Drawn from his 2007 dissertation, historian Solomon Iyobosa Omo-Osagie II offers readers a complex portrait of rural blacks' lives in the region's broiler industry. He moves seamlessly from social histories of rural African Americans to an economic history of the industry....He skillfully pieces together an effective outline of the local industry's trajectory over six decades based on official publications, local media, and oral histories...Omo-Osagie's book makes an important contribution to an emerging scholarship on the place of rural labor in the making of the modern chicken industry.
Agricultural History
Scholars have long overlooked African American contributions to the growth of poultry agribusiness, and this neglect is especially true with regard to the Chesapeake region. . . .[This book] provides a much-needed analysis of the region's poultry trade.
Journal of Southern History
Through the use of primary and secondary sources, Dr. Omo-Osagie provides an interesting look at these companies and their evolution over time into multi-million dollar operations. What is most exciting, however, is the fact that his manuscript provides a lens through which he examines the critical role which African Americans played in the growth and success of this industry — not as owners, but as workers. This is another aspect of the role of African Americans as workers in a critical 20th century American industry which has not been explored.
Bettye J. Gardner, professor of history, Coppin State University