The American College Town [Paperback]

The college town is a unique type of urban place, shaped by the sometimes conflicting forces of youth, intellect, and idealism. The hundreds of college towns in the United States are, in essence, an academic archipelago. Similar to one another, they differ in fundamental ways from other cities and the regions in which they are located.

In this highly readable bookthe first work published on the subjectBlake Gumprecht identifies the distinguishing features of college towns, explains why they have developed as they have in the United States, and examines in depth various characteristics that make them unusual. In eight thematic chapters, he explores some of the most interesting aspects of college townstheir distinctive residential and commercial districts, their unconventional political cultures, their status as bohemian islands, their emergence as high-tech centers, and more. Each of these chapters focuses on a single college town as an example, while providing additional evidence from other towns.

Lively, richly detailed, and profusely illustrated with original maps and photographs, as well as historical images, this is an important book that firmly establishes the college town as an integral component of the American experience.

“At last! With this literally unprecedented volume, Blake Gumprecht has filled what may have been the most grievous of gaps in the literature of our American settlement landscape. Moreover, he has done so in magisterial fashion by telling us in wonderfully readable prose virtually everything one might wish to know about those many scores of special places. I have read it with unalloyed pleasure and hope that a vast l*