The Jungle

1. The Jungle • Written by Upton Sinclair (1878 – 1968) • Sinclair was an early convert to socialism (elimination of private ownership of industry & economic/class equality) • The book follows an immigrant Lithuanian family as they come to America and end up working in the meat packing plants outside of Chicago around the turn of the century.

2. Publication • Published in 1906 • Sinclair couldn’t find a publisher because the book was to controversial until readers pre-ordered 12,000 copies and then Doubleday agreed to publish it.

3. Validity of the book • Sinclair lived with immigrant meat packing plant workers in Chicago’s meat packing district for seven weeks to do research for the book. • Dr. W.K. Jacques a former meat inspector stated that The Jungle contained no serious errors or exagerations • Isaac Marcosson, an editor for Doubleday, obtained a Meat Inspector’s badge and said what he saw was worse than Sinclair depicted it

4. Change created by the book • President Theodore Roosevelt read The Jungle and within six months of its publication the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Beef Inspection Act had been passed to regulate the meat packing industry that Sinclair had described.

5. Main point of the book not realized • While Sinclair’s book created real change the conditions of the meat packing plants were his secondary point. His main point was the treatment of workers and a call for this country to move towards Socialism.