“This retelling of a well-known story is significant partly for its detail and objectivity, but mostly because the author focuses on telling the story from the perspective of the police rather than the protesters. . . . Highly recommended.”

Choice

“Kusch’s history of white Chicago policemen and the 1968 Democratic National Convention is a solid addition to a growing literature on the cultural sensibility and political perspective of the conservative white working class in the last third of the twentieth century.”

Journal of American History

“A fascinating story unfolds, of family-oriented cops recruited from white ethnic communities confronting middle-class ‘longhairs’; of both the police and the activists able to perceive one another only as stereotypes . . . of the cumulative and destructive mutual antipathy between police and press.”

History

“Masterful. . . . Kusch’s interviews contribute invaluable material to one wishing to decipher and make theoretical sense of what happened in Chicago during the 1968 Convention.”

Contemporary Sociology

"Battleground Chicago is especially valuable because it lets the police officers involved in the riots in Lincoln and Grant Parks have their say."

Julia Keller | Chicago Tribune