Trailer Park America

In tracing the rise of these three distinctively American institutions, Andrew Hurley examines the struggle of Americans with modest means to attain the good life after two long decades of depression and war.".

THE STORY: There's a new tenant at Armadillo Acres--and she's wreaking havoc all over Florida's most exclusive trailer park. When Pippi, the stripper on the run, comes between the Dr. Phil-loving, agoraphobic Jeannie and her tollbooth collector husb

In Singlewide, Sonya Salamon and Katherine MacTavish explore the role of the trailer park as a source of affordable housing. America's trailer parks, most in rural places, shelter an estimated 12 million people, and the authors show how these parks serve as a private solution to a pressing public need. Singlewide considers the circumstances of families with school-age children in trailer parks serving whites in Illinois, Hispanics in New Mexico, and African Americans in North Carolina. By looking carefully at the daily lives of families who live side by side in rows of manufactured homes, Salamon and MacTavish draw conclusions about the importance of housing, community, and location in the families' dreams of opportunities and success as signified by eventually owning land and a conventional home. Working-poor rural families who engage with what Salamon and MacTavish call the "mobile home industrial complex" may become caught in an expensive trap starting with their purchase of a mobile home. A family that must site its trailer in a land-lease trailer park struggles to realize any of the anticipated benefits of homeownership. Seeking to break down stereotypes, Salamon and MacTavish reveal the important place that trailer parks hold within the United States national experience. In so doing, they attempt to integrate and normalize a way of life that many see as outside the mainstream, suggesting that families who live in trailer parks, rather than being "trailer trash," culturally resemble the parks' neighbors who live in conventional homes.

Manufactured Insecurity is the first book of its kind to provide an in-depth investigation of the social, legal, geospatial, and market forces that intersect to create housing insecurity for an entire class of low-income residents. Drawing on rich ethnographic data collected before, during, and after mobile home park closures and community-wide evictions in Florida and Texas—the two states with the largest mobile home populations—Manufactured Insecurity forces social scientists and policymakers to respond to a fundamental question: how do the poor access and retain secure housing in the face of widespread poverty, deepening inequality, and scarce legal protection? With important contributions to urban sociology, housing studies, planning, and public policy, the book provides a broader understanding of inequality and social welfare in the United States today.

In rural northern Idaho in the winter of 2013-2014, Syringa Mobile Home Park’s water system was contaminated by sewage, resulting in residents’ water being shut off for 93 days. By summer 2018 Syringa had closed, forcing residents to relocate or face homelessness. Trailer Park America chronicles how residents dealt with regulatory agencies, frequent boil order notices, threats of closure, and class-based social stigma over this period. Despite all this, what was seen as a dysfunctional, ‘disorderly’ community by outsiders was instead a refuge where veterans, women heads of households, and people with disabilities or substance use disorders were supported and understood. The embattled Syringa community also organized to defend the rights and dignity of residents and served as a site for negotiating with local government, culminating in a class-action lawsuit that reached the federal level. The experiences Syringa residents faced in this conservative, predominately white region of the United States are emblematic of the growing national and global crisis in affordable housing and home ownership, with declining work conditions and incomes for the working-class.

Get to know the colorful cast of characters at the Granite State Trailerpark, where Flora in number 11 keeps more than a hundred guinea pigs andscreams at people to stay away from her babies, Claudel in number 5 thinks he is lucky until his wife burns down their trailer and runs off with Howie Leeke, and Noni in number 7 has telephone conversations with Jesus and tells the police about them. In this series of related short stories, Russell Banks offers gripping, realistic portrayals of individual Americans and paints a portrait of New England life that is at once dark, witty, and revealing.

The American cultural stereotype might equate trailers with survival, but here in Boulder, people are choosing the trailer park as a way to thrive. Through interviews and photographs "Trailer Park People" explores the value of downsizing, settling in, growing a garden, creating community, and investing in less. When we explored this mobile home park in the heart of Boulder, Colorado, we found a hub of conscious living. By choosing a tiny space, residents find they can live more sustainably and simply, in one of America's most beautiful cities.

The first of its kind – a heavily illustrated, all-you-need-to-know book about the cult hit TV show, for both rabid fans and anyone who enjoys a hot toasted chicken finger. To the storied and pastoral locales of great Canadian fiction – Leacock’ s Mariposa, Lawrence’s Manawaka, Montgomery’s Avonlea – readers can now add the many splendours of Sunnyvale Trailer Park. With this lovingly designed volume, to grace even the finest toilet-side magazine basket, Ricky, Bubbles, Julian and the whole TPB crew stumble, bewildered and slightly aggravated, from the screen to the page – without spilling a drop of rum and Coke. Working in concert with the show’s creators Matthew Sibiga and Don Wininger have developed a wide range of interpretive devices, helpful lists, historical mementoes, legal advice, wrestling, kitty-care and grooming tips, and more, to aid in any fan’s appreciation of the show – or substitute for it when the cable is out. Added to these features is a two-page synopsis of every episode, including stats, air dates and best lines. Numerous photos and sidebars scattered throughout include quotes, philosophical gleanings and tidbits from the series. Just in time for new episodes on Netflix (or of yet-another-re-run) of one of the most popular television shows ever created in Canada, The Complete Trailer Park Boys truly is a resource no fan can do without. Some sample chapter topics: Ricky: -A list of Rickyisms -Map of areas in the park where he has passed out -A detailed pictorial of his car/home Bubbles: -Bubbles’s shopping cart chop shop–behind the scenes -Go-cart performance specs -Bubbles eye chart Julian: -Julian’s fashion tips (how to match black with black) -Best money-making schemes -T-shirt wearing and the art of seduction -Julian’ s bartending mix book Other characters: -J-Roc rap lyrics -Ray’s tips on beating the government on disability -Corey and Trevor’s gas siphoning tips