New spirits: Americans in the gilded age, 1865-1905

Part I. The wedge, 1865-1890

An uneasy peace: the legacies of Civil War

Reach: energy, corporations, and people in the global economy

Work: moving up or getting by

A state of war: the violence of incorporation

Part II. The exchange

Money

Youth

Sex

Faith

Science

Part III. The fires, 1890-1905

Cooperative dreams: populists and progressives

Executive powers: presidents, corporations, and American empire

Epilogue: the partridges and the hippopotamus.