About this Book

"Strictly speaking, this is not an architectural history. Rather, it is history narrated by architecture. This is a book about small towns because the history of the South before 1910 is about small towns. It is a book about courthouses because the courthouse, more than any other building of the era, symbolized the collective self-image of the people of these towns. It is a book about depots because the depot is the architecture of the railroad, and in this period, for these people, in these places, the railroad brought with it the all-consuming and often disappointing promise of the future."--Jacket.