• Zane Miller THE URBANIZATION OF MODERN AMERICA
• Lewis Mumford STICKS AND STONES
• David Ward CITIES AND IMMIGRANTS
• August Meier and Eliot Rudwick, FROM PLANTATION TO GHETTO
• Bluestone & Harrison, THE DEINDUSTRIALIZATION OF AMERICA

• Theodore Dreiser SISTER CARRIE
• Upton Sinclair THE JUNGLE
• Claude Brown MANCHILD IN THE PROMISED LAND
• Robert Caro THE POWER BROKER
• Mark Goldman, HIGH HOPES [A HISTORY OF BUFFALO]

MODULE ON BLACK URBAN HISTORY:
A special opportunity stemming from the fact that the instructor must be out of the country for a conference and lectures for two weeks in November: his place will be taken by Professor Henry Taylor Director of the Center for Applied Public Affairs Studies and a nationally known expert on Black urban history and geography. This is to be understood an integral part of the course: Professor Taylor's module will be a feature of the course syllabus; his material will be covered on the final examination.

GRADING:

20%	Midterm Examination          
40%	Final Examination          
40%	Urban Exploration Journal 

All readings will be on reserve at the UGL, but the major titles are also available in paperback at LACO TEXTS, on Main near Bailey Avenue. Given the inconvenience of using the UGL, especially if the course is large, it is advisable to purchase as many as you can manage. Cheap "trade" editions have been ordered where possible, but I'm sorry that the costs inevitably have to add up, a necessary consequence of my building the course around a diversity of readings rather than a single expensive text. Students have sometimes found it useful to pool purchases with others: two or three students might purchase all needed books and share them easily at moderate individual cost.

It is hard to say which books are "required" because this depends in part on how you approach buying and using books. Some titles may be assigned in their entirety, but may not be of lasting interest--so convenience now is to be weighed against lack of value later. The reverse is true for other titles only partially read in the course, which may be more worthwhile for later use and reference. Generally speaking, purchase of the core books is highly recommended, as is purchase of at least one of the additional books you choose. Unfortunately, you can't "wait and see" too long, because the bookstore must return unsold copies to publishers six or seven weeks into the term. Therefore, I've prepared the following brief notes to help you make informed choices early on.

I. CORE BOOKS [Assigned in entirety to all students]

1. Zane Miller, THE URBANIZATION OF MODERN AMERICA:
A basic, general overview, something like a text though we will not use it as such. Emphasis is on more recent history, with good case study portraits of twentieth century cities.

2. Lewis Mumford, STICKS AND STONES:
A classic overview of American culture and society as seen through its architecture. Can be difficult until you get used to the elegant style, but then it is brilliant and lucid-- American history in 150 pages, written when Mumford (now over ninety and a legendary figure in American intellectual life) was an opinionated twenty-two.

3. David Ward, CITIES AND IMMIGRANTS:
A book by a geographer. Clear introduction to modern urban social science as applied to historical analysis. Not sparkling writing, but good at connecting ethnic, urban, and industrial patterns, and showing their relation to modern urban life.

4. August Meier and Eliot Rudwick, FROM PLANTATION TO GHETTO:
A renowned brief history of blacks in America, setting modern urban history in the broader context of the legacy of slavery and racism and the great migration from the south to Northern cities. This will be the essential background reading for the special module on black urban history.

5. Barry Bluestone and Bennett Harrison, THE DEINDUSTRIALIZATION OF AMERICA:
A controversial recent book central to the current national debate about plant closings, community, economic growth, and the future, if any, of industrial cities like Buffalo.

II. OTHER ASSIGNED READINGS
[Students will choose from among these]

5. Theodore Dreiser, SISTER CARRIE:
Classic turn-of-the-century novel about Chicago, about the changing consciousness of women, about social roles and values--really one of the great novels of our literature. Scandalous then, and still powerful and provocative in terms of sexual politics today.

6. Upton Sinclair, THE JUNGLE:
The famous novel about immigrants in industrial Chicago that is set in, but actually isn't about disgusting meat-packing plants. (Sinclair said that he aimed for America's heart but seemed to hit its stomach.)

7. Claude Brown, MANCHILD IN THE PROMISED LAND:
A moving and tough autobiography of a young black man's boyhood in Harlem. A rich portrait--warm if anything but romantic--of the black world in a white city, and of the impact of an earlier drug epidemic on a struggling community. A sensation when first published in the 1960's, when Brown was in his twenties, and especially relevant today in the context of contemporary concerns about similar issues and their implications.

8. Robert Caro, THE POWER BROKER:
A monumental study of Robert Moses, who probably did more to shape the urban world you live in than any single individual, though he never held elective office and was not much more well known in his prime than he is today. The book is a spectacular epic of journalism that reads like a novel. Though we'll read only a small part (it's 1,000 pages plus) the book is worth buying for further reading after the course.

9. Mark Goldman, HIGH HOPES:
Although it won't be a formal assignment, I've ordered some copies of this excellent, lively, and controversial recent history of Buffalo. It may be of interest to many students, and can be especially useful in conjunction with the urban exploration journal.

PAPERBACKS USED:
[All other assignments on UGL Reserve]

• Zane Miller, URBANIZATION OF MODERN AMERICA
• David Ward, CITIES AND IMMIGRANTS
• Lewis Mumford, STICKS AND STONES

9/6-9/8

• Miller, Part One
• Ward, Ch. 1

9/11-9/15

• Ward, Ch. 2
• Mumford, Chs. 4-5
• Still, URBAN AMERICA: [Docs] pp.3-21
• Warner, PRIVATE CITY, Ch.1

9/18-9/22

• Miller, Part One, Ch. 2
• Ward, Ch. 3
• Still, URBAN AMERICA: 39-56
• Foner, TOM PAINE or URBAN CRUCIBLE: selections to be announced

9/25-9/29

• Miller, Part Two: Ch. 3
• Ward, Ch. 1
• Mumford, Ch. 4
• Still, URBAN AMERICA: 80-102

10/2-10/6

• Miller, Part Two: Ch. 4
• Ward, Ch. 2
• Warner, PRIVATE CITY: Ch. 4
• Still, URBAN AMERICA: 163-203

10/11-10/13

• Miller, Review
• Ward, Review
• Mumford, Review
• Still, URBAN AMERICA: 116-164
• Warner, PRIVATE CITY: Ch. 7

TENATATIVE MIDTERM EXAMINATION DATES:

NOTE: Reading Assignments are light at the start of the term, to permit more time for fieldwork in the city for your journals, while the weather is good. Reading is heavier towards the midterm, and will be more so in the second half.

Shortly after the exam, assignments will include your choice of a major novel--either THE JUNGLE or SISTER CARRIE. Because of the length of these books, and because they are novels that can be read for pleasure (you will not be quizzed on details or literary analysis) it might be a good idea to start reading your choice earlier, and read it at your own pace, rather than as a syllabus-slotted "assignment".

I. WEEKLY ASSIGNMENTS

• Miller, URBANIZATION. OF MODERN AMERICA
• Mumford, STICKS AND STONES
• Ward, CITIES AND IMMIGRANTS
• Meier & Rudwick, PLANTATION TO GHETTO
• Caro, THE POWER BROKER
• Hershberg, "Blacks in Philadelphia"
• Bluestone & Harrison, DEINDUSTRIALIZATION OF AMERICA

10/23

• Miller, New: 3-4-5; Old: 2-3
• Ward, Chs. 3-4
• Mumford, Chs. 4-5
• Choice of Novel

10/30

• Meier & Rudwick, Brown
• See Taylor Syllabus

11/6

• Meier & Rudwick, Brown
• See Taylor Syllabus

11/13

• Miller, New: 6-7; Old: 4-5
• Ward, Chs. 5
• Mumford, Chs. 6-8
• Caro, POWER BROKER: intro, Ch. 4

11/20

• Miller, New: 8; Old: 6
• Caro, POWER BROKER: Chs. 18, 20

11/27

• Miller, New: 9
• T. Hershberg, "Blacks in Philadelphia"
• Caro, POWER BROKER: 37, 38, 40

12/4

• Miller, New: 10; Old: 8
• Begin Bluestone & Harrison, DEINDUSTRIALIZATION of AMERICA: PARTS I, II, IV

12/11

• Miller, New: 11
• Finish DEINDUSTRIALIZATION: Parts I, II, IV

LAST CLASS: Wednesday, 12/13 [Friday Schedule]

Rather than make specific assignments in Bayrd Still, URBAN AMERICA: A HISTORY WITH DOCUMENTS let me simply urge you to browse through this regularly when in the UGL. As many of you found in the first half of the course, and in preparing for the midterm, the documents are interesting, and provide excellent material for illustrating points you may want to develop in essays. You'll find this even more true from here on; regular browsing will familiarize you with the documents so you can use them efficiently in preparing the final.

1. Between the midterm exam and the middle of November, you should read all or most of ONE of the two assigned novels-- SISTER CARRIE or THE JUNGLE.

2. Between the middle of November and the end of the course, you should read substantial portions of the ONE of the assigned biographical studies --Claude Brown's MANCHILD IN THE PROMISED LAND, or Caro's biography of Robert Moses, THE POWER BROKER.

NOTE: Because of the staggering length of the Caro book, I suggest you read the following chapters only; read sequentially, they give the best grasp of the overall book in half the length:

• Introduction; Chapters 4, 9, 10, 12, 14, 18, 20, 23, 25, 28, 33, 35,
• 37, 38, 40

An even shorter version can be suggested--the above selections come to about 440 pages, this one to 280. But it has to omit a lot of the most interesting material; I would urge you to at least skim chapters in the fuller selection:

• Introduction; Chapters 4, 9, 10, 12, 18, 20, 28, 33, 37, 38, 40

ALSO NOTE: Whether or not you select this reading for the special assignment, short sections of the Caro book are assigned as part of the regular course reading.

PART I: MULTIPLE CHOICE 25% Take Home, distributed Separately

PART II: ESSAY QUESTION 75% Fifty Minutes. Written In Class.

Choose ONE (1) of the following questions and be prepared to answer it in a developed essay. You will be allowed to bring a small index card with an outline and/or brief notes for use in writing, but no books or extensive notes.

1. There has been considerable recent debate, in cities like Buffalo, about the role that the role of downtown in the modern city, and the local government should play in its revitalization. In an effort to obtain historical perspective on this problem, civic leaders invite you, as a student of urban history, to address their monthly luncheon meeting on the theme "Perspectives on Our Changing Cities: The New Downtown of the 1840s and 1850s "

Drawing on readings, lectures, and journal, prepare an address for delivery to this group. Your essay should not be about Buffalo details, or any city in particular-- rather, your hosts wish you to discuss more general comparisons of the past to the present in several dimensions, such as the economic structure of downtown, its social structure and life, changing patterns of family life, work, and leisure, and issues of social conflict. Try to give your lecture focus and point by discussing the legacy of the local governments' evolving relation to the changes in that period-- the relevance, in other words, of what Zane Miller calls the first period of "urban crisis. "

2. "The American city is the key to understanding the relationship between a European culture carried almost intact across the water, and a not-so-new world gradually taking on more distinctly American form and meaning."

Discuss and evaluate this quotation from a recent book, by developing an essay on the nature and role of cities in the new nation. How did they shape and express the relationship between Europe and "America," and in what ways was the emerging American urban tradition shaped by their literally pivotal position? Draw on examples and themes from lectures and readings--with a special emphasis on Mumford's interpretation of American culture and architecture.

3. What good is a history course? Let's say you had a chance to break into television by working on a new mini-series set in urban American during the turbulent and dramatic period between the Revolution and the Civil War. The producer finds herself strong on writers, but weak on historical background. The central characters are to be an urban artisan (male) and his wife. To help guide the scripters, you are asked to prepare an excerpt from an imaginary autobiography that might have been written by either of them (your choice-- as is their ethnicity, religion, specific trade, and location) in the early 1840s, looking back over the changes in their lives, in their family, work, city, and society. The point of this is to imagine how historical themes and changes might have been reflected in individual experience, and how a person might have looked at and talked about these. Your chance of landing a job [i.e. your grade] will depend on the historical accuracy and insight of this document, not its literary qualities.

4. The course materials present very different approaches to the history of American cities in the early and mid-19th century: the lectures have stressed the urban dimension of a "3D ID Crisis," urban rivalry and promotion, and internal "triangular" changes. Miller offers an historical narrative culminating in a major period of "urban crisis." Ward's book unfolds a sophisticated structural model of urbanization and social change. And Mumford traces broad cultural and ideological changes through the evolution of physical form and expression.

In an informal essay, discuss what seem to you the contributions of each of these approaches, and the differences or tensions between them in the way they approach history as "the study of how things change." Try to summarize what they add up to, as a whole, in terms of a picture of the major course of urbanization in this period-- and what about it seem to you to hold the most important lessons, legacies, or questions.

5. In The Urban Crucible, Gary Nash writes, "The Revolutionary impulse in the northern ports is best understood if ideological principles and economic interests are seen as intimately conjoined. Everyone...has economic interests; and everyone...has an ideology, if that term is defined as a configuration of principles and values derived by a social group from its traditions and environment and applied to the circumstances it confronts."

Use this quote as a take-off point (you needn't have read the optional Nash selections) for an essay examining the role of cities in the process that led to the Revolution, and as "change agents" more generally. Illustrate the interests and the ideologies involved, their relation to urban life and dynamics, and suggest-- since Nash does not say-- which, if any, of these factors seems in your view more important in understanding the role of cities in accelerating the changes involved in, and flowing from, events such as the Revolution.

6. "In the century preceding Independence, New York City was but one of a chain of Atlantic Ports, and not the largest or most important at that. By the mid 19th century, it was the predominant metropolis of the nation, the pivot of its economic, social, and cultural life."

Discuss this transition in an essay considering the reasons for and the implications of New York's rise to dominance. Be sure to include discussion of the broader "so what" question as well-- what are the lessons of this story for today--when there is such widespread concern about whether particular cities and urban regions will grow or decline in the face of major structural changes in our society?