The Age of Reform is a 1955 Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Richard Hofstadter. It is an American history that traces events from the Populist Movement of the 1890s through the Progressive Era ending with the New Deal in the 1930s. The Age of Reform stands out from other historical material because Hofstadter's main purpose for writing is not to retell an extensive history of the three movements, but to analyze the common beliefs of the reform groups in our modern perspective, in order to elucidate many distortions, most notably between the New Deal and Progressivism. Hofstadter organizes his... book chronologically beginning with Populism. Here, Hofstadter introduces a key concept in understanding Populism: the agrarian myth. The author explains this as a representation of homage that Americans have paid to the subsistent, innocent, and yeoman farmer of old. The myth became a stereotype in later years since agriculture became more commercial, thus leading to over expansion. Populism's main cause for formation was the alleged loss of "free land."; Many Populist leaders believed that industry and government had a vendetta to destroy the agricultural business.
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