ABSTRACT
The concept of American dream was popularized by James Truslow Adams in the early years of the Great Depression. Adams was concerned about the destruction of American values and the country’s descent into a mass consumer society controlled by big corporations and a strong federal government. The idea of the American dream prospered because those with less were receptive to a national creed that emphasized the opportunity to succeed economically and socially based on their own initiative and hard work. European societies, highly stratified by wealth and social position, were not conducive to a similar appeal since the likelihood of individual success under those circumstances was so patently untrue. Due to its common usage, the phrase American dream may strike many as deriving from the time the first English settlers appeared on the Atlantic shore of North America.
