The Muckrakers

Exposed Social Evils – Theodore Roosevelt gave them this name because they were “only looking down on society,” raking muck onto society. Muckrakers are a group of authors that were exposing all the evils that were going on in American Corporations.

Upton Sinclair

Wrote the book "The Jungle" in 1906.

He was a Pulitzer-Prize winning author, who wrote over 90 books. He was considered one of the best investigators advocating socialist views. He gained his fame through his early 20th century novel "The Jungle," focusing on the horrors of the meat packing industry, and all the things that might "slip" into your meat in the packaging plant. Causing a public upheavle that contributed to the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act in 1906.

Lincoln Steffens

Wrote the book "The Shame Of The Cities" in 1904.

Steffens was a journalist. He later became an editor of McClure's magazine. he worked with famous muckrakers Ida Tarbell and Ray Stannard Baker. He was especially good at investigating government and political corruption. Two of his articles actually were made up into his book "The Shame Of The Cities" and "Struggle for Self-Government." He, Tarbell, and Baker, all formed American Magazine.

Jacob Riis

Wrote the book "How The Other Half Lives" in 1890.

In 1877 he took a job as a police reporter for the new york tribune. through his experiences as a police reporter, he worked in the most crime infested, lowest of slums. through this he wrote through the eyes of people living in these slums in an attempt to make a difference. After reading his book "How The Other Half Lives," Theodore Roosevelt like it so much he had to meet him, and thus coined the term "muckraking journalism." making Riis a prime example of muckraking.

Ida Tarbell

Wrote the book "The History of the Standard Oil Company" in 1904.

She was a teacher/writer, and was viewed as one of the "lead" muckrakers. In 1999 her book "The History of the Standard Oil Company" was listed as number 5 in the new york times top 100 books of the twentieth century.

Henry Lloyd

Wrote the book "Wealth Against Commonwealth" in 1894.

Henry Lloyd was a muckraking journalist for the Chicago Tribune.Henry Demarest Lloyd was born in New York City on 1st May, 1847.Lloyd published a series of articles exposing corruption in business and politics. This included "The Story of a Great Monopoly"(1881) and "The Political Economy of Seventy-Three Million Dollars" (1882) in the Alantic Monthly and "Making Bread Dear" (1883) and "Lords of Industry" (1884) in the North American Review. These are all exemplary behaviors of a muckraker.