| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.3

You have not been recognized as a subscriber to JAH online. About 220 words from this article are provided below; about 415 words remain.

If you are a individual member of the Organization of American Historians, you may:: • login here if you have already registered for online access.; • Or if you're already logged in register your subscription.
• Set up your online account for the first time.
If you are not a member of the Organization of American Historians, you can:: • Join the OAH and receive many member benefits including print and electronic issues of the Journal of American History.
• Purchase a research pass to gain two-hour access to the entire History Cooperative web site. You will have full access to current issues of the Journal of American History (86.1-present). Note: the Research Pass does not provide access to JSTOR's holdings of the Journal of American History.
Instititutions can:: • Subscribe to this journal and receive print and electronic issues.
• Activate your existing subscription so that we recognize your IP number ranges.

| Book Review | The Journal of American History, 93.3 | The History Cooperative

Book Review

Widows and Orphans First: The Family Economy and Social Welfare Policy, 1880–1939. By S. J. Kleinberg. (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2006. xiv, 230 pp. $35.00, ISBN 0-252-03020-6.)
The limited attention given widows in women's history publications motivated this careful study of how social policy and economic conditions influenced and diversified widows' family economy in the early twentieth century. S. J. Kleinberg positions the impoverishment of most widows' families at the core of calls for social welfare reform. This explains the book's title, though descriptions of continuing hardship show the irony of being "first."	1
The author combines national census demographics and manuscript census details from Baltimore, Maryland, Fall River, Massachusetts, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to illustrate that no single model represents widows' family economy. Quantitative and qualitative evidence from these cities describes varying degrees of reliance on working, receiving charity, placing children in orphanages, and residing in old age homes. Attitudes about self-sufficiency, family roles, and race opened opportunities in some places and closed them in others.	2
One of the book's strengths is its attention to race. Selection of Baltimore guaranteed that African American widows' experiences would be part of the analysis. Proportionately, they were more likely than white women to be widowed and less likely to receive help from outside the family.	. . .

There are about 415 more words in this article. Please log in (or, if you are not yet an authorized user, please go to the User Setup page) to gain full access rights. Or if you're already logged in register your subscription.