[Books](/books) ![The Grim Old Days Book Cover](/sites/cato.org/files/styles/serial_cover_phone/public/2026-08/9781969284120.jpg?itok=9GSdrx6K) Join the Conversation [\#CatoBooks](https://x.com/hashtag/CatoBooks) Purchase This Book [ Cato Store ](https://store.cato.org/products/the-grim-old-days-an-introduction-to-the-preindustrial-past) [ Amazon ](https://www.amazon.com/Grim-Old-Days-Introduction-Preindustrial/dp/1969284129/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1P3A4HJPPQVXK&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.5knuZjcaC15pr_eYIaj35bsQRVDCBO1toQOzL473caMZpft0n5W9XFtBRZ1oCbq0ZYYRBr5FvjzM27muRVskLJI0qJXWdCV-eWPqsFxILO0hLQMD5Pxsnm_mPA683X0zHPVv-kPmrMD5vtgADDnejNAJpbn87XG54YOM6FEi7LEqSPxf-2Cs2M6zlb3MHIMFHt5xDDUtFJqn5xIKbnBYFHB9KrsgUz5OlVs7yjgzTGw.YQ3_M0_tB5h8vlZ-fNa9AAqyHmpKlaMFLeD73cCm39I&dib_tag=se&keywords=the+grim+old+days&qid=1789046323&sprefix=the+grim+old+days,aps,114&sr=8-1) [ Barnes & Noble ](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-grim-old-days-chelsea-follett/1149519838?ean=9781969284120) [ Book​shop​.org ](https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-grim-old-days-an-introduction-to-the-preindustrial-past-chelsea-follett/9a6a3f79025dadb0?ean=9781969284120&bkshp-astro=t) # *The Grim Old Days* ##### *An Introduction to the Preindustrial Past* PRE-ORDER NOW! AVAILABLE OCTOBER 20TH. *The Grim Old Days* is an in-depth study of life prior to the Industrial Revolution—revealing that the world our preindustrial ancestors inhabited was more gruesome than modern minds can fathom. September 2026 • Published By Cato Institute By [Chelsea Follett](https://www.cato.org/people/chelsea-follett) Join the Conversation [\#CatoBooks](https://x.com/hashtag/CatoBooks) Purchase This Book [ Cato Store ](https://store.cato.org/products/the-grim-old-days-an-introduction-to-the-preindustrial-past) [ Amazon ](https://www.amazon.com/Grim-Old-Days-Introduction-Preindustrial/dp/1969284129/ref=sr_1_1?crid=1P3A4HJPPQVXK&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.5knuZjcaC15pr_eYIaj35bsQRVDCBO1toQOzL473caMZpft0n5W9XFtBRZ1oCbq0ZYYRBr5FvjzM27muRVskLJI0qJXWdCV-eWPqsFxILO0hLQMD5Pxsnm_mPA683X0zHPVv-kPmrMD5vtgADDnejNAJpbn87XG54YOM6FEi7LEqSPxf-2Cs2M6zlb3MHIMFHt5xDDUtFJqn5xIKbnBYFHB9KrsgUz5OlVs7yjgzTGw.YQ3_M0_tB5h8vlZ-fNa9AAqyHmpKlaMFLeD73cCm39I&dib_tag=se&keywords=the+grim+old+days&qid=1789046323&sprefix=the+grim+old+days,aps,114&sr=8-1) [ Barnes & Noble ](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-grim-old-days-chelsea-follett/1149519838?ean=9781969284120) [ Book​shop​.org ](https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-grim-old-days-an-introduction-to-the-preindustrial-past-chelsea-follett/9a6a3f79025dadb0?ean=9781969284120&bkshp-astro=t) Trying to imagine the preindustrial past might conjure the image of an idyllic country village with pristine air and residents merrily dancing around maypoles. The healthy, peaceful, and prosperous people in this fantasy of pastoral bliss do not realize that their contented, leisurely lives will soon be disrupted by the story’s villain: the dark smokestacks of the Industrial Revolution, what the poet William Blake called “satanic mills.” Yet such rose-colored views of history bear no resemblance to reality. The preindustrial world was far more gruesome than modern minds can fathom—marked by unthinkable poverty, drudgery, cruelty, and pain. From child abuse and famine-induced cannibalism to bloodletting and streets that doubled as open sewers, ordinary existence was fraught with horrors. *The Grim Old Days* indulges the reader’s morbid curiosity about everyday history with firsthand accounts and shocking facts, meticulously researched and laid out in grotesque detail. The book strips away romantic illusions to confront the harsh reality of preindustrial life—one that most people today would not wish upon their worst enemies. #### Praise for This Book “In this engaging and richly documented account of daily life of common people in the past, Follett eviscerates the widely believed myths of the good old days. Life before industrialization was, as Hobbes once put it, ‘poor, nasty, brutish, and short.’ It was also uncomfortable, disease-ridden, insecure, and painful. Anyone believing the idealization of past days, so common in circles of ‘de-growth,’ should regard this book as mandatory reading.” —Joel Mokyr, winner of the Nobel Prize in Economics (2025), Northwestern University “In 1954, F. A. Hayek edited *Capitalism and the Historians*, a book that refuted the myth that capitalism banished a green and pleasant pre-industrial existence. Now comes Chelsea Follett with an even more powerful demolition of capitalism’s critics. Read it and rejoice that the enemies of progress lost their argument against economic freedom.” —George F. Will, Pulitzer Prize–winning columnist, *Washington Post* “Most people are unaware of how life was lived before modernity, seduced by romantic images or misled by revisionist quibbles and asterisks. This richly researched and vividly written book sets the record straight. Every student and intellectually curious person should read it.” —Steven Pinker, Harvard University, and author of *Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress|* “This book is a rich feast of horrors: a detailed, scholarly but eloquent account of just how cruel, violent, filthy, prejudiced, and tedious life was in the past for almost everybody, even the rich. Chelsea Follett reminds us to dispel nostalgia and stop taking the wonders of the modern world for granted.” —Matt Ridley, author of *How Innovation Works: And Why It Flourishes in Freedom* “Too many of us have a view of the past, and particularly the premodern past, as somehow better than the present. Even if we accept that it was poorer, surely that was compensated for by greater meaning or stronger social connections? This is the definitive answer to such sentimental nonsense.… Read this and give thanks for your good fortune in being alive now and not in the grim old days.” —Stephen Davies, historian and author of *The Wealth Explosion: The Nature and Origins of Modernity* “Critics frequently imagine that growth conflicts with other things we value such as health, leisure, or the environment. In reality, the opposite is often the case as Chelsea Follett beautifully demonstrates in this fascinating and revealing account of how life was experienced prior to the Industrial Revolution.… Rather than romanticize what was lost to industrialization, Follett asks us to look clearly at what it actually was.” —Mark Koyama, coauthor of *How the World Became Rich: The Historical Origins of Economic Growth* #### About the Author Chelsea Follett is a research fellow at the Cato Institute’s Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity, working with Human​Progress​.org, a project of the Cato Institute that seeks to educate the public on the global improvements in well-being by providing free empirical data on long-term developments. She is the author of *Centers of Progress: 40 Cities That Changed the World*.