Building Charleston

"Building Charleston deserves a well-earned place on the urban historians' bookshelf. . . . Stands as an important contribution to the history of eighteenth-century Atlantic urbanism."—Journal of American History

"Breaks new ground in its convincing treatment of the importance of Charleston and its middle class in colonial southern life. Never again will we casually take Virginia as the ne plus ultra of the prerevolutionary South."—Journal of Southern History

"Emma Hart's Building Charleston is an intriguing and important book that significantly advances our understanding of colonial Charleston and, more importantly, will force scholars to rethink the study of early American urban history."—South Carolina Historical Magazine

"Hart's new study of Charleston refocuses our scholarly attention about the South from countryside to city, from planters to urban residents before the 1780s. . . . Hart provides a powerful descriptive narrative about Charleston and the variety of people shaping the city's character—economically, culturally, politically—and places this narrative into an equally strong comparative transatlantic British urban context."—Cathy Matson, University of Delaware, author of The American Experiment: A History of the United States