In the early nineteenth century, Lowell, Massachusetts, was widely studied and emulated as a model for capitalist industrial development. One of the first cities in the United States to experience the ravages of deindustrialization, it was also among the first places in the world to turn to its own industrial and ethnic history as a tool for reinventing itself in the emerging postindustrial economy. The Lowell Experiment explores how history and culture have been used to remake Lowell and how historians have played a crucial, yet ambiguous role in that process. The book focuses on Lowell National Historical Park, the flagship project of Lowell's new cultural economy. When it was created in 1978, the park broke new ground with its sweeping reinterpretations of labor, immigrant, and women's history.

The study identifies a clear pattern of reserving critical historical interpretation only for events and groups most distant from the present, and proposes two reasons for this pattern. First, a demographic examination of public historians at Lowell NHP reveals that like their audiences, they are attempting to locate themselves in a shifting professional middle class within a restructuring economy, a task in which Lowell NHP functions as a ritual space. Using Victor Turner's model of social drama, I argue that too close an examination of these circumstances in the park's interpretation would disrupt this reassuring function. Second, I trace the development of two poles of heritage discourse in Lowell based on localness and outsiderhood, and show how a division of cultural labor between the two has been created over time. While this balance ensures considerable local involvement in the city's heritage realm, it also declares subjects relating to immigration, ethnicity, and culture largely off-limits to the more critical historical perspective of the public historians, further limiting the counterhegemonic potential of their work.

Excerpt from Lowell: A City of Spindles In presenting to the public this History of our city, the Trades and Labor Council through their committee desire to return their thanks to all who have kindly aided us in making a success of our undertaking, especially are our thanks due to the merchants of our city for the uniform kindness they have evinced in calling public attention to their wares through this medium. While here publicly tendering our thanks for their practical aid, we cannot refrain from asking all who wish us well (members or not) to peruse the announcements carefully, and when the occa sion requires, to remember them in such a practical manner that it may cause their support to be substantially rewarded. That errors have occurred, is probable, and that matter has been omitted that should have been inserted, is quite certain. We can only state that we have exercised more than ordinary diligence and care in the difficult and compli cated feature of bookmaking. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Richard Drake has skillfully woven together the various strands of the Appalachian experience into a sweeping whole. Touching upon folk traditions, health care, the environment, higher education, the role of blacks and women, and much more, Drake offers a compelling social history of a unique American region. The Appalachian region, extending from Alabama in the South up to the Allegheny highlands of Pennsylvania, has historically been characterized by its largely rural populations, rich natural resources that have fueled industry in other parts of the country, and the strong and wild, undeveloped land. The rugged geography of the region allowed Native American societies, especially the Cherokee, to flourish. Early white settlers tended to favor a self-sufficient approach to farming, contrary to the land grabbing and plantation building going on elsewhere in the South. The growth of a market economy and competition from other agricultural areas of the country sparked an economic decline of the region's rural population at least as early as 1830. The Civil War and the sometimes hostile legislation of Reconstruction made life even more difficult for rural Appalachians. Recent history of the region is marked by the corporate exploitation of resources. Regional oil, gas, and coal had attracted some industry even before the Civil War, but the postwar years saw an immense expansion of American industry, nearly all of which relied heavily on Appalachian fossil fuels, particularly coal. What was initially a boon to the region eventually brought financial disaster to many mountain people as unsafe working conditions and strip mining ravaged the land and its inhabitants. A History of Appalachia also examines pockets of urbanization in Appalachia. Chemical, textile, and other industries have encouraged the development of urban areas. At the same time, radio, television, and the internet provide residents direct links to cultures from all over the world. The author looks at the process of urbanization as it belies commonly held notions about the region's rural character.

First Published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Updated in a new 6th edition, Communication in History reveals how media has been influential in both maintaining social order and as powerful agents of change. With revised new readings, this anthology continues to be, as one reviewer wrote, "the only book in the sea of History of Mass Communication books that introduces readers to a more expansive, intellectually enlivening study of the relationship between human history and communication history". From print to the Internet, this book encompasses a wide-range of topics, that introduces readers to a more expansive, intellectually enlivening study of the relationship between human history and communication history.