All of Hunter's books have a rich social atmosphere and none more so than the 1954 novel The Blackboard Jungle. In the early 1950s Americans developed a growing awareness of the rapid changes taking place in the nation's cities with the shift in ethnic populations, expanding government corruption, and increased crime, especially among the young. Teenagers and juvenile delinquency became a broadly discussed social problem. Everything from comic books, and popular music, to the movies was blamed for the accelerating breakdown of traditional social and family values and the shift in the behavior of the nation's young. The Blackboard Jungle, both as a novel and later as a successful film, dealt with this prominent issue in ways that dramatized the plight of both the juveniles and their adult supervisors.

By setting his novel in a mythical city vocational school, North Manual Trades High School, Hunter was able...