Upton

Sinclair, Upton (Upton Beall Sinclair), 1878-1968, American novelist and socialist activist, b. Baltimore, grad. College of the City of New York, 1897. He was one of the muckrakers, and a dedication to social and industrial reform underlies most of his writing. The Jungle (1906), a brutally graphic novel of the Chicago stockyards, aroused great public indignation and led to reform of federal food inspection laws. With the money earned from that novel, Sinclair established (1906) a short-lived socialist community, Helicon Home Colony, at Englewood, N.J., and a decade later he moved to Southern California. Among Sinclair's other novels exposing social evils are King Coal (1917), Oil! (1927), Boston (on the Sacco-Vanzetti Case, 1928), and Little Steel (1938). In his social studies, such as The Brass Check (1919), on journalism, and The Goose-Step (1923), on education, he tried to uncover the harmful effects of capitalist economic pressure on institutions of learning and culture.

An ardent socialist, Sinclair was in and out of the American Socialist party and, under its aegis, ran unsuccessfully for congressman, senator, and governor. In 1934 he was again defeated, this time as the Democratic party's candidate for California governor. World's End (1940) is the first of a cycle of 11 novels that deal with world events since 1914 and feature the fictional Lanny Budd as hero; the third, Dragon's Teeth (1942), won a Pulitzer Prize. Many of Sinclair's more than 90 books have been widely translated.

(born Sept. 20, 1878, Baltimore, Md., U.S.—died Nov. 25, 1968, Bound Brook, N.J.) U.S. novelist. He was supporting himself as a journalist when an assignment led him to write The Jungle (1906), a best-selling muckraking exposé of conditions in the Chicago stockyards. A landmark among naturalistic, proletarian novels, it aroused great public indignation and resulted in the passage of the U.S. Pure Food and Drug Act. Many other topical novels followed, as well as the successful Lanny Budd series of 11 contemporary historical novels featuring an antifascist hero, beginning with World's End (1940) and including Dragon's Teeth (1942, Pulitzer Prize). In the 1930s Sinclair organized a socialist reform movement and won the Democratic nomination for governor of California.

Learn more about Sinclair, Upton (Beall) with a free trial on Britannica.com.

(born Sept. 20, 1878, Baltimore, Md., U.S.—died Nov. 25, 1968, Bound Brook, N.J.) U.S. novelist. He was supporting himself as a journalist when an assignment led him to write The Jungle (1906), a best-selling muckraking exposé of conditions in the Chicago stockyards. A landmark among naturalistic, proletarian novels, it aroused great public indignation and resulted in the passage of the U.S. Pure Food and Drug Act. Many other topical novels followed, as well as the successful Lanny Budd series of 11 contemporary historical novels featuring an antifascist hero, beginning with World's End (1940) and including Dragon's Teeth (1942, Pulitzer Prize). In the 1930s Sinclair organized a socialist reform movement and won the Democratic nomination for governor of California.

Learn more about Sinclair, Upton (Beall) with a free trial on Britannica.com.

Upton is the name of a number of people and places. It may refer to:

People

Places

In Canada:

• Upton, Quebec

In Ireland:

• Upton, Cork

In the United Kingdom

• Upton, Berkshire – see Upton, Slough
• Upton, Buckinghamshire
• Upton, Cambridgeshire
• Upton, Cheshire
• Upton, Cornwall
• Upton, Cumbria
• Upton, Dorset
• Upton, Hampshire
• Upton, Kent – see Upton, London
• Upton, Leicestershire
• Upton, Lincolnshire
• Upton, London
• Upton, Merseyside (Wirral)
• Upton, Norfolk
• Upton, Northamptonshire
• Upton, Bassetlaw, Nottinghamshire
• Upton, Newark and Sherwood, Nottinghamshire
• Upton, Oxfordshire
• Upton, Pembrokeshire
• Upton, Slough
• Upton, Somerset
• Upton, Warwickshire
• Upton, West Yorkshire

See also:

• Upton-upon-Severn, Worcestershire
• Upton Cheyney, South Gloucestershire
• Hawkesbury Upton, South Gloucestershire
• Upton Fen, Norfolk
• Upton Grey, Hampshire
• Upton Hellions, Devon
• Upton House, Warwickshire
• Upton Lovell, Wiltshire
• Upton Magna, Shropshire
• Upton Noble, Somerset
• Upton Pyne, Devon
• Upton Scudamore, Wiltshire

In the United States of America:

• Upton, Indiana
• Upton, Kentucky
• Upton, Maine
• Upton, Baltimore, Maryland, a neighborhood in Baltimore, Maryland
• Upton, Massachusetts
• Upton, New York — home of Brookhaven National Laboratory
• Upton County, Texas
• Upton, Wyoming

See also

• Upton Park (disambiguation)