Crabgrass Frontier: The Suburbanization of the United States - Softcover

Jackson, Kenneth T.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0195049837 ISBN 13: 9780195049831

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1987

Synopsis

This first full scale history of the development of the American suburb examines how "the good life" in America came to be equated with the a home of one's own surrounded by a grassy yard and located far from the urban workplace. Integrating social history with economic and architectural analysis, and taking into account such factors as the availability of cheap land, inexpensive building methods, and rapid transportation, Kenneth Jackson chronicles the phenomenal growth of the American suburb from the middle of the 19th century to the present day. He treats communities in every section of the U.S. and compares American residential patterns with those of Japan and Europe. In conclusion, Jackson offers a controversial prediction: that the future of residential deconcentration will be very different from its past in both the U.S. and Europe.

About this title

About the Author:

Kenneth T. Jackson, Professor of History at Columbia University, is the author of The Ku Klux Klan in the City, 1915-1930; Cities in American History; and a number of other books.

Review:

"A compelling narrative.... Jackson traces the consequences of the predominantly North American process [of suburbanization] through three centuries of technological, economic and social innovation."--Philadelphia Inquirer

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1987
• ISBN 10: 0195049837
• ISBN 13: 9780195049831
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 432