David Kherdian has given us his finest, most complete, and undoubtedly final book on his Midwestern hometown. Here we have in fifty odd “chapters” the places, people, artifacts, and events, as experienced by the people of Racine during the long middle years of the last century, in a luminous way that will provide an awakening for all who were there, and not just the people of Racine, but all Americans, especially those in America's rust belt. This is the universal story of our country during a defining period of our history, when we were living the promise of America, at its egalitarian best, as a model for ourselves and a promise to the world.