Portraits in Steel [Paperback]

Michael Frisch (Author), Milton Rogovin (Photographer)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 11, 1993

This powerful book documents--in images and words--the unsettling experience of a dozen men and women workers who lost their jobs in the steel mills of Buffalo, New York, and had to fashion new lives for themselves. A stunning collection of revealing narratives that bears witness to wrenching changes in the American economy. Photographs.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Frisch ( A Shared Authority: Essays on the Craft and Meaning of Oral and Public History ) and documentary photographer Rogovin here collaborate on a mid-1980s portrait of the lives of 12 former steelworkers, male and female, in Buffalo, N.Y. PW saw only a fraction of the black-and-white photographs but these are illuminating examples of what Frisch calls "a presentation of self." Frisch's introduction thoughtfully describes Buffalo through deindustrialization and tentative revival. His interviews are earnest, detailed and sometimes redundant. The workers describe their work in steel, from running the furnaces to pouring molten steel, their family life and how they have coped with adversity. Some have made a successful transition while others struggle: one man is on welfare; another guards the empty steel plant where he once worked. Most striking are the sometimes xenophobic, often uninformed but heartfelt responses workers give to Frisch's very leading questions about the decline of the economy: they presage the large numbers of voters who supported Bill Clinton and H. Ross Perot in the 1992 presidential race.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Paperback: 280 pages
• Publisher: Cornell University Press; First Paperback Printing edition (May 11, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0801481023
• ISBN-13: 978-0801481024
• Product Dimensions: 10.2 x 8.6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,792,765 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Despair and Diaspora made meaningful..., March 5, 2002

By 

Shelley Ashfield (Philadelphia, PA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Portraits in Steel (Paperback)

I wish I could provide a comparative review, but to this day, this seems to be the ONLY book available that actively addresses what happened to Buffalo in the last quarter century. Thank you for conducting interviews honestly, without unwarranted nostalgia or trying to put a "happy face" on what continues to be a sad and terrible situation. I also appreciate your craftsmanship, both in the gorgeous photography and in your writing. The little was otherwise available on the subject through the Buffalo Historical Society was so amateurish that I was embarrassed to continue reading.
As a Western New York expatriate, I lead a happy life. That is, until I visit back home, and realize that no one knows me and that poverty has settled permanently on my hometown. I had imagined once that I could contribute to my community, that I could have somehow helped, but like the Blizzard of '77, the economic collapse was bigger than I was. You help to provide meaning to the Steeltown Diaspora.