The Life Stories of Undistinguished Americans As Told by Themselves

Hamilton Holt, editor of The Independent, collected these touching autobiographies of ordinary people--new immigrants and sharecroppers, cooks and fishermen, women and men working in sweatshops, in the city, and on the land. First published in 1906, and reissued a decade ago, this new edition of Life Stories of Undistinguished Americans is expanded to include lives Holt did not include in his original selection, as well as a new preface by Werner Sollors.

In addition to a career as a newspaper editor, Hamilton Holt was a supporter of Zora Neale Hurston and President of Rollins College. Werner Sollors is Henry B. and Anne M. Cabot Professor of English Literature, Professor of Afro-American Studies, and Chair of the History of American Civilization Program at Harvard University. His books include Beyond Ethnicity and The Invention of Ethnicity.