In 1925 and ten years later in the depression 30s, Robert and Helen Lynd used "class" the cleavage between a dominant business and the working class -to illuminate the dynamics of community life in Muncie, Indiana. Their focus on class reflected not only what they observed in the field but also the impact of Marxism on American intellectual life. Although the authors accord it no special significance, the publication of a whole book on Muncie's families in the late 1970s suggests important changes in American ideology and politics. Peter Davis in his Spring 1982 television series on Middletown also focused on a family in three of his five documentary films. The three films that focus on family life are "Circle of Faith" about a fundamentalist family, "Second-Time Around" about a couple's planned marriage after prior divorces, and "Family Business." A fourth film, "The Campaign" also presents materials about the candidates' family life. On rereading Middletown and Middletown in Transition, it was the Lynds' often underinterpreted data on family life that struck me as especially interesting.
Middletown and Middletown in Transition documented the local decline from 1890 through the 1930s of an organized, conscious and politically active working class coupled with the rise of a coherent business class. This is not what the Lynds hoped to find. While not completely revealing their own political proclivities, the Lynds specified that they, unlike their subjects, were critical of a laissez faire economy. The Lynds also rejected the prevalent view