Originally published in 1942 The Valley of Decision was an instant success and its story of four generations of the Scott family--owners and operators of a Pittsburgh iron and steel works--has since captured the imagination of generations of readers. Absorbing and complex it chronicles the family s saga from the economic panic of 1873 through the dramatic rise of American industry and trade unionism through waves of immigration class conflict natural disaster World War I and Pearl Harbor. In 1945 it was made into a major motion picture starring Greer Garson and Gregory Peck. This reissue features a new foreword by noted steel industry historian John Hoerr author of And the Wolf Finally Came who places the novel in context as a classic depiction of twentieth-century America.