It's been called the "war that changed everything," and it is
difficult to think of a historical event that had a greater impact
on the world than the First World War. Events during the war
profoundly changed our nation, and Chicago, especially, was
transformed during this period. Between 1913 and 1919, Chicago
transitioned from a nineteenth-century city to the metropolis it is
today. Despite the importance of the war years, this period has not
been documented adequately in histories of Chicago. In Chicago
Transformed: World War I and the Windy City, Joseph Gustaitis fills
this gap in the historical record, covering the important wartime
events, developments, movements, and people that helped shaped
Chicago. Gustaitis attributes many of Chicago's changes to the
labor shortage caused by the war. African Americans from the South
flocked to Chicago during the Great Migration, and Mexican
immigration increased as well. This influx of new populations along
with a wave of anti-German hysteria-which nearly extinguished
German culture in Chicago-changed the city's ethnic composition. As
the ethnic landscape changed, so too did the culture. Jazz and
blues accompanied African Americans to the city, and Chicago soon
became America's jazz and blues capital. Gustaitis also
demonstrates how the nation's first sexual revolution occurred not
during the 1960s but during the World War I years, when the labor
shortage opened up unprecedented employment opportunities for
women. These opportunities gave women assertiveness and freedom
that endured beyond the war years. In addition, the shortage of
workers invigorated organized labor, and determined attempts were
made to organize in Chicago's two leading industrial workplaces-the
stockyards and the steel mills-which helped launch the union
movement of the twentieth century. Gustaitis explores other topics
as well: Prohibition, which practically defined the city in the
1920s; the exploits of Chicago's soldiers, both white and black;
life on the home front; the War Exposition in Grant Park; and some
of the city's contributions to the war effort. The book also
contains sketches of the wartime activities of prominent
Chicagoans, including Jane Addams, Ernest Hemingway, Clarence
Darrow, Rabbi Emil Hirsch, John T. McCutcheon, "Big Bill" Thompson,
and Eunice Tietjens. Although its focus is Chicago, this book
provides insight into change nationwide, as many of the effects
that the First World War had on the city also affected the United
States as a whole. Drawing on a variety of sources and written in
an accessible style that combines economic, cultural, and political
history, Chicago Transformed portrays Chicago before the war,
traces the changes initiated during the war years, and shows how
these changes still endure in the cultural, ethnic, and political
landscape of this great city and the nation.
General
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