A History of US: Book 9: War, Peace, and All That Jazz 1918-1945 [Paperback]

Joy Hakim (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 9 and up | Grade Level: 4 and up | Series: History of US

From woman's suffrage to Babe Ruth's home runs, from Louis Armstrong's jazz to Franklin Delano Roosevelt's four presidential terms, from the finale of one world war to the dramatic close of the second, War, Peace, and All That Jazz presents the story of some of the most exciting years in U.S. history. With the end of World War I, many Americans decided to live it up, going to movies, driving cars, and cheering baseball games a plenty. But alongside this post-WWI spree was high unemployment, hard times for farmers, ever-present racism, and, finally, the Depression, the worst economic disaster in U.S. history, flip-flopping the nation from prosperity to scarcity. Along came one of our country's greatest leaders, F.D.R., who promised a New Deal, gave Americans hope, and then saw them through the horrors and victories of World War II. These three decades--full of optimism and despair, progress and Depression, and, of course, War, Peace, and All That Jazz--forever changed the United States.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 6 Up-History comes alive in this spirited retelling of the first half of 20th-century America. Laid out with a plentitude of black-and-white photographs and "feature" boxes, the book portrays the past in a vivid, accessible manner. Hakim spotlights notable figures such as Susan B. Anthony, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, Charles Lindbergh, and many others. She explains complicated political matters and puts them in perspective. For example, the Depression is explored in detail, including the events leading up to it and the country's struggle to end it. The volume is perhaps best summed up by the author in her closing note: "There was a lesson in all this. It isn't easy to be a citizen in a democracy. It takes work: reading, listening, and questioning...A good citizen needs to be well informed, to get involved, and to know history." War, Peace and All That Jazz is a readable, engrossing, and entertaining resource. Unfortunately, many of the photographs and reproductions are dark and blurry.
Julie Halverstadt, Douglas Public Library District, Castle Rock, CO
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"A big breath of fresh air and the best possible news for the youngsters who get to read them." -- David McCullough, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of John Adams

"For kids who think United States history is merely sleep-inducing, author Joy Hakim offers an antidote." -- Publishers Weekly --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 9 and up
  
• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA; 3 edition (September 15, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0195153367
• ISBN-13: 978-0195153361
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.5 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #768,405 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

I started my career as an author with a ten-volume U.S. history: A History of US, published by Oxford University Press in 1993, and now in a third updated printing. I had no idea the history would end up in ten books, or that it would be so much fun to write.
A History of US has been awarded a bunch of prizes. David McCullough commented, ". . .the idea that history might ever be thought of as a chore has clearly never crossed her mind." In testimony before the Senate Education Committee he called the series "superb." People Magazine described me as "the J.K. Rowling of the history world." (Umm, that would be nice. But the books have sold 5 million copies.)
Mine are narrative history books that attempt to set literary standards. I mean for them to be exciting to read. They're meant for young readers, and their teachers and parents, or for anyone without a deep background in U.S. history. These are books that can be found in bookstores, on Amazon, and in schools. Oxford and Hopkins have done teaching materials for those who want to use the books in academic study.
That series was followed by: Freedom: A History of US (published in 2003), the companion to a 16-part PBS series of the same name that was narrated by Katie Couric, with voices by a host of Hollywood figures, from Tom Hanks to Robin Williams. The videos are available to schools from PBS. And the book spawned a terrific website: (www.pbs.org/wnet/historyofus).

I'm now writing The Story of Science. The first three books are jointly published by Smithsonian Books and the NSTA (National Science Teachers Association). They focus on the quest to understand the universe--from ancient Greece to today's expanding universe. The first volume is Aristotle Leads the Way; the second, Newton at the Center; the third book, Einstein Adds A New Dimension, attempts to explain quantum theory and relativity with black holes and space travel too. Writing in the New York Times, Natalie Angier called the books, "richly informative." Alan Alda raved. These books have won prizes too. Science writer Timothy Ferris said he wished he had them when he was a boy. Educators at Johns Hopkins and NSTA have developing coordinated teaching materials for classroom use (available from NSTA or Amazon).

I'm currently working on two books that put biology into a narrative framework.

Before I began writing books, I was an associate editor, editorial writer, and business writer for The Virginian-Pilot (Norfolk's morning paper) and a general reporter and photographer on the staff of The Ledger-Star (Norfolk's afternoon paper. I did a whole lot of freelance writing while raising three kids. And I was an assistant editor of World News, a foreign news service at McGraw-Hill.

Writing and teaching seem to be two faces of the same need to explain things. Which may explain why I've had dual careers--as writer and teacher.

I've taught elementary school (Omaha, NE), high school English (Virginia Beach, VA), special education in a middle school (Syracuse, NY), and English composition and American literature at a community college (Virginia Beach). I initiated and taught a writing course for high school teachers of English through the University of Virginia.

I do a lot of speaking, especially to education groups. For three years I worked with a group of history teachers in Los Angeles under a TAH (Teaching American History) grant. I've spent some of my time in an inner-city school where most of the students speak Spanish at home and reading English doesn't come easily. I'll be speaking at Teachers College, Columbia in the fall of 2009 where reading guru, Lucy Calkins, has called my books the "gold standard" in the field.

As to my schooling: I earned a B.A. from Smith College after high school in Rutland, Vermont. Then I received a M.Ed. and an honorary doctorate from Goucher College. Smith gave me the Smith Medal (2000); the Matrix Foundation, the Edith Workman Award (2003); I've taken graduate courses in journalism and in geography at New York University, child psychology at Johns Hopkins, and courses in American history and science at Brown, Harvard, Cornell, and Cambridge University. My website is: joyhakim.com.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars I loved it!, May 7, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: A History of US: Book 9: War, Peace, and All That Jazz (1918-1945) (Paperback)

I loved this book and all of Joy Hakim's books. She makes history interesting, not just interesting, but FASINATING! I would recomend this book to anyone.

12 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Buyer Beware, July 19, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: A History of US: Book 9: War, Peace, and All That Jazz 1918-1945 (Paperback)

I doubt there's any US History textbooks more excitingly written for kids age 9-12 than Joy Hakim's. (This series is the one used in one of the best private schools in Silicon Valley.) They're glossy and beautiful, and well-nigh irresistible. What an incredible shame. What's the problem? The problem is they contain a version of history so slanted as to amount to an utterly shameless propagandizing of children. I'm a liberal atheist, but, really, these books should be sealed into a time capsule, to entertain future historians.

I assume Hakim simply doesn't know any better, but even a Marxist with a PhD in American History would blush a little to discover that a child reading this series would never suspect that close to 100 million innocent men, women, and children died under the yoke of socialist regimes, nor that a third of the world was plunged into an unnecessary grinding poverty for decades. On the other hand, they will learn, as they should, that National Socialism murdered six million innocents, and that the Ku Klux Klan `grew hugely' in the 1920s. But they won't learn that any other serious totalitarian movements also grew hugely in the 1920s, or that five million innocents died under the rule of Lenin's first experiment in socialism in the 1920s.

On the contrary, all anti-Communism in the twentieth century is presented as nothing better than a witch-hunt. Indeed, anti-communism is literally referred to as a `witch-hunt,' several times. Come on. So, was the fight against Hitler's National Socialism a `witch-hunt'? Why such a palpable double standard for twin evils? Hakim teaches children that while National Socialism was indeed a real and present danger, and even worth waging an unprecedented World War to fight it, on the other hand, international socialism, or Communism, was, as she tells it, never any real danger to Americans.

For instance, there's a chapter on the HUAC hearings in which McCarthy is referred to as a 'liar' about a half a dozen times. The chapter literally begins with the opening sentence "Joe McCarthy was a liar." Sure, he's controversial, but the latest research by historians just doesn't back up Hakim's wild-eyed account of liberal anti-socialism in America as nothing better than a nefarious `witch-hunt' conducted by `liars' and oppressors. Totalitarian Communist Lillian Hellman is profiled as a hero, and the overall impression is given that none of these people really were Communists, but, instead, were all just as falsely accused as the supposed `witches' of Salem.

This conclusion is then used to prove the statement that Americans are a fundamentally paranoid people, who basically lose their marbles very once in a while. (See book "Not Without Honor." on McCarthy and PBS documentary on Salem to find out why even Salem wasn't actually paranoia after all, but a toxic crop of moldy rye.)

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bravo!, May 24, 2005

By 

Li'l Big Sis (End of the Road, Alaska) - See all my reviews

This review is from: A History of US: Book 9: War, Peace, and All That Jazz 1918-1945 (Paperback)

Bravo, Joy Hakim! History was never really enjoyable for me-not boring, just not really captivating. This book, number 9 in A History of US, is my favorite so far. The others were really well done, and I enjoyed them, too.
She really writes it more like our countries big story. The famous men and women are introduced more as characters than as names. From the "Lets just have a good time" 20's after World War I, through racial bigotry, the Depression, the attack on Pearl Harbor to the end of World War II, she explains everything in detail. Hakim throws in funny and interesting facts, pictures (the second edition is in full color) paragraphs out of books, autobiographies and letters, making you feel that you understand almost everything you can. I think this, the 1918-1945 period in history has been the most interesting for me. So much was going on! It seems like she packed a lot into one book, but even her summarizing jobs are amazing.
I really admire her truthfulness, and the hope she always seems to have that things will get better in the future, and that we'll try not to repeat old mistakes. She acclaims people who helped change the nation for better, and doesn't justify or smooth over the bad. Even while she's telling about all the evil of Hitler's government, she is letting you know that America's government made some pretty bad mistakes too, like not accepting the 2,000 refugee children from Germany that Hitler was willing to send over.
One thing I like most about her books, and especially this one, is she never makes an excuse for the hate groups, rioters, and even famous people that she admires. She pulls out the faults, and explains carefully why they did the things they did . Hakim does it in a way that makes you understand, if not accept, their acts. There are still things I don't (and don't think I ever will) understand in history, but Hakim really helps me grasp them better. Kids will really enjoy these books a lot more than the huge history textbooks. Hakim put some really hard issues and photos in her books, but after all, they are history.
Five stars definitely!