Business History Review

In the early twentieth century, companies relied on advertising to inform international audiences about their products and services, just as they do today. The J. Walter Thompson Company, a New York-based advertising agency, entered the global stage early, and by 1928 Thompson advertisements had appeared in twenty-six languages in over forty countries. Reaching international audiences and expanding their tastes required an understanding of local cultures and the ways in which they conducted their businesses, and advertisers often had to act as mediators for their clients. The J. Walter Thompson Company's efforts in Argentina provide an excellent case study of how both "local" and "global" messages of consumption were understood—and often misinterpreted—when they were transmitted to other countries from the United States. (Pages 387-416)

Beginning in 1897, the American ceramics industry entered a period of stability and collaboration that emerged from an agreement by several leading firms to fix prices and discounts, exchange cost and price information, and begin close contractual relations with its workers' union, the National Brotherhood of Operative Potters. One issue, however, remained troublesome: how to deal with occupational health issues in this disease-ridden trade. Should firms rely on state or private inspection? Should they be bound to one standard? Significantly, the companies and unions opted for private inspection systems that allowed them to maintain trade stability, even at the cost of health improvements. This arrangement remained in place until 1923, when federal antitrust actions shattered the trade association. Employers then faced a shift to state inspection and enacted a range of new schemes and private welfare plans to suit their designs. (Pages 417-446)

The sale of luxury goods during the 1930s represents an incongruous aspect of American business that has been largely ignored by historians. This essay focuses on the efforts of one manufacturer of high-quality, elegant glassware, A. H. Heisey & Company of Newark, Ohio, to survive the Great Depression. Heisey created successful new sales strategies and product designs to meet the changing tastes of its customers. Although difficult to gauge with precision, Heisey's business also benefited from the overlapping influence of several New Deal measures: the Beer-Wine Revenue Act, the National Recovery Act, and the National Housing Act. Paradoxically, Heisey was most hampered by President Roosevelt's adoption of fiscal restraint in 1937, a policy that the company's Republican executives strongly advocated. (Pages 447-478)

River of Enterprise: The Commercial Origins of Regional Identity in the Ohio Valley, 1790-1850. By Kim M. Gruenwald. Reviewed by John L. Brooke.

Fort Union and the Upper Missouri Fur Trade. By Barton H. Barbour. Reviewed by Clark C. Spence.

The Divided Welfare State: The Battle over Public and Private Social Benefits in the United States. By Jacob S. Hacker. Reviewed by Mark J. Stern.

Deceit and Denial: The Deadly Politics of Industrial Pollution. By Gerald Markowitz and David Rosner. Reviewed by David Stradling.

The Wealth of Nations Rediscovered: Integration and Expansion in American Financial Markets, 1780-1850. By Robert E. Wright. Reviewed by Lance Davis.

State Banking in Early America: A New Economic History. By Howard Bodenhorn. Reviewed by Benjamin J. Klebaner.

Empire City: The Making and Meaning of the New York City Landscape. By David M. Scobey. Reviewed by Matthew Gandy.

A River and Its City: The Nature of Landscape in New Orleans. By Ari Kelman. Reviewed by Ann L. Buttenwieser.

Neither Lady nor Slave: Working Women of the Old South. Edited by Susanna Delfino and Michele Gillespie. Reviewed by Nancy Bercaw.

Prostitution, Polygamy, and Power: Salt Lake City, 1847-1918. By Jeffrey Nichols. Reviewed by Thomas C. Mackey.

The Circus Age: Culture & Society Under the American Big Top. By Janet M. Davis. Reviewed by Bluford Adams.

Selling Yellowstone: Capitalism and the Construction of Nature. By Mark Daniel Barringer. Reviewed by Marguerite S. Shaffer.

High Altitude Energy: A History of Fossil Fuels in Colorado. By Lee Scamehorn. Reviewed by Joseph A. Pratt.

Yellowcake Towns: Uranium Mining Communities in the American West. By Michael A. Amundson. Reviewed by Michael A. Church.

Every Farm a Factory: The Industrial Ideal in American Agriculture. By Deborah Fitzgerald. Reviewed by R. Douglas Hurt.

Peanuts: The Illustrious History of the Goober Pea. By Andrew F. Smith. Reviewed by David Gerard Hogan.

A Breed So Rare: The Life of J. R. Parten, Liberal Texas Oil Man. By Don E. Carleton. Reviewed by Paul H. Carlson.

Benjamin V. Cohen: Architect of the New Deal. By William Lasser. Reviewed by Jason Scott Smith.

The Market, the State, and the Export-Import Bank of the United States, 1934-2000. By William H. Becker and William M. McClenahan Jr. Reviewed by Michael R. Adamson.

Confronting American Labor: The New Left Dilemma. By Jeffrey W. Coker. Reviewed by Kevin Boyle.

Race on the Line: Gender, Labor, and Technology in the Bell System, 1880-1980. By Venus Green. Reviewed by Alex Lichtenstein.

Between Human and Machine: Feedback, Control, and Computing before Cybernetics. By David A. Mindell. Reviewed by Thomas Haigh.

Strategic Computing: DARPA and the Quest for Machine Intelligence, 1983-1993. By Alex Roland and Philip Shiman. Reviewed by James W. Cortada.

False Prophets: The Gurus Who Created Modern Management and Why Their Ideas Are Bad for Business Today. By James Hoopes. Reviewed by Daniel A. Wren.

Jimmy Carter's Economy: Policy in an Age of Limits. By W. Carl Biven. Reviewed by Wyatt Wells.

The Company They Kept: Migrants and the Politics of Gender in Caribbean Costa Rica, 1870-1960. By Laura Putnam. Reviewed by Ron Harpelle.

Credit and Debt in Medieval England c. 1180-c. 1350. Edited by P. R. Schofield and N. J. Mayhew. Reviewed by Maryanne Kowaleski.

The Rise of Commercial Empires: England and The Netherlands in the Age of Mercantilism, 1650-1770. By David Ormrod. Reviewed by Martine Julia van Ittersum.

The Mighty Experiment: Free Labor versus Slavery in British Emancipation. By Seymour Drescher. Reviewed by Pamela Scully.

Chronicles of British Business in Asia, 1850-1960: A Bibliography of Printed Company Histories with Short Accounts of the Concerns. By Lionel Carter. Reviewed by Catherine R. Schenk.

The Great Train Race. Railways and the Franco-German Rivalry, 1815-1914. By Allan Mitchell. Reviewed by Boris Barth.

Multinationalität hat verschiedene Gesichter." Formen internationaler Unternehmenstätigkeit der Société Anonyme des Mines et Fondries de Zinc de la Vielle Montagne und der Metallgesellschaft vor 1914 ["Multinationality Has Different Faces": Aspects of International Business Transactions of the Anonymous Society of Mines and the Zinc Foundries of Vielle Montagne and the Metal-Trading Company before 1914]. By Susan Becker. Reviewed by Christian Kleinschmidt.

National Cultures and International Competition: The Experience of Schering AG, 1851-1950. By Christopher Kobrak. Reviewed by S. Jonathan Wiesen.

Il Quarto Capitalismo. Un profilo italiano [The Fourth Capitalism: An Italian Profile]. By Andrea Colli. Reviewed by David LoRomer.

Commerce in Russian Urban Culture, 1861-1914. Edited by William Craft Brumfield, Boris V. Anan'ich, and Yuri A. Petrov. Reviewed by William Tompson.

Consuming Hong Kong. Edited by Gordon B. Mathews and Tai-lok Lui. Reviewed by Yin-wah Chu.

Coping with Crisis: International Financial Institutions in the Interwar Period. Edited by Makoto Kasuya. Reviewed by Barry Eichengreen.