With the rising tensions and strains created by modern America, historians have sought diligently to discover the answers to industrial America's problems. One answer lay in American reform movements, and as the New Deal reforms came under fierce attack in the 1950's, liberal historians sought diligently to give to reform movements historical authenticity.

The purpose of this study was to examine the changing definition of color harmony and to ascertain a general state of understanding of the term. A content analysis method was applied to writings taken in a special sampling technique, selecting for analysis those works regarded as classics in the broad field of color literature.