Resumen
Following the lead of influential articles by Henry Littlefield (1964) and Hugh Rockoff (1990), teachers of economic history often relate the Populist movement of the 1890s to L. Frank Baum?s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. This paper reexamines the inevitable question of whether Baum intended his story as a parable on Populism. From other, more overtly political writing sof Baum?s, and from biographical information about Baum himself, the evidence suggests that Oz was not a Populist parable. We can still profitably read it as one, but we need to separate that interpretation from Baum?s intention.