In his new book, Bryant Simon investigates the tragic 1991 chicken processing plant fire in the small town of Hamlet, North Carolina. This was one of the worst accidents in recent American history, causing twenty-five deaths behind their locked doors. Simon’s interviews with survivors, first responders, workplace safety experts, and local business professionals give a hard-hitting social autopsy of this gruesome event. The book shows in vivid detail how this fire was the nearly inevitable product of what we eat, the rush for deregulation and the even larger American obsession and devotion to the “values of cheap,” values that we can’t seem to shake in the ‘Wal-Mart world” of today
Bryant Simon is the award-winning history professor and author of EVERYTHING BUT THE COFFEE: Learning About America from Starbucks and BOARDWALK OF DREAMS: Atlantic City and the Fate of Urban America.