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圖書館 | 資料類型 | 書架號 | 子計數 | 书架位置 | 狀態 | 館藏預約 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
正在查詢... Central | Book | 306 BEN | 1 | Non-fiction Collection | 正在查詢... 未知 | 正在查詢... 不可借閱 |
正在查詢... Science | Book | 306.0973 B439W 1996 | 1 | Stacks | 正在查詢... 未知 | 正在查詢... 不可借閱 |
正在查詢... Science | Book | 306.0973 B472W | 1 | Stacks | 正在查詢... 未知 | 正在查詢... 不可借閱 |
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摘要
摘要
An insightful look at the government program that worked -- and enabled millions to achieve the American dream.
評論 (3)
Kirkus 評論
A rarely told story: how the GI Bill loosed great unseen forces that helped to transform America from the working-class, largely agricultural society of the Great Depression and the New Deal into a largely middle-class society. Bennett, a former reporter for the Boston Herald and the Detroit News, begins by tracing the origins of the bill and the fight to make it law in 1944. The American Legion was particularly influential: Members who had fought in WW I remembered the shabby treatment they had received when they came home. The heart of the book, though, is Bennett's study of the ways in which the law helped transform postwar American life. It provided opportunities for education unavailable to previous generations, as well as low- priced home mortgages that helped fuel new suburbs and emptied ethnic ghettos. Mature, world-traveled GIs, most of them from the urban and rural working class, stormed college campuses in record numbers, filled honor rolls and deans' lists, raised student performance levels, and shook up the old, gentlemanly college culture. Millions of erstwhile blue-collar, rent-paying workers turned into professionals of every calling, as well as prosperous, skilled entrepreneurs and home-owners. This silent army, Bennett suggests, created a revolution in American life; GIs used the money they got to do vital if seemingly ordinary things and in the process created a more abundant and egalitarian society. The total postwar cost of $14.5 billion was an investment that returned manyfold more in revenue as veterans earned more and paid more taxes. Bennett believes that the GI Bill was the most successful government program since the Homestead Act. A refreshing look at a time of optimism, sacrifice, hard work, and achievement (despite the Cold War) when the American dream finally became a reality for millions.
Choice 評論
Although many Americans are vaguely familiar with what came to be known as the G.I. Bill, inexplicably little scholarly work has been done on this historic legislation. In Bennett's telling the G.I. Bill has an almost unalloyed success, in contrast to more recent and troubled social welfare programs. Bennett emphasizes the Bill's monumental impact, finding its influence almost everywhere in the post-WW II US--the development of suburbia (mortgage assistance complemented the Bill's better-known educational provisions), the country's knowledge-education-technology-driven culture, even the Civil Rights Movement. Ultimately, Bennett argues, the G.I. Bill made possible the realization of Jefferson's "agrarian" dream, which was really a dream of a self-sufficient, middle-class, property owning society. Allowing for some exaggeration, the arguments are both novel and convincing. Ironically, this massive social program was pushed not by New Deal liberals but by the American Legion, William Randolph Hearst, and mostly conservative politicians. Bennett is a journalist; his book is anecdotal and relies primarily on secondary sources. Although not the final world on so significant a subject, it is an excellent beginning point. All levels. K. Blaser; Wayne State College
《圖書館雜誌》(Library Journal )書評
The G.I. Bill has been hailed as the Marshall Plan for America. It offered to pay college expenses for military veterans returning from World War II, making it a stairway to the middle class that was soon utilized by millions. The result was a social revolution leading to suburbia and even to our present information age. Author Bennett, a Pulitzer Prize-nominated reporter (Lambert Simnel and the Battle of Stoke, St. Martin's, 1987), feels that the huge education bill not only prevented a return to the Great Depression but suggests it actually headed off a Marxist surge in America. Bennett examines with journalistic verve the forces that made the great social experiment necessary and the political maneuvers that made it possible. With enthusiasm he relates how university faculties at first disdained the surging vets but soon came to cherish their pragmatic determination, which democratized higher education forever. Bennett offers an enthusiastic and detailed study of a necessary area. Recommended for public and academic libraries.Raymond L. Puffer, U.S. Air Force History Prog., Edwards AFB, Cal. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.