"Jan Goggans has found a wonderful way to explore the rich history of 1930s California: by giving us a deep look at the indispensable work of economist Paul Taylor and photographer Dorothea Lange, the brilliant husband-wife team whose classic from '39, An American Exodus, deserves a spot on the shelf right next to The Grapes of Wrath. With prose that's as insightful as Taylor's own and as vivid as a Lange photograph, California on the Breadlines both captures and contextualizes this hugely important period. Goggans's book will surely find its own place in the canon of Californiana."--Rick Wartzman, author of Obscene in the Extreme: The Burning and Banning of John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath "During the Great Depression, Paul Taylor and Dorothea Lange took to the embattled fields of California on behalf of a suffering nation. This elegant narrative presents the national service and shared passion of two talented Americans swept up by the drama of their times and their growing discovery of each other."--Kevin Starr, University of Southern California "A rich and gorgeous book, and an elegant treatment of the complex and fascinating personal/professional relationship between husband and wife, labor economist Paul Taylor and photographer Dorothea Lange. Their photojournalism gave face and voice to the mute shuffling in 1930s California breadlines, etching into the national mind the greatest sufferers in a decade of agony. Professor Goggans' study is seminal in 21st century California studies: thoroughly researched, critically sophisticated and global in imagination, a pleasure to pore over and read through. California on the Breadlines is a true and riveting narrative of the rare, singular partnership between Lange and Taylor."--Jack Hicks, co-editor of The Literature of California, Volume I "This is an extraordinary book. Goggans elegantly interweaves sound scholarship with the moving human stories of California's Dust Bowl immigrants. In bringing the agony of Depression-era California home to the nation, we immediately think of John Steinbeck and Carey McWilliams. But Goggans makes it dramatically clear that Taylor and Lange, labor economist and photographer, husband and wife, fused documentary photojournalism and the traditions of protest literature to create a new form that was at least as essential in telling that story and in proposing remedies. As such, California on the Breadlines is a powerful reminder that even in terrible economic times, when Americans are willing, hope and imagination are always possible."--Peter Schrag, author of Not Fit for Our Society: Immigration and Nativism in America "A major contribution, meticulously researched and written. Goggans refracts the complex histories of California labor and migration through the lens of Lange and Taylor's fieldwork, landmark images, and remarkable marriage. Rare in scholarship, this book narrates history's epic arc alongside the more intimate story of Lange and Taylor, providing a wealth of insights on the Great Depression that reads like the Great American novel."--John T. Caldwell, author of Production Culture and director of Rancho California (por favor) "California on the Breadlines offers a compelling analysis of how Lange's and Taylor's work grew out of their shared social concerns and how that work offers a unique portrait of the cultural imagination of their time--which of course, their work also helped to shape."--Terry Beers, author of Gunfight at Mussel Slough: Evolution of a Western Myth "Goggans provides an accessible and compelling account of the path that brought Paul Taylor and Dorothea Lange together and led them to dedicate their lives and work to documenting conditions of poverty in California."--Flannery Burke, author of From Greenwich Village to Taos: Primitivism and Place at Mabel Dodge Luhan's

At no time during the Great Depression was the contradiction between agriculture surplus and widespread hunger more wrenchingly graphic than in the government's attempt to raise pork prices through the mass slaughter of miliions of "unripe" little pigs. This contradiction was widely perceived as a "paradox." In fact, as Janet Poppendieck makes clear in this newly expanded and updated volume, it was a normal, predictable working of an economic system rendered extreme by the Depression. The notion of paradox, however, captured the imagination of the public and policy makers, and it was to this definition of the problem that surplus commodities distribution programs in the Hoover and Roosevelt administrations were addressed. This book explains in readable narrative how the New Deal food assistance effort, originally conceived as a relief measure for poor people, became a program designed to raise the incomes of commercial farmers. In a broader sense, the book explains how the New Deal years were formative for food assistance in subsequent administrations; it also examines the performance--or lack of performance--of subsequent in-kind relief programs. Beginning with a brief survey of the history of the American farmer before the depression and the impact of the Depression on farmers, the author describes the development of Hoover assistance programs and the events at the end of that administration that shaped the "historical moment" seized by the early New Deal. Poppendieck goes on to analyze the food assistance policies and programs of the Roosevelt years, the particular series of events that culminated in the decision to purchase surplus agriculture products and distribute them to the poor, the institutionalization of this approach, the resutls achieved, and the interest groups formed. The book also looks at the takeover of food assistance by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and its gradual adaptation for use as a tool in the maintenance of farm income. Utliizing a wide variety of official and unofficial sources, the author reveals with unusual clarity the evolution from a policy directly responsive to the poor to a policy serving mainly democratic needs.

California on the Breadlines is the compelling account of how Dorothea Lange, the Great Depression’s most famous photographer, and Paul Taylor, her labor economist husband, forged a relationship that was private—they both divorced spouses to be together—collaborative, and richly productive. Lange and Taylor poured their considerable energies into the decade-long project of documenting the plight of California’s dispossessed, which in 1939 culminated in the publication of their landmark book, American Exodus: A Record of Human Erosion. Jan Goggans blends biography, literature, and history to retrace the paths that brought Lange and Taylor together. She shows how American Exodus set forth a new way of understanding those in crisis during the economic disaster in California and ultimately informed the way we think about the Great Depression itself.

Blake Allmendinger's A History of California Literature surveys the paradoxical image of the Golden State as a site of dreams and disenchantment, formidable beginnings and ruinous ends. This history encompasses the prismatic nature of California by exploring a variety of historical periods, literary genres, and cultural movements affecting the state's development, from the colonial era to the twenty-first century. Written by a host of leading historians and literary critics, this book offers readers insight into the tensions and contradictions that have shaped the literary landscape of California and also American literature generally.

How did our children end up eating nachos, pizza, and Tater Tots for lunch? Taking us on an eye-opening journey into the nation's school kitchens, this superbly researched book is the first to provide a comprehensive assessment of school food in the United States. Janet Poppendieck explores the deep politics of food provision from multiple perspectives--history, policy, nutrition, environmental sustainability, taste, and more. How did we get into the absurd situation in which nutritionally regulated meals compete with fast food items and snack foods loaded with sugar, salt, and fat? What is the nutritional profile of the federal meals? How well are they reaching students who need them? Opening a window onto our culture as a whole, Poppendieck reveals the forces--the financial troubles of schools, the commercialization of childhood, the reliance on market models--that are determining how lunch is served. She concludes with a sweeping vision for change: fresh, healthy food for all children as a regular part of their school day.

For the first time, Poil0/00ne, CEO of the Poil0/00ne bakery, provides detailed instructions so bakers can reproduce its unique "hug-sized" sourdough loaves at home, as well as the bakery's other much-loved breads and pastries. Beyond bread, Poil0/00ne includes recipes for such pastries as tarts and butter cookies. cookies.