The Second Greatest Show on Earth: Henry Bergh, the Protection of Animals, and the Evolution of the Modern Social Movement

In 1865 wealthy American expatriate Henry Bergh (1813–1888) chose suddenly to abandon a life of leisure in Europe. Returning to his home city of New York, he set to work on what soon proved a remarkable accomplishment: the establishment of an institutional framework for the animal protection movement in America.

What makes that accomplishment all the more remarkable, Darcy Ingram argues, is what brought Bergh to it in the first place. Surprisingly, it had little to do with animals. Through a...