The other half : the life of Jacob Riis and the world of immigrant America / Tom Buk-Swienty ; translated from the Danish by Annette Buk-Swienty.
Material type: TextLanguage: English Original language: Danish Publication details: New York : W.W. Norton & Co., c2008.Description: xvi, 331 p. : ill. ; 25 cmISBN:- 0393060233 (hardcover)
- 9780393060232 (hardcover)
- Ideelle amerikaner. English
- Riis, Jacob A. (Jacob August), 1849-1914
- Danish Americans -- New York (State) -- New York -- Biography
- Immigrants -- New York (State) -- New York -- Biography
- Investigative reporting -- New York (State) -- New York
- Journalists -- New York (State) -- New York -- Biography
- Social reformers -- New York (State) -- New York -- Biography
- New York (N.Y.) -- Biography
Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book | Main Library | Biography | Riis, J. B932 | Available | 33111005022583 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
Drawing on previously unexamined diaries and letters, The Other Half marvelously re-creates the moving story of Jacob Riis, the legendary Progressive reformer and muckraking photographer. Born in 1849 in rural Denmark, Riis immigrated to America in 1870 following a devastating romantic breakup. Penniless and starving, Riis stumbled into journalism, eventually becoming a charismatic police reporter for the New York Tribune, where he befriended Theodore Roosevelt and witnessed firsthand the appalling tenement conditions of late nineteenth-century New York. His resulting exposé, How the Other Half Lives, was the first major American muckraking book. It brought Americans in touch with their lost humanity, establishing a precedent for Ida Tarbell, Lincoln Steffens, Jane Addams, and Upton Sinclair. Described by Roosevelt as "the ideal American," Riis died in 1914, mourned by millions, a celebrated hero. Tom Buk-Swienty's long-awaited biography, a superb evocation of the muckraking era, is a compelling work, designed with 55 haunting images from Riis's own photographic oeuvre.
Includes bibliographical references (p. 307-310) and index.