This book provides the reader with a wide-ranging social history of the English working class from 1750 to 1900, and brings a new perspective to historical debate about the industrial revolution and the making of the English working class. The study is divided into three sections ranging from a consideration of the classic industrial revolution, 1750-1850, through the mid-Victorian boom, 1850-1875, to the late-Victorian Great Depression of 1875-1900. In each section the author discusses issues such as Living Standards, housing, work, popular culture, radicalism and reformism and by so doing he illuminates areas of working class experience which are excluded from other studies of the industrial revolution. This book will acquaint readers with some of the most controversial areas of debate in modern British social history.