America Adopts the Automobile, 1895-1910 by James J. FlinkReview by: Gene D. LewisThe Journal of American History, Vol. 58, No. 1 (Jun., 1971), pp. 199-200Published by: Organization of American HistoriansStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1890151 .

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Book Reviews 199

other ethnic groups with different histories, he might have probed more deeply into the ideas of community in America; and he might have related Magnes' thought to his personal and intellectual milieu. But these are doubtless themes for other books that Goren's fine monograph will surely elicit.

SAN FRANCISCO STATE COLLEGE MOSES RIsCHIN

America Adopts the Automobile, 1895-1910. By James J. Flink. (Cam- bridge: MIT Press, 1970. 343 pp. Illustrations, chart, tables, notes, bibli- ography, and indexes. $12.50.) This book is the first of a projected two-volume study of the automobile

and the automobile industry from its inception to predominance in Ameri- can civilization. The present work sketches the acceptance of European technological innovation, and then in rapid order considers briefly the de- velopment of mass markets, the beginnings of automobile clubs, licensing of operators, legislating speed, insurance, storage and repairs, and con- cludes with a brief analysis of the monopoly threat supposedly posed by the Selden patent to the gasoline automobile.

The author's efforts to fill the void in our knowledge of the "many sig- nificant relationships between the development of the industry as a whole and the changing social and cultural milieu within which this development occurred" has not been entirely successful. This may be due to the scarcity of sources, a deficiency which might have been partially remedied had the author turned to newspaper accounts. More fundamental, however, is that the topics considered are only indirectly related to the "social and cultural milieu" of the early twentieth century, and these are superficially treated. In fact, one can conclude from this volume that the automobile did not have a significant impact on American life before 1910, and that serious adoption was in some doubt until the opening of the Ford Highland Plant in that year.

The material in this book could have been more profitably included in the first two or three chapters of a volume dealing with the history of the automobile industry in its formative stages through the 1920s. Forty-six full-page illustrations augment the text, but the publisher was apparently too busy to set the type properly. The book is the only one this reviewer has seen recently which has no even or standard right hand margins. The large print and double spacing also make the book appear as a typed doctoral dissertation rather than a serious production from a prestigious press.

The undertaking, however, holds considerable promise if the next vol- ume grapples with some of the questions raised but not considered in this book. These indicate that the automobile was the "prime mover" in the economy, and that its influence reshaped American lifeways in such areas

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200 The Journal of American History

as residence patterns, work habits, education, socialization of children, and use of leisure time.

UNIVERSITY OF CINCINNATI GENE D. LEWIS

The Social Responsibzlzties of Business: Company and Community, 1900- 1960. By Morrell Heald. (Cleveland: Press of Case Western Reserve University, 1970. xix + 339 pp. Tables, notes, appendix, bibliographical note, and index. $9.95.) During the last decade a number of historians, including Arthur M.

Johnson, Louis Galambos, Elliott Hawley, and others, have clarified the na- ture of business relations with the federal government in the course of the twentieth century. Much of their interest has centered on the ideas of busi- nessmen and their part in the formulation of public policies. This volume by Morrell Heald is a welcome addition to the growing literature on the subject since it enlarges our knowledge of the social conscience of America's businessmen in the first sixty years of this century.

Although the Puritan doctrine of stewardship and the late-nineteenth- century concept of the gospel of wealth both provided a foundation for the development of social awareness among individuals engaged in business, Heald considers such sensitivity primarily a twentieth-century phenome- non. In tracing different stages of its growth, he analyzes the company towns of the 1890s and the YMCA movement in the two decades thereaf- ter. Heald rightly focuses on the 1920s as a seminal period in the transfor- mation of business thought. Far from being an era of reaction and self-adu- lation-as the traditional view of Prothro and others would have it-this was a period of intensive self-examination and search for new values, a search not wholly divorced from the agonizing self-appraisal of the Ameri- can intellectual community. One visible result of this stocktaking was the community chest movement of this decade which provided an outlet for the social consciousness of many men and women in the business world. The Great Depression temporarily dampened such activities, but World War II gave them an enormous boost, in theory as well as in practice. With some insight Heald examines the significant impact of the war in enlarging the social consciousness of the managerial elite of that day and the coming gen- eration of executives. This is an aspect of the wartime experience that has heretofore been largely ignored. One fourth of the study is devoted to an analysis of attitudes governing corporate responsibilities between 1945 and 1960. Heald concludes that while business administrators have greatly ex- panded their views concerning their obligations to the public, their ex- tended vision has not affected the internal management of corporations.

Heald has written a competent book. It is a well-documented study that reflects a careful choice of source materials. The author's judgments are so-

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