Check It Out

Golden Dreams: California in an
Age of Abundance, 1950-1963.
by Kevin Starr.
F866.2 .S733 2009

This volume concludes Kevin Starr's seven-volume history of a single American state. Starr covers a broad range of subjects: demography, water, freeways, politics, culture, the state's major cities, race relations. This volume focuses on the post-World War II era, when California's prosperity and cultural exuberance astonished the world.


In particular, war played an enormous role in the shaping of modern California: World War II accelerated California's growth, as the federal government created a manufacturing base here for the defense industry that led to a massive migration of African Americans to the West Coast, and Cold War defense expenditures not only fueled California's economy but also financed the University of California system.


Check out Golden Dreams: California in an
Age of Abundance, 1950-1963, available now in the library.