Living and writing during the 1910s, Teasdale was exposed to and inspired by some of the most dramatic changes American life had ever encountered. By the time "There Will Come Soft Rains" was published in 1920, the United States had risen to the status of world power, and mass production had made the nation the most highly industrialized in the world. Henry Ford's one millionth Model T had rolled off the newly invented assembly line, selling for a little over $300. Social attitudes loosened remarkably, compared to the previous Victorian era, and women became more outspoken about voting rights, better job opportunities, and greater freedom and independence. In the same year that Congress passed the Nineteenth Amendment, 1919, granting women the right to vote, Prohibition was also enacted, a law that would prove futile and pave the way for bootlegging gangsters such as Al Capone and Dutch Schultz. In...