Synopsis
Winner 2024 Next Generation Indie Book Awards (NGIBA), Historical (Non-Fiction)
The first book to tell the early history of cars in Los Angeles.
Los Angeles's car culture has shaped the nation's preferences in transportation, architecture, leisure, and even dining. The story of the automobile and that of Los Angeles have been entwined for more than a century. Driving Force: Automobiles and the New American City, 1900-1930, explores how the explosive growth of Los Angeles's passion for automobiles was ignited by an unlikely, visionary mix of entrepreneurs and risk-takers. It owed its inception to the bicycle shop owners who began repairing and selling cars, carriage retailers, and automobile aficionados who ventured into unknown territory to sell a product regarded by nearly all banks and most businesses as a fad at best. These early adopters learned how to broaden the market for automobiles and convince the public that the car was no longer a luxury but a necessity.
About the Author
Darryl Holter is the author of Workers and Unions in Wisconsin: A Labor History and The Battle for Coal: Miners and the Nationalization of Coal-Mining in France. He is a musician and singer-songwriter, a former labor leader, an urban developer, an adjunct professor of history at the University of Southern California, and a member of the Professional Musicians Union Local 47 in Los Angeles.
Stephen Gee is an award-winning writer and television producer based in Los Angeles. He is the author of Iconic Vision: John Parkinson, Architect of Los Angeles (2013), and co-author, with Arnold Schwartzman, of Los Angeles Central Library: A History of its Art and Architecture (2016), which won the 2016 Glenn Goldman Award for Art, Architecture, and Photography, presented by the Southern California Independent Booksellers Association. He also wrote Los Angeles City Hall: An American Icon (2018) and Paul R. Williams: Master Architects of Southern California 1920-1940 (2021), produced in collaboration with Marc Appleton and Bret Parsons.
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