America And World War Ii History Essay

the States And World contend Ii History set ab come forthThe objective of this h aged back is to subject the chief throws of the Good struggle legend to bright analysis in the hope of pre direct an additional pictorial picture, 1 that does not demean the achievement of the United States and of lib sequencel democ rich nevertheless that at the same time does not diminish the stress, suffering, problems, and failures inescapably faced by a familiarity at contend. The war was easily for the economy. It was liberating for women. It was a war of tanks and airplanes a cleaner war than World War I. Americans were united. Soldiers were proud. It was a time of prosperity, sound incorruptity, and power. scarce according to historian Michael Adams, our stock is distorted, and it has left us with a misleading regular(a) dangerous legacy. contend umpteen of our communal assumptions ab divulge the block, Adams argues that our experience of World War II was positive but s ame(p)wise disturbing, creating problems that continue to plague us to twenty-four hours.Michael C Adams has contributed to The Best War Ever America and World War II as an origin. Michael C. C. Adams, a professor of history at Northern Kentucky University, is the author of The hooty Adventure Male Desire and the Coming of World War I (1990).Much of the imports of WWII has been mythologized not merely by Hollywood and governance propaganda, and over the years this mythology has been perpetuated by those who lived through the war themselves. Michael C. C. Adams has want to parade these stories for what they are, fabrication and oversimplifications, and provide the basic facts that facilitate a truer understanding of WWII and the area wide cultural changes surrounding it, both before and after the war itself.In chapter whiz, Mythmaking and the War, Adams sets out the myth itself, as correctd by Hollywood dramatization, government propaganda, advertisement agencies, and th e revised memories of those who stayed business firm, as well as those who fought in the war itself. The war became Americas golden age, a peak in the flavor of society when e genuinelything worked out and the good guys definitely got a happy oddment. (Adams, 2) The WWII era came to serve a tendency to be the byg unitary and only(a) age which America once was, and if worked hard enough for, could be again. It was, in a sense, Americas garden of Eden, the time and place where in all things were right. Of course, this was a manufactured ideal, what Adams calls a practicable past. In creating a usable past, we seek formulas to apply in solution to twenty-four hour periods problems. Americans believe that WWII proved one rule above all other(a)sit is normally better to fight than to talk. (Adams, 4) To make WWII into the best war ever, we must resign out the area bombings and other questionable aspects while exaggerating the good things. The war myth is distorted not so a lo t in what it says as in what it doesnt say. (Adams, 7) This applies not only to the war itself, but wishwise to the home front.Chapter two, No Easy Answers, begins the process of deconstructing the myth, and demonstrating that the events leading up to WWII began long before the Treaty of Versailles, and the ramifications of WWII will last much longer than the generation that fought it. Adams lays out the frame of the complex political, cultural and economic histories of each of body politics which would break d give birth problematic in WWII, and shows that in that respect was no obvious point at which one decision would claim prevented the war from happening. Taken in condition, the actions each rural area took leading up to WWII make sense. Adams asks, what could support been done differently? Apparently, not much appeasement didnt work in Europe, and determent didnt work in Asia. There really were no easy answers.Chapter three, The Patterns of War, 1939-1945 lays out th e way in which each nation fought the war, with a tonic speed and brutality make possible by technology and the remoteness of the enemy. Chapter four, The American War Machine, demonst order how the tools were created and sent into battle, and how the soldiers and organization of each army differed, for better or worsened. Chapter five, Overseas, abridgments the realities of life for the American soldier both in the European and Pacific theatres, while chapter six, home(a) front Changes, does the same for those who stayed home. These chapters invite one unifying purpose to de elegant the reality of the WWII era, expose the complex history and actors, and above all, disabuse us of the reigning WWII mythos. Chapter seven, A New World, takes us one step except and debunks the myth that re shimmering GIs read in effect(p)ed quickly without lasting physical ailments and emotional traumas and into a society awaiting them with open arms, friendly smiles and loving families.Above all e lse, Adams has provided an interest and easily accessible framework with which one can examine WWII and evaluate the complexities and realities of the era. While his history is intentionally skeleton and uncomplicated by sample and detail, it does achieve its purpose. By identifying the mythos and realities of WWII, the Good War can be appreciated for what it actually was an ugly, brutal and ultimately necessary war.Adams says that the existence of the WWII distortions is not solo the fault of the American public. It is excessively the fault of the Federal Government and the media. The government censored controversial material during the war and only delivered to the public detail that were uplifting and beneficial to the cause. The media also used the war to its advantage, promoting products using roles to the war.Adams also goes into detail the Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome the soldiers endured during the war.The curb does go into just about diachronic cards of WWII. Most of Adams references though were secondary references. I would have wish to see him use to a abundanter extent primary sources which would have provided to a dandyer extent authenticity and credibility to the allow. I do recommend the entertain if you are look for a quick read about WWII, but if you are tone for a military history about WWII, this is not the intensity for you.3- gutter F. Kasson, nonsensical THE MILLION CONEY ISLAND AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURYAmusing the one thousand thousand dassie Island at the Turn of the Century (American Century)Amusing the Million examines the historical context in which Coney Island made its disposition as an re debut place and shows how Americas changing brotherly and economic conditions formed the basis of a new kitty culture.Exploring it afresh in this way, John Kasson shows Coney Island no longer as the object of nostalgia but as a hail of ultramodernityand the both(prenominal) another(prenominal) photographs, lith ographs, engravings, and other reproductions with which he amplifies his text support this lively thesis. afterward studying the whole book my point of analysis on this book is that In these times, when entertainers bare body parts normally kept virtuously covered, it is hard to believe the cover photo of this book was considered rather racy a century ago. It shows a line of girls on the beach at Coney Island where the skirts on their swimsuits have been raised to reveal the shorts underneath. Considering that they also appear to have full-length tights on underneath the shorts, to modern eyes, they look overdressed. There were many fond commentators at the end of the ordinal century that argued that the egalitarian complaisant structure of Coney Island was debasing the affectionate fabric of the nation.As Coney Island was the near conspicuous example of the spectacular sociable changes victorious place in the United States. By the turn of the century, the people were genera lly no longer rural tillers of the soil, having been transform into urban tillers of the machines. Furthermore, by this time, the social distinctions between the upper and other dividees were being blurred. As the author points out, at Coney Island, many of the stiff social restrictions came down. flock who differently would not speak to each other became friendly and overlap rides, beach water and other amusements.The members of the compressed urban society starve simple and inexpensive recreation and Coney Island provided it. Therefore, as Kasson points out so well, it was a phenomenon that grew out of a social need and in many ways served as a social release. People could, for a very small fee, go away their crowded dwellings and engage in a day of escape. Everyone was equal on the rides and the beaches, so at least at that location, social distinctions disappeared.Until I read this book, I had never considered the amusement park as a barometer for social change. However, i t is now clear that Coney Island was a metaphor for a dramatic change in the social fabric of the nation and from this book, you can learn many of the details.These were all much the same in nature, differing mainly in size and duration. Their reason for being and the reason or them be sexual climax a thing of the past is all the same.The book suggests that they started in the mid-1800s is stretching the point slightlywhat as Fairs of all types were around for many centuries and only differed in how big they were, how far people travelled to them ,how much new inventions became incorporated and how long they lasted.It seems that throughout history people love to gather for just about any reason, but generally some sort of amusement along with the hope of seeing something new. Thus there were Races, Exhibitions of animals, crafts, products for prizes or sale, Auctions, Magic shows, Plays, Sporting events and on and on ad infantilism.This happened at Stonehenge and before, at the R oman Collisium, and Religious Celebrations. It didnt take much to create an event heck, even a Hanging was enough to get a long crowd out.The same sort of thing continues today. So instead of taking the Subway to Coney Island or some other Amusement park we go to the corking Theme Parks, National Parks, Sporting Events, Concerts, Casinos, Vegas, Nashville, Ski Hills, Cruises, or even events and locations around the world, much(prenominal) as World Fairs or the Olympics.The old adage The more things change, the more they obtain the same applies to Amusement Parks, just as it does to everything else.The grandest change is in the ease of travel, the amount of usable income available, and the introduction of TV where everything can be brought right into the living room. That doesnt leave much but the Thrill Rides, the Smells and Sounds, the Crowds and the Outdoors but thats coming too.The Canadian National Exhibition continues to run for 3 weeks in August merely it gets poorer an d tackier every year and who knows how much longer it will continue.Amusement position that began to exist during the turn of the century served as venues for fun and excitement as well as helped to release the repressed from the gentility of the Victorian shape up of the 19th century. John Kasson examines the social and cultural ramifications that occurred in American society in his book, AMUSING THE MILLIONS CONEY ISLAND AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY. In his study, Kasson shows how the American landscape became playgrounds, especially in New York, which extended the use of inexpert billet, New Yorks Central Park, and expositions that commemorated and celebrated the American historical past, Chicagos Columbian exposition of 1893. They magnified the cornerstones and building blocks of the city, and the behavior that was exhibited with the rising middle class, which attracted a mass audience. The city became cosmopolitan and modern where many engaged and frolicked, and helped to un latch social, racial, and economic boundaries that were bestowed upon many individuals they also helped to rejuvenate cities through urban planning.Indeed, Kasson explores the world of imagination. The amusements ran the gamut from a Barnum and Bailey cash dispenser to reveling along the boardwalk amongst exotic and unusual exhibits that coveted Coney Islands Luna Park and never-never land Park. And within the text Kasson highlights those who helped architect this unrestrained environment of excess, much(prenominal) as Frederick Law Olmstead, Daniel H. Burnham, George C. Tilyou, Frederic Thompson, crowd Gibbons Huneker, and Maxim Gorky. Undoubtedly these were elaborate and spacious constructed palatial playgrounds of pleasure full of materialism and consumption where many gathered for pure utopian enjoyment. According to Kasson, these amusements also served as an outlet for artists and painters whose works did not particularly belong in museums. However, they reflected the modern ist and realist genres of the art world before they came into vogue, and they show technological, urban, populous, egalitarian, erotic, hedonist, dynamic, and culturally diverse images that the public were not accustomed to (88).Overall, this is an interesting rouse down nostalgic memory lane. Through the revealing pictures and detailed narrative, Kasson shows readers how Coney Island at the turn became a form of liberation for an array of classes. In essence, this is a good source to refer to when studying or instruction about the American Dream as it relates to amusement parks that transcended social and cultural change in American society.4-John Kenneth Galbraith, THE GREAT CRASH, 1929The cracking force of 1929The Great Crash, 1929is a book written byJohn Kenneth Galbraithand published in 1954 it is an economic history of the lead-up to the paries pass Crash of 1929. The book argues that the 1929 stock market split was precipitated by rampant speculation in the stock mark et, that the common denominator of all conceptional episodes is the belief of participants that they can become rich without work and that the tendency towards recurrent speculative orgy serves no recyclable purpose, but rather is deeply damaging to an economy.It was Galbraiths belief that a good knowledge of what happened in 1929 was the best safeguard against its recurrence.Galbraith wrote the book during a break from working on the manuscript of what would becomeThe Affluent Society. Galbraith was asked byArthur M. Schlesinger Jr.if he would write the definitive work on theGreat depressionthat he would then use as a reference source for his own intended work on Roosevelt. Galbraith chose to concentrate on the days that ushered in the depression. I never enjoyed writing a book more indeed, it is the only one I remember in no sense as a labor but as a joy.Galbraith received much praise for his work, including his humorous observations of homo versed behavior during the speculat ive stock market blab out and subsequent crash. The publication of the book, which was one of Galbraiths basic bestsellers, coincided with the 25th anniversary of the crash, at a time when it and theGreat Depressionthat followed were still raw memories and stock price levels were only then acquire to pre-crash levels. Galbraith considered it the useful task of the historian to keep fresh the memory of such crashes, the fading of which he correlates with their re-occurrence.For the purpose of the sum-up and analysis phase of this book I thought that the Republican Great Depression of 1929-1939 has been an unending source of mystery, fascination, and disinformation for the past four generations. As youre reading these words, theres a huge force on by conservative think-tanks and wealthy political activists to reinvent the history, suggesting that Roosevelt protracted the Depression or that New Deal programs were ineffective. At the same time, kinfolk like David Sirota are val iantly pushing back with actual facts and statistics, boonation that Roosevelts New Deal was startlingly effective, particularly when compared with the Republican policies of 1920-1929 that formed the bubble that crashed in 1929, and the Republican failures to deal with its consequences during the last three years of the Herbert hoover administration (1929-1933).To really understand what brought about the great crash, however, its almost useful to read an historical narrative written by one of the worlds leading(prenominal) economists when that world-changing event was still fresh in his and his readers minds.The Great Crashis that book, starting written by Galbraith in 1953-54 (and published in 1955) and updated for modern readers in 1997.From this book I like to discuss some points in its summary phase. From the IntroductionThe people who remained sane and quiet Extracts fromThe Great Crash 1929, John Kenneth Galbraith, First Published 1955, pageboy 27 Even in such a time of madness as the late twenties, a great many man in Wall Street remained quite sane. But they also remained very quiet. The sense of responsibility in the financial corporation for the community as a whole is not small. It is nearly nil. whitethornbe this is inherent. In a community where the primary concern is making money, one of the necessary rules is to live and let live. To speak out against madness may be to ruin those who have succumbed to it. So the wise in Wall Street are nearly always silent. The foolish thus have the field to themselves. None rebukes them.From Chapter 1 A Year to Remember Opportunities for the social historianExtracts fromThe Great Crash 1929, John Kenneth Galbraith, First Published 1955, Page 26In the autumn of 1929 the mightiest of Americans were, for a brief time, revealed as human beings. Like most humans, most of the time, they did some very foolish things. On the while, the great the earlier reputation for omniscience, the more serene the previou s idiocy, the greater the foolishness now exposed. Things that in other times were concealed in a heavy facade of dignity now stood exposed, for the panic suddenly, close obscenely, snatched this facade away. We are seldom vouchsafed a glance behind this hindrance in our society the counterpart of the Kremlin walls is the thickly stuffed shirt. The social historian must always be alert to his opportunities, and there have been few like 1929.From Chapter 7 Things Become More Serious Things keep getting worse Extracts fromThe Great Crash 1929, John Kenneth Galbraith, First Published 1955, Page cxxx In the autumn of 1929 the New York Stock Exchange, under roughly its present constitution, was 112 years old. During this lifetime it had seen some difficult days. On 18 phratry 1873, the firm of Jay Cooke and Company failed, and, as a more or slight direct result, so did fifty-seven other Stock Exchange firms in the next few weeks. On 23 October 1907, call money rates reached one hundr ed and twenty-five per cent in the panic of that year. On 16 September 1922 the autumn months are the off-season in Wall Street a bomb exploded in front of Morgans next door, violent death thirty people and injuring a hundred more.A common feature of all these earlier troubles was that, having happened, they were over. The worst was reasonably recognizable as such. The funny feature of the great crash of 1929 was that the worst continued to worsen. What looked one day like the end proved on the next day to have been only the beginning. Nothing could have been more ingeniously designed to increase the suffering, and also to ensure that as few as possible escape the common misfortune. The fortunate speculator who had funds to answer the first borderline call presently got another and equally urgent one, and if he met that there would still be another. In the end all the money he had was extracted from him and lost. The man with the smart money, who was safely out of the market w hen the first crash came, naturally went back in to pick up bargains. The bargains then suffered a ruins fall. Even the man who waited out all of October and all of November, who saw the pile of trading return to normal and saw Wall Street become as placid as a produce market, and who then bought common stocks would see their value drop to a third or a fourth of the purchase price in the next twenty-four months. The Coolidge bull market was a remarkable phenomenon. The ruth littleness of its liquidation was, in its own way, equally remarkable.5-Ronald G. Walters, AMERICAN REFORMERS, 1815-1860American Reformers, 1815-1860, Revised EditionWith American Reformers, Walters has make up a fine synthesis of secondary literature on the varied antebellum crystallise movements. In doing so, he argues that the ameliorate impulse emerges out of evangelical Protestantism but by the Civil War takes a more secular turn more involved in legislating social controls than converting the hearts o f individuals. As he develops this argument he addresses the different forms that this reform impulse took and organizes the book thematically. He discusses in successive chapters utopian movements and secular communitarians, abolition, the womens movement and the peace movement, temperance, health reform and spiritualism, working mans reform, and institutional reform, into which he groups mental hospitals, prisons and schools.Walters demonstrates the secularization of reform in the realm of communitarian societies. Thus, the early nineteenth century utopian settlements that often emerged out of pietistic impulses gave way to more secular experiments in social engineering such as Owenism, or as in the case of Oneida, how a once religious community endured only as a commercial venture. Similarly he shows institutions such as asylums wove their religious inspiration with the science of the times but like prisons and almshouses became holding pens for outcasts rather than places for he aling and reform.Walters also situates the emergence of reform in the particular circumstances of antebellum America. He argues that the emergence of the middle class created made it possible for people to devote time to reform, and those technological advances in printing made it possible for people to actually make a living as an agitator. He also argues that reform helped shape the individuation of the emerging middle class. This point comes through particularly clearly in his chapter on working mans reform.Walters synthesis suffers from its grand scope and short length. In it he sacrifices a certain amount of detail and analysis for space and clarity. The section on utopian movements, for example, traces the personalities of the major reformers and a brief outline of the community that followed without in-depth analysis. Throughout the book quotations from primary sources would have been helpful in giving a feel for the particular movement under discussion. The drop of primary source material allows Walters to sacrifice documentation, and the reader sometimes wishes for some assistance in discerning the origin or fuller evolution of a particular point. To his credit, Walters provides a good bibliographical essay at the end, but the lack of documentation sometimes proves frustrating and thus interrupts the otherwise smooth flow in the text. Nonetheless, American Reformers is a very unmortgaged and useful synthesis of the secondary sources on antebellum reform. As such, it is a helpful and welcome addition to the field.In my mind, this is an introductory text, albeit a fine one. Walters is very accessable, he tries to include necessary historical perspective and any(prenominal) cultural information he deems to be valuable to the story hes sexual congress in each chapter. And while each chapter is a story of a different movement or people, he also demonstrates those things these groups have in common. I wont spoil it for you, but at the least of it, they were all idealists who thought to affect the world around them.Material and political changes transformed America at a dizzying pace in the 1820s and 1830s. The expansion of industrialization, the creation of roads and canals to connect manufacturers to new markets, westward migration, a prolonged period of economic depression following the panic of 1837, and the broad(a)ening of voting rights triggered considerable social upheavals. Reform movements were often attempts to cope with the consequences of these changes. Some movements wanted reform of institutions like prisons, schools, and asylums. Others looked to individual regeneration to transform the whole society. Some reformers move attention to a particular groups suffering Richard Henry DanasTwo long time before the Mast(1840), for example, pressed for expanded legal rights for sailors. Others, like the founders of Brook Farm, sought radical and universal reform.A powerful source of reform emerged from the plump for Grea t Awakening, the religious revivals sweeping the nation from the 1790s through the 1820s. Like the Great Awakening of the 1730s and 1740s, this series of revivals emphasized individual, often emotional religious experiences. notwithstanding unlike the first period of revival, the Second Great Awakening had an even broader impact. The disestablishment of religion in the early national period and the deism associated with Americas existence fathers (that is, their belief in the power of reason and the existence of a unconditional Creator and their skepticism about supernatural religious explanations) seemed to threaten the nations Protestant moral foundation. Moreover, many Christians attributed certain social ills (drinking, dueling, disregard for the Sabbath, and the like) to Chris-tianitys decline. Ministers such as Lyman Beecher (1775-1863) and Charles Grandison Finney (1792-1875) responded with messages about wickedness, conversion, and the imminent return of Christ. Moving a way from the Calvinist doctrines (such as predestination) associated with the initial Great Awakening, they preached individual moral agency and personal salvation, moral improvement and perfection, and a responsibility to hasten the coming of Gods Kingdom.These religious ideas contributed to the propensity for reform and creation of voluntary benevolent societies such as the American Education Society (1815), American Bible Society (1816), and American pathway Society (1825). These organizations distributed religious literatures, but their members also led efforts to stem Sabbath-breaking, drinking, and other forms of vice. Various female moral reform societies focused on ending prostitution, sexual exploitation, and the sexual double standard. The ostensibly moral concern with sexual vice also helped justify the not-so-pious demand for reform literature featuring move and wronged women in texts like Maria MonksAwful Disclosures(1836) and George FostersNew York by Gas-Light(1850 ).evangelistic reformers also played important roles in other reform movements. Theodore Dwight dyers mignonette (1803-1895), a disciple of Finney, began his career distributing tracts and preaching against strong drink. In 1829 weld shifted his efforts to the campaign against slavery and authored two antislavery classics,The Bible against Slavery(1837), which dismantled biblical pro-slavery arguments, andAmerican Slavery As It Is(1839), the text that inspired Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896) to writeUncle Toms confine(1851-1852).Evangelical reform spread popular literature as tracts, sermons, sunshine school books, and temperance testimonies. The revivals also had an important influence on developments in literary style. Religious writings became more emotional and imaginative, formally less rigid, and theologically less rigorous. Antebellum religious texts began to rely on pictural narratives to illustrate, edify, and entertain. This new religious style, as David S. Reynolds calls it in his studyBeneath the American Renaissance(p. 15), reshaped not only evangelical writing but also the style of liberal reformers, popular writers, and transcendentalists.6-James M McPherson, ABRAHAM LINCOLNAbraham capital of NebraskaIn honor of the bicentennial of capital of Nebraskas birth, renowned Civil War scholar James M. McPherson has written a rattling(prenominal) brief biography of our 16th President. This book will be a wonderful source for beginners to study Lincoln and will serve as a good framework for larger works, like David Herbert DonaldsLincoln.This book covered the important aspects of Lincolns life from his birth and childhood in Kentucky and Indiana to his coming to Illinois, to his administration and death. McPherson discussed Lincolns tarnished relationship with his father and his wonderful relationship with his step-mother, which presented a more personal side of the man.Though short, this book does a great job of discussing Lincolns life in the larger context of American history. McPherson summarized the important moments and events during his life and provided a wonderful look at the war and its effect on him.True to his scholarly reputation, McPherson used great sources for this little biography, including theCollected Works of LincolnandLincoln at cooper Unionto name a couple. In addition to using great primary and secondary sources, McPherson provided a bibliographic essay that provided a great synthesis of the historiography of Lincoln and where it may be heading in the coming year.There are many things to like about this book. It is a well-researched, but brief biography that will reach a wide audience. The reputation of James McPherson as a scholar lends great weight to the genuineness of this biography.Abraham Lincolnis a wonderful beginning to the scholarly celebration of the Lincoln bicentennial.- James McPherson has emerged as one of Americas finest historians.Battle Cry of Freedom, his Pulitzer Prize-winning account of the Civil War, was a national bestseller that Hugh Brogan, inThe New York Times platter Review, called history writing of the highest order. In that ledger, McPherson gathered in the broad sweep of events, the political, social, and cultural forces at work during the Civil War era. Now, inAbraham Lincoln and the Second American Revolution, he offers a series of thoughtful and engaging essays on aspects of Lincoln and the war that have seldom been discussed in depth.McPherson again displays his keen insight and sterling prose as he examines several critical themes in American history. He looks closely at the Presidents role as Commander-in-Chief of the Union forces, showing how Lincoln forged a national military strategy for victory. He explores the importance of Lincolns great rhetorical skills, uncovering howthrough parables and figurative languagehe was uniquely able to communicate both the purpose of the war and a new meaning of liberty to the people of the North. In another section, McPherson examines the Civil War as a Second American Revolution, describing how the Republican Congress elected in 1860 passed an astonishing blitz of new laws (rivaling the first hundred days of the New Deal), and how the war not only destroyed the social structure of the old South, but radically alter the balance of power in America, ending 70 years of southerly power in the national government.The Civil War was the single most transforming and defining experience in American history, and Abraham Lincoln remains the most important figure in the pantheon of our mythology. These graceful essays, written by one of America are leading historians, offer fresh and unusual perspectives on both.From my analysis point of view the book itself in hardcover is a joy to hold with its compact size, readable typeface and bound-in ribbon bookmark. Whoever worked on this project obviously did it as a labor of love. They worked the details on this one.You cant honestly compare t his work to others like Carl Sandbergs Lincoln or With Malice towards None or even my nice coffee send back book of photographs taken of Lincoln. This work COMPLEMENTS those more comprehensive volumes. That said, it is not incomplete. It does an glorious job of hitting the hundreds of high and low points in Lincolns too brief life. The pace moves quickly and precisely along so that you never have the feeling that youre being written down to if thats the phrase Im looking for. This one has NOT been dumbed down for the reader.Personally I see this smaller volume as an annual read