I think we have all heard of the Mason-Dixon line, with regard to the Civil War and the lead-up to it, but I did not know who Mason and Dixon were, or how the line came to be. The line predates the era that it is almost synonymous with by almost a century. And the Read More
Tag: Family History
The Birth of America, by William R Polk
The subtitle of this book is, “From Before Columbus to the Revolution”, which is about 300 years of history. These are 300 years of history we don’t usually think about. Polk starts with information about the Native Peoples, as well as their interactions with the newer arrivals to the continent. Sadly, most of the information Read More
Mayflower Lives, by Martyn Whittock
This is not your typical Mayflower history. Oh, it talks about all the basic things – how most of the Saints spent a few years in Leiden, how the Speedwell, didn’t. But this book takes twelve of the passengers, plus the Mayflower captain and a Native American, and goes into detail about their lives. And Read More
Roger Williams and The Creation of the American Soul, by John M Barry
Most of us, if we have studied early American history at all, have heard of Roger Williams. He is one of the people the Puritans booted out of Massachusetts, remember? He disagreed with the leaders of the Bay colony about what seems to us today to be minor points relating to their religious beliefs, and Read More
Iron Horses, by Walter R Borneman
This is a very detailed description of the early days of the railroads in the western United States. The subtitle is “America’s Race to Bring the Railroads West”. Borneman discusses the numerous railroad companies, and the men who ran them. There were fortunes to be made, if you could get your line through to the Read More
Daughter of Boston, edited by Helen R Deese
This is the edited transcription of a diary written by Caroline Healy Dall in the 1800’s. The editor has also added introductions to each chapter, which each cover a year or two in the life of Caroline Dall. Deese has also added footnotes that identify most of the people Dall mentions in her diary. And Read More
The Lion and the Fox, by Alexander Rose
The subtitle of this book is “Two Rival Spies and the Secret Plot to Build a Confederate Navy”, and it does read somewhat like a spy thriller. Most of the action happens in, of all places, Liverpool, England. The American Consul assigned to Liverpool, which had a number of companies who were very good at Read More
Democracy’s Data, by Dan Bouk
This book is a little different from most of the books I have reviewed. You can tell by the subtitle: “The Hidden Stories in the U.S. Census and How to Read Them”. Bouk looks primarily at the 1940 census, but he looks at much more than that. He wanted to look deeply into a census Read More
Triangle, The Fire that Changed America, by David Von Drehle
I remember hearing about this fire, which occurred in 1911, in my Social Studies class, which was long enough ago that it obviously made an impression, since I can still remember it now. That was only a paragraph or two, and this is an entire book. Obviously, the story is even more memorable when you Read More
Team of Rivals, by Doris Kearns Goodwin
This book is not a weekend read, or a beach book. But if you are interested in Lincoln’s presidency, and the Civil War era, it is a book you should read. This book is not just about Lincoln; as the title suggests, Kearns also discusses the members of his cabinet, some of whom were his Read More