Why read Rust Belt Boy?

Book cover of Rust Belt Boy: Stories of an American Childhood

Book description

These stories are specific to one legendary riverfront plateau and one boy's journey, but are emblematic of immigrant life and blue-collar aspirations during the heyday of American industry and its crash, foreshadowing one of the largest internal migrations in U.S. history. Approximately six million baby boomers, like the narrator, fled…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Rust Belt Boy as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Neill McKee

Author

This was one of the first of many childhood and youth memoirs I read while writing my book. The author, Paul Hertneky, had a similar experience to mine in a larger immigrant-filled steel mill town, Ambridge, Pennsylvania. It’s an entertaining story of how he almost became a permanent resident, working in the mill like his father, but finally escaped this industrially-polluted environment, as I did. My hometown also had many newly-arrived immigrants and, at one time, I was also thinking of following in my father’s footsteps. The big difference is that my hometown never became part of the rust belt,…

From Neill's list on The best memoirs of childhood and youth.