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==As nostalgia== From the mid to late 20th century, Americana was largely conceptualized as a nostalgia for an idealized life in small towns and cities in the United States around the [[turn of the century]], roughly in the period between 1880 and the [[World War I|First World War]].<ref name="Sears 1">{{cite book |last=Sears |first=Stephen |title=Hometown U.S.A. |year=1975 |publisher=American Heritage |location=New York |isbn=0-671-22079-9 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/hometownusa00sear/page/6 6–9] |url=https://archive.org/details/hometownusa00sear/page/6 }}</ref> It was believed that much of the structure of 20th-century American life and culture had been cemented in that time and place. American author [[Henry Seidel Canby]] wrote: {{blockquote|It is the small town, the small city, that is our heritage. We have made twentieth-century America from it, and some account of these communities as they were ... we owe our children and grandchildren.<ref name="Canby">{{cite book |last=Canby |first=Henry Seidel |title=The Age of Confidence: Life in the Nineties |url=https://archive.org/details/ageofconfidencel0000canb |url-access=registration |year=1934 |publisher=Farrar & Rinehart |location=New York |asin=B000857UVO}}</ref>}} Many kinds of cultural artifacts fall within the definition of Americana: the things involved need not be old, but are usually associated with some quintessential element of the American experience. Each period of [[History of the United States|United States history]] is reflected by the advertising and marketing of the time, and the various types of antiques, collectibles, memorabilia and vintage items from these time periods are typical of what is popularly considered Americana. ''[[The Atlantic]]'' described the term as "slang for the comforting, middle-class ephemera at your average antique store—things like needle-pointed pillows, [[American Civil War|Civil War]] [[daguerreotype]]s, and engraved silverware sets".<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/08/why-is-a-music-genre-called-americana-so-overwhelmingly-white-and-male/278267/|title=Why Is a Music Genre Called 'Americana' So Overwhelmingly White and Male?|author=Giovanni Russonello|work=The Atlantic|date=August 2013}}</ref> The nostalgia for this period was based on a remembrance of confidence in American life that had emerged during the period due to such factors as a sense that the [[American frontier|frontier]] had finally been "conquered", with the [[U.S. Census Bureau]]'s declaration that it was "closed" in 1890, as well as the recent victory in the [[Spanish–American War]].<ref name="Sears 1" /> By 1912, the contiguous United States was at last fully politically incorporated, and the idea of the nation as a single, solid unity could begin to take hold. As Canby put it, {{blockquote|Americans at this time "really believed all they heard on the [[Independence Day (United States)|Fourth of July]] or read in school readers. They set on one plane of time, and that the present, the [[United States Declaration of Independence|Declaration of Independence]], the [[manifest destiny]] of America, the new plumbing, the growth of the factory system, the morning paper, and the church sociable. It was all there at once, better than elsewhere, their own, and permanent. ... They had just the country they wanted...and they believed it would be the same, except for more bathtubs and faster trains, forever ... for the last time in living memory everyone knew exactly what it meant to be an American."<ref name="Canby" />}} On growing up [[Italian-American]], novelist [[Don DeLillo]] stated: {{blockquote|It’s no accident that my first novel was called Americana. This was a private declaration of independence, a statement of my intention to use the whole picture, the whole culture. America was and is the immigrant's dream, and as the son of two immigrants I was attracted by the sense of possibility that had drawn my grandparents and parents.|''Conversations With Don DeLillo''<ref name="Conversations with Don DeLillo">{{cite book|last1=DeLillo|first1=Don|title=Conversations with Don DeLillo|date=January 13, 2005|publisher=University Press of Mississippi|isbn=1578067049|page=88|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nIOdBrl1keUC}}</ref> }} The [[zeitgeist]] of this idealized period is captured in [[Disneyland]] and [[Magic Kingdom]]'s [[Main Street, U.S.A.]] section (which was inspired by both [[Walt Disney]]'s hometown of [[Marceline, Missouri]] and [[Harper Goff]]'s childhood home of [[Fort Collins, Colorado]]),<ref name="fort-collins.co.us">{{cite web|url=http://library.ci.fort-collins.co.us/Local_history/Topics/legends/disney.htm |title=Local History Archive Larimer Legends – Old Town & Disneyland – City of Fort Collins, Colorado |publisher=Library.ci.fort-collins.co.us |accessdate=2013-12-19 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20090125183538/http://library.ci.fort-collins.co.us/Local_history/Topics/legends/disney.htm |archivedate=2009-01-25 }}</ref> as well as the musical and movie ''[[The Music Man]]'' and [[Thornton Wilder]]'s stage play ''[[Our Town]]''.<ref name="Sears 1" /> Especially revered in nostalgic Americana are small-town institutions like the barber shop,<ref name="Sears 2">{{cite book |last=Sears |first=Stephen |title=Hometown U.S.A. |year=1975 |publisher=American Heritage |location=New York |isbn=0-671-22079-9 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/hometownusa00sear/page/12 12–13, 29] |url=https://archive.org/details/hometownusa00sear/page/12 }}</ref> drug store, soda fountain and ice cream parlor;<ref name="Sears 3">{{cite book |last=Sears |first=Stephen |title=Hometown U.S.A. |year=1975 |publisher=American Heritage |location=New York |isbn=0-671-22079-9 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/hometownusa00sear/page/12 12–13, 20] |url=https://archive.org/details/hometownusa00sear/page/12 }}</ref> some of these were eventually resurrected by mid-twentieth century nostalgia for the time period in businesses like the [[Farrell's Ice Cream Parlour]] chain, with its 1890s theme.<ref name="franchise">{{cite news |url=http://nrn.com/corporate/farrells-looks-restart-growth |title=Farrell's looks to restart growth Owner outlines expansion plans for iconic ice cream chain |date=August 31, 2010 |work=Nation's Restaurant News |accessdate=4 June 2014}}</ref>
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