“The westward migration across America in the decades after World War II was the largest and most precipitous migration in world history. It so defied all precedent that scholars hesitated even to attempt to interpret it.
“One serious and committed journalist, Neil Morgan, couldn’t wait. He loaded recorders and fax into his back seat and toured the entire West alone for two years. He provoked serious conversation with Westerners from gold miners to governors, from publicists to physicists.
“A pattern of faiths emerged, from which Morgan has written a massive, narrative study. His conclusions, hopeful but wary, will stand for a long time until historians cover the same ground. By then, I suspect, the fate of Morgan’s West will seem perfectly obvious."
--Gladwin Hill, The New York Times, 1963
Reviews:
“Horace Greeley must have been right. Easterners know more about California than any other state in this Western group, but here they will find a new dimension. Neil Morgan’s analysis of the political and economic life of the eleven states that make up the Far West is a delightful book by a migrant from North Carolina. From the date groves and resorts of Palm Springs, through Disneyland, Hollywood and up the Central Valley to the cable cars of Baghdad-by-the Bay (which Morgan derides for its narcissism), one reads this valuable book with excitement and anticipation.”
--Senator Maurine Neuberger in the Washington Post
Excerpt
“The naturalist Joseph Wood Krutch moved West, not for its future, but to escape city crowding and to explore wild life and natural beauty. In his Tucson patio one afternoon, his wistful words crystallized the hopes and fears I had accumulated during my two-year journey:
“The West did, and still does, offer a wonderful opportunity for starting a new kind of life, a civilization different from the old one. The real questions are, ‘Is that opportunity going to be muffed? Will the possibility be realized?’ Won’t it be interesting to see the answers?’ It has become far more than interesting. Now it is crucial for the nation.”
“It is not enough to face a doubling of population in California by redoubling expenditures of energy, imagination, and political leadership. These commitments must take innovative forms. More than the future of this one state is at stake. California is ranging out ahead of America. To study its people is to turn a telescope toward the future, whether it matches the dream or the nightmare..
