Michael V. Uschan introduces "The 1910s" as a time of changes created by the industrial revolution, problems in the big cities, and the progressive movement of reform. The book is divided into seven chapters: (1) The Progressive Movement and Woodrow Wilson; (2) The Fights for Rights; (3) Popular Culture: Silent Films, Vaudeville, and the Model T; (4) Edging into World Affairs; (5) The United States Goes to War; (6) The United States Helps Win the War; and (7) The Postwar Period. If Theodore Roosevelt dominated the first decade of the 21st century then clearly Woodrow Wilson was the major figure of this decade, although the legacy he wanted of the League of Nations was denied him. The irony of declaring we sent troops to Europe to fight the "War to End All Wars" is omnipresent because even the most disinterested student of American History knows what the next generation is going to have to do because of the missed opportunities during this period.

The name of this series as "A Cultural History of the United States" is somewhat misleading, because although these volumes certainly emphasize cultural aspects of history such as literature, sports and entertainment more than that traditional history textbooks, they certainly do not emphasize American culture. These books cover technology, significant political and social events, trends and music. Sidebars offer details on everything from Mother Jones and the Labor Movement to the Draft Lottery. Actually, Uschan sold me on the depth of his research when he covered the invention of Lincoln Logs and the Erector Set. Illustrations in this series consist of not only historic photographs from the period but editorial cartoons, which I always like to see in a history textbook because they often bring the passions of the time alive more than anything else.

Some school have add to traditional division between World and U.S. history a course focusing on the Twentieth Century. This move has been justified not only because the United States dominated the last century, making it impossible to deal with World History without taking into consideration America's role, but also because so much happened in the last hundred years matters very much to the lives and future of our students. Consequently, a series looking at American history decade by decade through the last century can have great value to students and teachers alike. While I imagine it might be impractical to have a classroom set of this entire series for each student, these books can certainly be used by teachers to supplement the basic material in the textbook or by students looking at this particular decade in some detail.

Obviously most of the chapters in "The 1940s" are going to be devoted to the Second War War, while the rest reflect its aftermath. Michael V. Uschan goes through the decade in seven chapters: (1) America Enters the War covers Pearl Harbor and how the country geared up for war; (2) America at War: The Home Front talks about the impact on the war in terms of women working in defense plants and internment camps for Japanese-Americans; (3) Winning the War is an interesting chapter because unlike the rest of the book it provides LESS details about the details of the war than you would expect to find in a standard American history textbook; (4) The Movies Go to War focuses on how Hollywood provided more than entertainment during this period; (5) Postwar Life looks at how the returning GIs created a new world of life in the suburbs while Jackie Robinson breaks the color line in baseball, which has profound social consequences; (6) Popular Culture: From Jack Benny to Howdy Doody traces how the decade begins with the heyday of radio and ends with the emergence of television; (7) The Cold War will dominate the next decade, but Uschan shows how it begins here, the ironic legacy of WW2. This is a decade that is not dominated by any one individual, despite the best efforts of FDR, but rather by events. The goal here is to get beyond what you are going to find in your standard American history textbook and Uschan certainly accomplishes that overall.

This book is part of the series A Cultural History of the United States: Through the Decades. The book is "enlivened" with numerous photographs as well as informative sidebars on topics like Edward R. Murrow, Comic Books, the Hollywood Ten, and Forties slang. With this particular volume, I think the sidebars are more useful than usual, mainly because students tend to already know the basic story of the war, making the details more important. Despite the title, these books obviously look at more than just American culture, covering technology, significant political and social events, as well as trends in things like music. The back of the book includes notes, bibliographies, a chronology of events, and a detailed index.

What little I learned in American history about North Carolina during the colonial period has been effectively overshadowed by a recurring line in "1776," the Broadway musical about the Declaration of Independence. Every time North Carolina's name comes up on the role call of the colonies the North Carolina delegate Joseph Hewes stands up and says "North Carolina passes to South Carolina." Of course, South Carolina comes out to become the hotbed of secession leading to the Civil War, while North Carolina eventually became famous for college basketball teams. This deplorable hole in my colonial education is more than rectified by Michael V. Uschan's volume on "North Carolina" for The Thirteen Colonies series. In the book's introduction Uschan establishes North Carolina as "A Colony of Bewitching Beauty and Danger" which became the home of colonists as unruly as any other British subjects in the New World.

Uschan traced North Carolina's difficult beginning, including the story of the Roanoke Colony; it was originally part of Virginia until King Charles I gave the southern half of the colony to Sir Robert Heath, his attorney general. Thus we have the irony that what is now North Carolina was original South Virginia. The story of the colony is one of settlers from both Europe and other American colonies, war with the Tuscarora tribe, pirates such as Edward Teach (a.k.a. Blackbeard), and the Lord Proprietors. After detailing the political, economic, and social life in colonial North Carolina, Uschan looks at the role it had in the American Revolution. Although there is usually little about such things in your standard American history textbook, there was the first recorded political act by colonial women at the Edenton Tea Party as well as a couple of battles at Moore's Creed Bridge (1776) and Guilford Court House (1781).

The final chapter of the book looks at the troubles North Carolina had as a state in the new union, suffering from both a weak economy and a weak government. The former was a result of the devastation the British army inflicted on the colony as Cornwallis's army marched north to its fate at Yorktown, while the latter reflected the divided political philosophies of the former colony's citizens. Consequently, Uschan paints a picture of the North Carolina colony that clearly establishes it as unique in its own right when compared to its better known brethren such as Virginia and South Carolina. The book is illustrated with black & white illustrations, mostly historic etchings and paintings. One of the strengths of this series is its use of quotations from both primary and secondary sources, as well as the time line, annotated bibliography and index provided in the back of the book. This is an excellent series and the best thing I can say about it is that if the entire work could be dropped into the start of a textbook about the history of their state for North Carolina junior high students I would tend to believe they would be well served.