, and contemporary cartoons and engravings. Illuminating sidebar material presents quotations and descriptions by men and women who were directly involved in the historic event. These easy-to-read books transform dry historical statistics and dates into intensely readable accounts, and are focused especially to serve as supplements to junior and senior high school texts. The back of each book features a brief summary of important dates, a glossary, and a recommended reading list. Available in both paperback and hardcover editions, these volumes will be welcomed by teachers for classroom use, and will also fill a valuable niche in school and public libraries.
Editorials
KLIATT
This review addresses several titles from the "Lives in Crisis" series. Copiously illustrated with photographs, drawings, maps, and paintings, these brief histories are appealing to the eye. The text is not lengthy, but the print is small and the tone is such that senior high students would not think they are being talked down to as they read it. The chapters are organized to give readers a sense of the historical forces that were part of the era. For instance, the book on the Great Depression starts with WW I and how that war influenced the world-wide depression that followed a decade later. The slave trade book focuses on America, of course, but also deals briefly with slavery in the western world from classical times, with the role of Africans (especially Arabs) in the American slave trade, and so forth. As is true of each book, the text and illustrations are also broken up with inserted quotations from individuals—from the well known such as Frederick Douglass, about his grandmother's life as a slave, to unknown riders on trains during the Depression who describe their experiences. The book on Civil Rights starts with the Reconstruction Period after the Civil War but focuses most chapters on the 1960s, with a final chapter on the Civil Rights legacy. The series is called Lives in Crisis, so that is why the focus of the illustrations is on individuals or groups of people, while the text gives readers a sense of what it would have been like to live in such times. (Lives in Crisis). KLIATT Codes: JS—Recommended for junior and senior high school students. 2003, Barron's, 64p. illus. maps. bibliog. index.,— Claire Rosser