Mass Appeal

Edward D. Berkowitz is Professor of History at George Washington University. He has held academic positions at the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and administrative positions at Brandeis University and the President's Commission for a National Agenda for the Eighties. He is the author of six previous books, including Something Happened, his history of the seventies. He is co-author of four other books and editor of three, including A Documentary History of Social Security. Berkowitz has given invited lectures at the European University in Florence, at Oxford and Cambridge Universities, and in the Netherlands, Australia, and New Zealand. He has published more than one hundred articles in publications including the Journal of Social History, the Milbank Memorial Quarterly, the Boston Globe, the Washington Post, and the San Jose Mercury News. His media work also includes appearances on Terry Gross's 'Fresh Air', C-SPAN's book channel, and the History Channel. In 2009, he was a principal commentator in the AP-TV's coverage of the Obama administration.

• 1. Sound comes in, vaudeville and silent pictures go out; 2. From Broadway to Hollywood with Groucho, Fred, and Ginger; 3. Radio nights; 4. From the 30s to the 40s with Kate, Bud, and Lou; 5. Bogie, Bob, and the boys at war; 6. The postwar movie scene; 7. Make room for TV; 8. Putting it together: Walt Disney introduces the baby boom to television; 9. The end of an era?

"With compelling detail and an accessible style, Berkowitz demonstrates how film, radio, and television, from their beginnings to the present, offered all-inclusiveness or, as the title puts it, mass appeal. Highly recommended." -Choice