Jacob Riis (1849-1914) began his career as a journalist in New York City and dedicated his life to trying to reform the tenement slums. His innovative use of photographic journalism helped raise awareness of poverty among city officials. Yet Riis did not escape the prejudices of the time that many native whites held against Jewish and other immigrants.
Abraham Cahan (1860-1951) was a Jewish immigrant from Russia, a journalist, a novelist, and a socialist. Much of his efforts were focused on depicting the social, cultural, religious and other aspects of Jewish life in New York city in the Jewish Daily Forward , a journal that he edited. Unlike reformers, Cahan viewed the East Side with sympathy and compassion.
The Populist Omaha Platform, 1892, articulates the great agrarian protest against falling prices, poor credit, poor marketing facilities, and crop failures.
Novelist Willa Cather (1873-1947) celebrated the pioneer tradition of western prairies in such books as O Pioneers (1913). This excerpt from My Ántonia (1918) offers a glimpse of rural life in Nebraska.