"Riders were very appropriate to a western war, but these horsemen could not have been more different. One group patrolled the oceanfront of 'The City' after dark. While the residents of the nearby Sunset District and Seacliff huddled around the radios in their living rooms, curtains pulled and blinds lowered, listening to war news or to 'One Man's Family,' other residents rode the beaches. Mounted on their own ponies, the men of the San Francisco Polo Club labored through the sands of China Beach, Baker Beach, and the Ten Mile Beach, looking for Imperial Japanese intruders." ―from the book In the mythology of the West, the city was seen as a place of danger and corruption, but the "bad" city proved its mettle during the "Good War." In this book, Roger W. Lotchin has written the first comprehensive study of California's urban home front. United by fear of totalitarianism, the diverse population of California's cities came together to protect their homes and to aid in the war effort. Whether it involved fighting in Europe or Asia, migrating to a defense center, writing to service personnel at the front, building war machines in converted factories, giving pennies at school for war bonds, saving scrap material, or pounding a civil defense beat, urban California's participation was immediate, constant, and unflagging. Although many people worked in offices, factories, or barracks, the wartime community was also fed by a vast army of volunteers, which until now has been largely overlooked. The Bad City in the Good War is a comprehensive local history of the California home front that restores a little-known part of the story of the Second World War. "' a major force in the war against totalitarianism. According to Lotchin, 'Cities have a greater capacity to serve a society at any given time than is evident or than they are usually called upon to use' (p. 52). While he also notes that rural areas contributed to the war effort, Lotchin explains that industrial output is best suited to cities, and this was especially true of California cities in World War II. He unequivocally declares that the degree of urbanization within the state at that time, due mostly to the political and business boosters, allowed the federal government to step in and more efficiently and cheaply amass resources for the war effort. The freeways, city infrastructures, power plants, aqueducts, excess housing, and recreational spaces 'allowed the government to evade many of the costs of war' (p. 70). As Lotchin makes clear, each of the major cities were underutilizing their resources and the federal government was able to redirect that 'ammunition' toward fighting the war. These resources made 'Fortress California"― "From her glamorous Seacliff neighborhood, Californian Senator Diane Feinstein today might ponder her state's involvement in Iraq, but I wonder if she knows that pony riders from the San Francisco Polo Club conducted coastal surveillance to protect her exclusive neighborhood against possible Japanese invasion in World War II? Also, in WWII, armed cowboys rode through the Hollywood hills patrolling against saboteurs who might try to disrupt the war production plants in the area. Contrast the stereotype of the cowboy herding cattle through the wide-open spaces of the West to the WWII Buffalo Soldiers riding border patrol, and extend that image to the polo player riding his expensive, precision pony on night patrol on the Bay Area beaches, and you have a complex picture of a diverse California. Lotchin shows how all of these seemingly incongruous images were part of the excess human resources applied toward the war effort in World War II. Bringing together all of these disparate and vast resources from urban California unified the state with a single vision or purpose."― ". . . Contrast the stereotype of the cowboy herding cattle through the wide―open spaces of the West, to the WWII Buffalo Soldiers riding border patrol, and extend that image to the polo player riding his expensive, precision pony on night patrol on the Bay Area beaches, and you have a complex picture of a diverse California. Lotchin shows how all of these seemingly incongruous images were part of the excess human resources applied toward the war effort in World War II. . .September, 2006"― USA "For those of us who have lived in California, we know first―hand what a state of unification means to the individual Californian―an uneasy truce in the old cultural chasm that historically divided the state along north―south lines. The north has always had an abundance of resources that it has had to share with the south, most specifically water resources. But also the state has been divided by cultural differences. California has always had a disparate cast of characters who personify its distinctive qualities. Think of President Ronald Reagan and Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren and you have two figures that personify the north―south conservativliberal divide. Think ab