• American Studies
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.1-33
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• 2021

This paper examines the service ideal preached by Bruce Barton, a bestselling American author in the 1920s. Based on archival sources and other historical materials, this paper presents Barton's endorsement of service ideal less as an adaptation to the looming consumerist society than an endeavor to revive the old producer ethos that was more coercive than therapeutic. Revisiting Barton's messages to Americans, this paper traces the intellectual root of Barton's service ideal to the Social Gospel and illustrates the ways his producer ethos evolved into a commonplace ideology of Christian meritocracy that endorsed individualism and small government.