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A recent survey conducted by L. Allan Austin for the American Management Associations illustrates an important point: zero‐base budgeting works.

Seeks to examine the origins and development of quality initiatives in US business.

Reviews and discusses the literature and history pertaining to quality initiatives in US business, with particular reference to the reconstruction of Japanese industry following the Second World War.

The real beginnings of “quality initiatives” in the USA came after W. Edwards Deming, Joseph Juran, and others returned from Japan in the late 1950s. These men and their colleagues had answered a call from the US Government to assist in the reconstruction of Japanese industry following the Second World War. Their techniques and methodologies had raised the industrial output of Japan to heights not previously envisioned.

Examines current quality initiatives in a fresh light by reviewing their origins and history.

President, Charles S. Goldman, M.P.; Chairman, Charles Bathurst, M.P.; Vice‐Presidents: Christopher Addison, M.D., M.P., Waldorf Astor, M.P., Charles Bathurst, M.P., Hilaire Belloc, Ralph D. Blumenfeld, Lord Blyth, J.P., Colonel Charles E. Cassal, V.D., F.I.C., the Bishop of Chichester, Sir Arthur H. Church, K.C.V.O., M.A., D.Sc., F.R.S., Sir Wm. Earnshaw Cooper, C.I.E., E. Crawshay‐Williams, M.P., Sir Anderson Critchett, Bart., C.V.O., F.R.C.S.E., William Ewart, M.D., F.R.C.P., Lieut.‐Colonel Sir Joseph Fayrer, Bart., M.A., M.D., Sir Alfred D. Fripp, K.C.V.O., C.B., M.B., M.S., Sir Harold Harmsworth, Bart., Arnold F. Hills, Sir Victor Horsley, M.D., F.R.C.S., F.R.S., O. Gutekunst, Sir H. Seymour King, K.C.I.E., M.A., the Duke of Manchester, P.C., Professor Sir Wm. Osler, Bart., M.D., F.R.S., Sir Gilbert Parker, D.C.L., M.P., Sir Wm. Ramsay, K.C.B., LL.D., M.D., F.R.S., Harrington Sainsbury, M.D., F.R.C.P., W. G. Savage, M.D., B.Sc., R. H. Scanes Spicer, M.D., M.R.C.S., the Hon. Lionel Walrond, M.P., Hugh Walsham, M.D., F.R.C.P., Harvey W. Wiley, M.D., Evelyn Wrench.

The aim was to test the feasibility of using automated data, and evaluate the impact of an emergency cardiac decision unit (CDU) on the overall outcomes of patients seen for chest discomfort. We used a retrospective, quasi‐experimental design to identify patients who had cardiac enzymes measured and an electrocardiogram performed during an ED visit in two six‐month periods, pre‐CDU (1 January‐30 June 1995) and post‐CDU (1 January‐ 30 June 1996). A total of 4,336 patients had outcomes assessed. After opening, 14.8 per cent of all chest pain cases were treated in the CDU. Hospital admission rates were reduced from 81.1 per cent to 66.7 per cent. Length of stay, myocardial infarction rates, and mortality were unchanged. The 14‐day revisit rates increased from 5.3 per cent to 10.3 per cent. We conclude that cardiac decision units decrease hospital admissions but increase ED revisit rates as a consequence of this now frequently used care pathway.

Through an account of the layout, operations, and four main product lines of a small Chicago bookstore between 1938 and 1947, the purpose of this paper is to show how a neighborhood retail establishment reacted to the sweeping events of the Great Depression and World War II.

The research is based upon multiple primary data sources including store financial records, family photographs, representative artifacts and ephemera, oral history interviews, and period retailing literature.

Located in an area of Chicago heavily populated by Polish and Jewish immigrants and their children, General Book Store was a traditional mom and pop operation. The mix of its product lines – books and magazines, model kits, greeting cards, and camera supplies and photo‐finishing – evolved over time while always connecting customers to the national experience. The store afforded its owners a modest, but upwardly mobile middle‐class life style.

Although much has been written on large‐scale retailing, marketing historians have conducted very little research on small‐scale retailing in the USA. This study documents the intermingling of a business and a household economy and how the management of merchandise assortments and maintenance of customer relationships depended upon both owner interests and the opportunities and constraints presented by environmental forces.

This paper aims to examine the extent to which students’ experiences and perceptions of their literature classroom align with their teacher’s instructional goals for literary inquiry and what teachers can learn from gaining access to students’ perspectives on their classroom experiences.

Thematic analyses were used to examine the data sources: mid-year and end-of-year interviews with six students, audio recordings of the teacher’s rationale for her instructional designs and a reflective discussion with the teacher upon reading the student interviews three years later.

Much of what the teacher intended students to get out of her instruction was what they expressed learning and experiencing in the class, yet some understood the purpose of the class to be far from her intentions. All the interviewed students had deeply personal and varied ways of relating what they learned in class to the world and their own lives. The teacher’s reflection on the interviews highlighted the importance of making space for multiple meanings and perspectives on literary works.

This paper speaks to the importance of surfacing students’ individual and varied ways of making sense of literary texts as part of instruction that values students’ thinking as well as the epistemic commitments of literary reading.