Patricia A. Schechter teaches history at Portland State University in Oregon, U.S.A. She is the author of Ida B. Wells-Barnett and American Reform, 1880-1930, which won the Keller-Sierra Book Prize. Her other books and public history projects have been recognized for their excellence by ACRL Choice and the Oral History Association, among others.
Patricia A. Schechter has written a wonderful story of what we often call modernization. Focusing on a small Andalusian town, Pueblonuevo (Córdoba), she aptly explains how the arrival of “progress” brought with it the emergence of new social groups, identities, and conflicts that deepened until the tragic outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936. This is local history at its best. Antonio Cazorla-Sánchez, Professor of History, Trent University, Canada