Roadside Americans : the rise and fall of hitchhiking in a changing nation /

Reid, Jack,

Roadside Americans : the rise and fall of hitchhiking in a changing nation / Jack Reid. - 251 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Brother, can you spare a ride? Hitchhiking in the Great Depression, 1928-1940 -- It's easy for a soldier boy to catch rides : hitchhiking during World War II, 1941-1947 -- The dangerous stranger : hitchhiking in the age of affluence, 1948-1959 -- An unfiltered dose of the human condition : hitchhiking and the pursuit of authenticity, 1960-1967 -- Riders on the storm : countercultural hitchhiking and conservative resistance, 1968-1975 -- Goin' down the road feelin' bad : the decline of hitchhiking, 1976-1988.

"Between the Great Depression and the mid-1970s, hitchhikers were a common sight for motorists, as American service members, students, and adventurers sought out the romance of the road in droves. Beats, hippies, feminists, and civil rights and antiwar activists saw "thumb tripping" as a vehicle for liberation, living out the counterculture's rejection of traditional values. Yet, by the time Ronald Reagan, a former hitchhiker himself, was in the White House, the youthful faces on the road chasing the ghost of Jack Kerouac were largely gone--along with sympathetic portrayals of the practice in state legislatures and the media"--

9781469655000 1469655004

2019037870


Hitchhiking--History--United States--20th century.
Hitchhiking--Social aspects--United States.
Hitchhiking--Public opinion.

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