Nobody's Boy and His Pals: The Story of Jack Robbins and the Boys’ Brotherhood Republic

The Boys Brotherhood Republic, founded by social reformer Jack Robbins in 1914, was an unconventional and unusual institution that allowed adolescent boys to govern themselves democratically and with compassion for one another. Robbins' will, drafted in the late 1950s, suggests that he continued to care about forgotten boys even as the political and legal contexts that shaped childrens lives changed dramatically. Nobodys Boy and His Pals is a lively investigation that challenges our ideas about the history of American childhood and the law, exploring themes of childhood and adolescence, race and ethnicity, sexuality, wealth and poverty, and civil liberties across the American Century.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 336 pages
Publication date: 16 July 2024
Publisher: The University of Chicago Press

Jack Robbins, a social reformer, and a group of adolescent boys in Chicago founded the Boys Brotherhood Republic in 1914, an unconventional and unusual institution. During a moral panic about delinquent boys, Robbins did not seek to rehabilitate and/or punish wayward youths. Instead, the boys governed themselves, democratically and with compassion for one another, and lived by their mantra "So long as there are boys in trouble, we too are in trouble." For nearly thirty years, Robbins was their "supervisor," and the will he drafted in the late 1950s suggests that he continued to care about forgotten boys, even as the political and legal contexts that shaped children's lives changed dramatically.

Nobodys Boy and His Pals is a lively investigation that challenges our ideas about the history of American childhood and the law. Scouring the archives for traces of the elusive Jack Robbins, Hendrik Hartog examines the legal histories of Progressive reform, childhood, criminality, repression, and free speech. The curiosity of Robbin's story is compounded by the legal challenges to his will, which wound up establishing the extent to which last wishes must conform to dominant social values. Filled with persistent mysteries and surprising connections, Nobodys Boy and His Pals illuminates themes of childhood and adolescence, race and ethnicity, sexuality, wealth and poverty, and civil liberties, across the American Century.

Weight: 510g
Dimension: 151 x 230 x 25 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780226834375