This book is an interpretive history of the organizational revolution that took place in American schooling during the 19th century, its politics and ideology. It attempts to assess how the schools shaped, and were shaped by, the transformation of the United States into an urban-industrial nation. It looks at the shift from village school to urban system using a variety of social perspectives and modes of analysis. "Community control" in the rural and village school (a pattern of governance followed by many of the early city schools) is analyzed first. Then, the development of ideological and organizational consensus in the search for an urban educational order is traced--a process frequently complicated by heterogeneous values among the urban populations and diffusion of power in school governance. Next, the author deals with the centralization of education (1890-1920); and reformist emphasis on expertise, efficiency, and the disinterested public service of elites. Case studies of four cities offer variations on the central theme and analyze the opposition to centralization. Finally, some of the major changes (1890-1940), the appearance of more complex educational structures and new specializations, and the development of a "technology of discrimination" are described. The author stresses that it is the persistence of historical myths and problems that today stands in the way of realistic reform of urban education. An extensive bibliography is included. (Author/WM)