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Creating a Top Ten List for the Gilded Age/Progressive Era is challenging. There are an extraordinary number of outstanding books on this period. These books are a selection of our favorites. Most of these books are focused on trying to define this era as whole, instead of focusing on a single issue. In other words, several of these books are seeking to create a grand narrative of the era to help their readers understand it.
Admittedly, the border between the Gilded Age and the Progressive Era is somewhat murky. There are not any of the easy starting and stopping points that can be pointed to for defining eras such as Colonial America, the American Civil War, Reconstruction or the Cold War. Arguably, even the term Gilded Age is somewhat archaic and perhaps the era should be renamed.
In a way, this listed is focused on the last thirty years of the Nineteenth Century and the implications of those decades on the start of the Twentieth Century. Many people have pointed to similarity of the issues between the Gilded Age/Progressive Era and our present America (technology, income inequality, immigration, expansion of government, big business, extreme wealth, etc.).
As with all of our booklists, if you disagree with this expert booklist you can create a new and better one.
Edward L. Ayers, ''[[Categoryhttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0195326881/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0195326881&linkCode=as2&tag=dailyh0c-20&linkId=e61efea8bf3f1f272083a6c8d564d53a The Promise of the New South:Booklists]Life After Reconstruction] '' (Oxford University Press, 2007 - 15th Anniversary edition) Ayers book is a nuanced and complete view of the South after Reconstruction. Ayers is more concerned with everyday citizens than political actors, but this approach shows how the South balanced tradition and a modernizing world. [[CategoryFile:United States HistoryMetaphysical.jpg|right|thumbnail|250px|<i>The Metaphysical Club</i> by Louis Menand]] Louis Menand, ''[[Categoryhttps://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0374528497/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0374528497&linkCode=as2&tag=dailyh0c-20&linkId=90cc56b6a3388a6c824f90a3594d5571 The Metaphysical Club:Gilded Age]A Story of Ideas in America] [[Category:'' (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2002) The Metaphysical Club won the Pulitzer prize for its extraordinary take on a group of Progressive Era]][[Category:History Booklists]]intellectuals. His book shows how these intellectuals brought America into the modern world with their brand of philosophical pragmatism.