By Kenneth T. Jackson
(New York: Oxford University
Press, 1987); 978-0195049831
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.