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Subject is exactly Packingtown

Promotional Piece III - "The Jungle" - Appeal to Reason

"As previously announced, the second chapter of "The Jungle" will be printed next week—No. 484—thus giving an interval of two weeks between the publication of the first chapter and the second. This was done in order that the names of the new subscribers could be put on the mailing list in time to receive the second chapter. This putting on of new names is a big job—especially true at this time when the new names are beginning to roll into the office in a flood. . . ."

Appeal to Reason  1905-03-04

Promotional Piece II-"The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"It will set forth the breaking of human hearts in a system which exploits the labor of men and women for profits. It will shake the popular heart and blow the top off of the industrial tea-kettle. What Socialism there will be in this book, will, of course, be imminent; it will be revealed by incidents--there will be no sermons. The novel will not have any superficial resemblance to 'Uncle Tom's Cabin.' Fundamentally it will be identical with it—or try to be. It will show the 'system working.' It will show Graft in its thousand forms at work slaughtering women and children. Its themes will be the everyday ones of bread and butter; it will have incidents and adventures—a life and death struggle, and a heart-breaking tragedy—the tragedy of life. . . ."

Appeal to Reason  1905-02-11

Introductory Essay to The Lost First Edition of Upton Sinclair's "The Jungle" - Gene DeGruson - Peachtree Press

"In the summer of 1980 a young man brought to Pittsburg StateUniversity a small truckload of rotting, mildewed paper. He had been hired, he explained, to clean out a cellar of a nearby Girard, Kansas, farm. Upon seeing the name of Upton Sinclair on several pieces of correspondence, he decided that perhaps the material should go to the local university's library rather than to the county dump. Too fragile to handle, the papers were covered with brightly colored mold, dyed purple by typewriter ribbon and red and green by inks used to write and print the documents. The fetid mass eventually proved to be over a thousand business records, inner office memos, and correspondence of the Appeal to Reason, once the nation's leading Socialist newspaper. Six months of drying were followed by weeks of careful brushing. More than a year was to pass before the most delicate items were deacidified and mounted on rag paper. Then began the organization of the papers. Pages of letters had become separated, and, in the sorting and drying process, many pieces no larger than a dime were stored to await their place in what came to be regarded as a gigantic jigsaw puzzle. Throughout the long and tedious period of reconstruction, however, there was no question that the time and expense would be warranted. . . "

VII-"The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"They were over a hundred dollars in debt, and all things not yet counted. It was a bitter and cruel experience, and it left them plunged in an agony of despair. Such a time of all times for them to have it, when their hearts were made tender! Such a pitiful beginning it was for their married life; they loved each other so, and they could not have the briefest respite!"

Appeal to Reason  1905-04-15

VI-"The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"The details came gradually. In the first place as to the house they had bought, it was not new at all, as they had supposed; it was about fifteen years old, and there was nothing new upon it but the paint, which was so bad that it needed to be put on new every year or two. The house was one of a whole row that was built by a company which existed to make money by swindling poor people."

Appeal to Reason  1905-04-08

Promotional Piece I-"The Crowning Achievement of the Appeal" - "The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"It will be the most powerful story ever written. It will be the Uncle Tom's Cabin of the Socialist movement. It will touch the heart strings of the people as they have never been touched before."

Appeal to Reason  1905-02-04

III- "The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"Jokubas was an old-time resident, and all these wonders had grown up under his eyes, and he had a personal pride in them. The packers might own the land, but he claimed the landscape, and there was no one to say nay to this."

Appeal to Reason  1905-03-18

II- "The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"There were twelve in all in the party, five adults and six children—and Ona, who was a little of both. They had a hard time of the passage: there was an agent who helped them, but he proved a scoundrel, and got them into a trap with some officials, and cost them a good deal of their precious money, which they clung to with such horrible fear. This happened to them again in New York—for, of course, they knew nothing about the country, and had no one to tell them, and it was easy for a man in a blue uniform to lead them away, and to take them to a hotel and keep them there, and make them pay enormous charges to get away."

Appeal to Reason  1905-03-11

I- "The Jungle: A Story of Chicago" - Upton Sinclair - Appeal to Reason

"Marija was too eager to see that others conformed to the proprieties to consider them herself. She had left the church last of all, and, desiring to arrive first at the hall, had issued orders to the coachman to drive faster. When that personage had developed a will of his own in the matter, Marija had flung up the window of the carriage, and, leaning out, proceeded to tell him her opinion of him, first in Lithuanian, which he did not understand, and then in Polish, which he did."

Appeal to Reason  1905-02-25

"Is 'The Jungle' True?" - Upton Sinclair - The Independent

"The question is," says The Independent reviewer, "how seriously shall we take this story of life in the packing house district of Chicago?" That seems to be the question with a great many people. For the past year, ever since the story began appearing serially, I have been receiving half a dozen letters a day asking it; so that if a public answer serves no other purpose, it will at least help to lighten the burden of my mail.

The Independent  1906-05-17