Author Description

The book is a photographic essay about a 1920s West Texas oil boomtown, Breckenridge, using 100 of the images of local photographer, Basil Clemons. On a larger scale, however, it is a photographic record of the cultural roots of modern America. Most historians would agree that modern American culture began after World War I and took shape in the 1920s. The twenties featured such modern cultural fare as widespread auto ownership, big-time sports, and the first mesmerizing mass media--radio and cinema. Basil Clemons never saw himself as the photographer of modern American culture, but that is what he has become to us. His photographs will remain American--and Texas--treasures, because they so vividly captured that formative modern, national, Jazz-Age culture. (The authors)