Diners, bowling alleys and trailer parks : chasing the American dream in the postwar consumer culture

Author(s)

Bibliographic Information

Diners, bowling alleys and trailer parks : chasing the American dream in the postwar consumer culture

Andrew Hurley

Basic Books, c2001

  • : pbk.

Available at  / 17 libraries

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Note

Includes bibliographical references and index

Paperback's ISBN from cover

Description and Table of Contents

Volume

ISBN 9780465031863

Description

An entertaining and revealing history of diners, bowling alleys, and trailer parks that charts the hopes, dreams, fears, and hidden divisions of America's postwar middle class. The years immediately following World War II witnessed a dramatic transformation of America's working-class suburbs, driven by postwar prosperity and a burgeoning consumer culture. Chrome and neon were the new currency in this revitalized consumer culture, and no postwar consumer products trafficked more heavily in this currency than diners, bowling alleys, and trailer parks. Through these three quintessentially American institutions, Andrew Hurley examines the struggle of blue-collar Americans to attain the good life after two long decades of depression and war. Diners, bowling alleys, and trailer parks shed their hardscrabble origins and unsavory reputation in the postwar years, becoming places where blue-collar families announced and celebrated their arrival into the middle class. Touted as a force for egalitarianism and inclusion, they nonetheless became, more often than not, battlegrounds where deep racial, ethnic, class, gender, and generational divides were revealed. Andrew Hurley tells this story of the humble origins, explosive growth, and gradual decline of the diner, bowling alley, and trailer park in expert fashion. This is substantial cultural and social history that also knows how to entertain as it opens a revealing window onto the larger history of postwar America.
Volume

: pbk. ISBN 9780465031870

Description

The years immediately following the Second World War witnessed a dramatic transformation of America's working-class suburbs, driven by an unprecedented post-war prosperity and a burgeoning consumer culture. Chrome and neon were the new currency in this newly vital consumer culture, and no post-war consumer products trafficked more heavily in this currency than diners, bowling alleys, and trailer parks. Through these three distinctively American institutions, Andrew Hurley examines the struggle of Americans with modest means to attain the good life after two long decades of depression and war. He tells the story of the humble origins, explosive growth, and gradual, sad decline of the diner, bowling alley, and trailer park in expert fashion. This is cultural and social history that knows how to entertain.

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