Someone told me of an article which would be helpful to me with regard
to some research I am working on.  It was written by A.H. Raskin in
the Sunday New York Times during the 1950s sometime.  It  is about a
worker in the Bronx who scraped by but still considered himself middle
class.

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Request for Question Clarification by pafalafa-ga on 09 Jun 2005 17:39 PDT

Raskin has written so much for the Times that it would be hard to
pinpoint this article with such a sketchy description of it...is there
anything else you can add here?

pafalafa-ga

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Clarification of Question by hotpatatta-ga on 10 Jun 2005 16:16 PDT

Gosh, I'm sorry but I don't have any more information.  I tried
looking through the abstracts at NYTimes.com and the abstracts didn't
have enough info to determine if the article was the one I am looking
for.  The NYTimes website charges a fee of about $2.50 to see the
whole article and I couldn't afford to look at more than a few of
them.  I thought you might have access to a NY Times database and that
paying you $8 would be cheaper than paying to see a whole bunch of
articles on the NY Times website.

Got it!

It took a bit of luck, but the title of the article was so telling,
that it seemed to be the one, even without looking at it.  Once I had
a look, there was no doubt:


Life With Tom and Helen Garland
By A. H. RASKIN
New York Times
Apr 6, 1952
pg 12, Sunday Magazine


TOM GARLAND thinks it's time someone blew the whistle on prices.  What
Tom thinks is important.  Not because therre is anything exceptional
about Tom, but because there is nothing exceptional about him.  Tom
comes as close to being Mr. Average Worker as is possible to find...

...Tom's pay as a stock selector at the Cutler-Hammer Electrical
Company plant in the Bronx averages slightly less than $72 a
week...There was a time when Tom would have considered the $3,722 he
earned last year a princely sum, but it doesn't seem to stretch very
far these days.

=====

I can't excerpt much more since the article is copyright, but a good
librarian should be able to get you a copy, or -- as you are aware --
you can access it for a few bucks at the NY Times archives website.

I trust this fully answers your question, but if you need anything
else, please let me know before rating this answer.  Just post a
Request for Clarification, and I'm at your service.

Cheers,

pafalafa-ga


searh strategy -- searched the NY Times archives for [ raskin bronx 1950-1959 ]

pafalafa-ga was so friendly, smart, and fast!  I will definitely be
using Google Answers again!!