Our Times: America at the Birth of the Twentieth Century

By Dan Rather and Mark Sullivan

Book Overview

Originally published in six volumes in the 1930s under the auspices of journalist Mark Sullivan, an abridged edition edited by the veteran CBS-TV journalist chronicles the social and political history... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0684815737
• ISBN13: 9780684815732
• Release Date: December 1995
• Publisher: Scribner Book Company
• Length: 731 Pages
• Weight: 2.41 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.5" x 6.4" x 9.5"

Customer Reviews

Skip the introductory materials; if time allows, read the full original

I detest Dan Rather and his editorializing in the introduction and epilogue of this book, which in the original would rate 5-star rating. He ruins this edited edition (six volumes down to one) with his written words, and I suspicion, with his mindless incompetence at the task of editing. I would recommend finding the full six volumes and reading them before taking on this book again.

Like taking a time machine to the first quarter century

If you like history, wouldn't it be great to hear from someone who was there? Mark Sullivan was there during the period of 1900-1925 and has written a detailed account of what things were like and what was the mood of the country. It is facinating to hear him speak of Teddy Roosevelt taking him aside and telling him of his concerns about his successor, Taft. It is also interesting to hear him speak of the concerns of the day, which seem much like concerns many share today. This is a well-done historical work. For most of us readers, we should thank Dan Rather for cutting it down to an abridged form.

Great summation--look for the originals, too

Thanks to Dan Rather for boiling-down Mark Sullivan's Our Times series. A great job--but go out and look for the originals (they're not too hard to find, at least in NY). Sullivan got a bit carried away with his pet politicians, but his sidelong views of everyday life (music, clothing, humor, race relations, etc.) between 1900-25 are a stunning time machine. He was THERE, so you'll read things in his book a modern-day historian might discard.