Oh What a Slaughter: Massacres in the American West: 1846-1890 by Larry McMurtry

Americans do not know much about our Indian Wars.

Think about it. Many of us know so much about the American Revolution, the Civil War, the world wars, and the Vietnam Conflict (war never being proclaimed in Congress). These wars are revisited often in books, movies, and television documentaries. My library has many shelves of books about these wars because we have reader demand.

What about the Indian Wars in our history, starting on the East Coast at the time of colonization and working their way west. If the shelves of my library and the reports of book circulation are an indication, we are not thinking about native tribes and the wars of their displacement. There are books a couple of shelves about the conflict but few are new. The readers are also few. Even our local schools seem to have dropped their Native American assignments. Some of the books have not been out in years.

In a way, the Indian Wars are hard to know. They stretched over centuries and involved many different tribes in many remote places. There was no concentrated focus of place and/or time as there was in World War I or World War II. Many of the battles have been forgotten nationally. What memory remains of many of the battles is often local and like legends.

I also think that many of us do not want to think about the Indian Wars. They do not show our ancestors in a favorable light. Subsequently, we are often surprised by what we learn when we visit historical sites or read a book like Oh What a Slaughter: Massacres in the American West: 1846-1890 by Larry McMurtry. Though I have read a handful of other books on the forced displacement of the tribes, I did not know half of what I read in the popular novelist's compact book.

McMurtry has often written about the West, publishing many novels, essays, and histories. As always, in Oh What a Slaughter he is forthright and compels the reader to hear him out. It is a fine introduction to the history of the Indian Wars about which we should be reading more.

McMurtry, Larry. Oh What a Slaughter: Massacres in the American West: 1846-1890. Simon & Schuster, 2005. 178p. ISBN 9780743250771.

Empire of Sin: A Story of Sex, Jazz, Murder, and the Battle for Modern New Orleans by Gary Krist

Living in New Orleans has always been dangerous. Hurricanes, flooding, and tropical diseases were among the natural dangers present even before widespread settlement. As a busy port for French and Spanish colonies, it attracted many rough characters and supported a booming vice economy. Some histories portray the city as racially tolerant before it become a part of the U.S. and less so when it really succumbed to Southern culture. It had notorious slave markets. By the 1880s, it had a bad reputation that business people and upper crust New Orleanians wished to improve. Novelist-turned-historian Gary Krist recounts a struggle for law and order in the city in Empire of Sin: A Story of Sex, Jazz, Murder, and the Battle for Modern New Orleans.

As he did in his Chicago book City of Scoundrels, Krist weaves together stories of crime, politics, and culture and how they shaped a city's future. Unlike that previous book in which the events occurred in twelve days, Empire of Sin is a story spanning decades and including many characters, including saloon owner and state representative Tom Anderson, brothel owner Josie Arlington, and young jazz musician Louis Armstrong. Some of the most interesting of the characters were trying to profit from vice while living in the respectable part of New Orleans.

I listened to Empire of Sin on an audiobook read by actor and frequent book narrator Robertson Dean. It was a pleasure.

Krist, Gary. Empire of Sin: A Story of Sex, Jazz, Murder, and the Battle for Modern New Orleans. Crown Publishers, 2014. 416p. ISBN 9780770437060

Audiobook: Dreamscape Media, 2014. 9 compact discs. ISBN 9781633793231.

The Girl from Human Street: Ghosts of Memory in a Jewish Family by Roger Cohen

In the case of The Girl from Human Street: Ghosts of Memory in a Jewish Family by Roger Cohen, the subtitle is a better indicator of its subject than the title. Cohen's book is not focused on one person who came from a particular place, that being a neighborhood in Johannesburg, South Africa. Instead, the book is a sweeping family history, recounting the lives of the author's ancestors and their descendants in Lithuania, South Africa, England, the United States, and Israel. In one sense the book is a where-I-came-from memoir, but it is much more. Through telling about his family, Cohen recounts the global story of Jewish people from the late 19th century to the present.

Having now finished, it is hard to remember the point at which Cohen starts his story, for he goes back and forth in time and from place to place frequently. The reader has to stay alert to track the various members of his mother's and father's families as they migrate to new lands that promise greater freedoms and a chance of fortune. The true starting point of the family was the Lithuanian shtetls of Zagare and Siauliai. Many of those who stayed there survived pogroms only to exterminated by the Nazis in World War II. Many of those who move suffer new injustices and mental illness in new lands.

In its lyrical telling, The Girl from Human Street reminds me of The Hare with Amber Eyes by Edmund de Waal. Both stories evoke both pride and regret for the past actions of families. Both will help readers get beyond textbook histories of the modern world.

Cohen, Roger. The Girl from Human Street: Ghosts of Memory in a Jewish Family. Alfred A. Knopf, 2015. 304p. ISBN 9780307594662.

Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and a Great American Land Grab by Steve Inskeep

What forces shaped the culture, politics, and economy of the American South? The factors were many - it was not one man's doing - but NPR correspondent and author Steve Inskeep suggests that one particular man in the early 19th century played a key role in a struggle that allowed the South to develop as it did. That man was Andrew Jackson, and the issue was the forced removal of native tribes from the South. Inskeep tells the story in Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and a Great American Land Grab.

In Jacksonland, Inskeep focuses on two men. The first is, of course, Andrew Jackson, an icon of American history. The second is Cherokee chief John Ross, whose name is mostly forgotten today. Jackson and Ross were not always opponents, as the latter served in a Cherokee regiment under Jackson in the War of 1812. Ross was elected to the Cherokee Council in 1817, became its president in 1819, and spent the next twenty years negotiating with government officials in Washington to protect tribal land. Jackson and his wealthy friends, however, had designs on that land. When Jackson became president, the removal of the Cherokee tribe from the South became inevitable.

As the subtitle suggests, Jacksonland is a book in which the author's sympathies are apparent. What will interest many modern reader are the stories showing that Jackson seemed like a cad to many in his own time. Critics, mostly in the North, decried the forced removal of native tribes who had previously been assured by treaties of their territory in the South. For a while, the issue was hotter than slavery.

I listened to Inskeep read his book on compact disc. I especially liked the final section that brings the story to date, telling how many Cherokees never left and others returned to the South. The audiobook was good listening for commuting and gardening for a week.

Inskeep, Steve. Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and a Great American Land Grab. Penguin Press, 2015. 421p. ISBN 9781594205569.

Audiobook: Books on Tape, 2015. 10 compact discs. ISBN 9781101914953.

Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine and the Miracle That Set Them Free by Hector Tobar

I enjoyed its reviews in newspapers and podcasts, and Bonnie and other readers whose opinions I trust recommended this book. I remember the story from 2010 as amazing and compelling. The probability that I would enjoy Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine and the Miracle That Set Them Free by Hector Tobar was high. The only reason that I have taken so long in starting is my to-read list is long. (I started to say over-populated, but you can not have too many books in your reading queue.)

Luckily for me, Bonnie borrowed the 11 disc audiobook of Deep Down Dark so I could listen while driving, cooking, and gardening. Henry Leyva is a great reader. I like how he moved easily from English to Spanish and back in this book, pacing well, and distinguishing different voices effectively. Of course, with 33 men in the collapsed Chilean mine and numerous important figures on the surface above, the task for the writer and the narrator to make each of them singularly memorable is impossible. Still I felt the voices were right as I heard them.

What I did not expect was the amount of the story that takes place after the miners were discovered to still be alive and after they were rescued. The one part of the story I would have like to be more detailed is the actual day of rescue. I am glad Tobar recounts about his interviews and tells how the miners have fared since the ordeal.

I would happily read Deep Down Dark again if it is chosen for our book group. If you wonder about conditions in mines and want a dramatic tale with suspense, even when you know the outcome, You may also like this disaster rescue story.

Tobar, Hector. Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine and the Miracle That Set Them Free. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014. 309p. ISBN 9780374280604. 

Audiobook: Macmillan Audio, 2014. 11 compact discs. ISBN 9781427244505.

Losing Our Way: An Intimate Portrait of a Troubled America by Bob Herbert

Most republicans will not like Losing Our Way: An Intimate Portrait of a Troubled America. Many democrats won't either, as former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, points out many ways in which the elected leaders of our cities, states, and country (of either party) have failed the public by looking after their own interests and that of special interests. He does this through telling stories about the lives of citizens.

Here are issues that Herbert examines in Losing Our Way:

The infrastructure of highways, bridges, rails, electrical grid, etc. is crumbling as elected officials will not raise taxes to pay for the needed work. The short-sightedness of fearing that taxpayers will vote officials out of office for raising taxes is that the projects would create jobs and leave the country better able to support its industry. Everyone would benefit, but our governments large and small are unwilling to invest in the future.

Most educational testing has weakened education, as schools teach to the tests instead of offering broadly-based lessons that teach children to think and prepare them for the future. Magnet schools have often been ineffective, and they fail to bring together the haves and have-nots. Educational corporations lobby for increased testing and against teachers having a say in curriculum. Rupert Murdoch is the big winner in what is often labelled "school reform."

All the wars we have fought since the Vietnam War (including Vietnam) have been against own interest and have destabilized many nations. Many died for no good purpose - a very dangerous thing to say in our for-us-or-against-us culture. Our economy has been drained for useless foreign action that only benefits arms manufacturers and Wall Street.

Wall Street is also behind the increasing gulf between earnings of workers and stock holders. Jobs are eliminated and wages kept low so the rich may reap more and more of the profits. As a result, more and more full time workers go farther and farther into debt, bringing the economy down.

That is just a taste of what Bob Herbert has to say.

When did the country lose its way? Herbert points to President Lyndon Johnson's increasing the troops sent to Vietnam, and he adds Ronald Reagan's campaign to deregulate many industries, especially weakening banking and finance rules.

Bob Herbert thinks that the trend of the last 50 years can be reversed. He points to the success of grass roots action of the Civil Rights and Women's Rights movements. He urges people to get involved at the bottom to take back the country from special interests.

Herbert, Bob. Losing Our Way: An Intimate Portrait of a Troubled America. Doubleday, 2014. 283p. ISBN 9780385528238.

Books on Tape, 2014. 8 compact discs. Approx. 10 1/2 hours. ISBN 9780804193573.

The Roman Guide to Slave Management : A Treatise by the Nobleman Marcus Sidonius Falx by Jerry Toner

While in Rome, I had access to wifi in our hotel. At all times a librarian, I decided to see what books I could download from my work library's digital collection to my phone while in a foreign country. Of course, I could download anything I could in Illinois, but just doing it on foreign soil would give me more creed with the clients who ask about digital books for their travels. Looking through the history offerings on eRead Illinois, I found The Roman Guide to Slave Management : A Treatise by the Nobleman Marcus Sidonius Falx by Jerry Toner. Being in the historic city, it seemed an appropriate choice. I clicked "borrow" and had the book on my phone in less than a minute.

I started the book while in Rome but set it aside until I returned home. I got the hardback edition of the title last week and finally got back to reading. I still prefer a print edition when available.

Marcus Sidonius Falx is not a name you are going to find in your search of Roman history, but someone just like him must have existed. He would have been a nobleman with slaves both in Rome and in the country. His wealthy family would have had slaves for generations. He would have seen that a slight profit could be made from selling some scrolls with his his advice to new slaveholders.

That Toner was able to mysterious interview the nearly two thousand year old nobleman is a fact we should just accept and read Falx's advice, which seems strange and cruel to us now. Falx is an almost likable character who has some entertaining stories to tell. At the end of his chapters, Toner steps in to provide academic references that document the historical details and attitudes to which Falx refers.

The Roman Guide to Slave Management is an easy read and can be used to make history more interesting to students. It also suggests questions to discuss about twenty-first century slavery and near-slavery. It is worth reading from a scroll, bound book, or digital tablet. It should be in more libraries than it currently is.

Toner, Jerry. The Roman Guide to Slave Management : A Treatise by the Nobleman Marcus Sidonius Falx. Overlook Press, 2014. 216p. ISBN 9781468309379.

Gloomy Terrors and Hidden Fires: The Mystery of John Colter and Yellowstone by Ronald M. Anglin and Larry E. Morris

Who was John Colter? He was a companion of Lewis and Clark on their trek across the continent from 1803 to 1806 and is often credited with discovering what later became Yellowstone National Park (as if no native Americans had ever set foot in the volcanic region). He ventured alone into the valleys of the Bighorn, Yellowstone, and Snake Rivers to trap beaver, always failing to make a profit to cover expenses. He led a large group of trappers into the same area, and they also failed to bring many pelts back; some even lost their lives. He was the subject of many popular frontier legends of the early 19th century, especially the story of his run to escape being killed by Blackfoot warriors. He was a key witness to the exploration of the American West, but he left no accounts of his own. Only a sort of figure eight drawn on a map by William Clark remains, and even what that means is disputed. In short, according to Ronald M. Anglin and Larry E. Morris in Gloomy Terrors and Hidden Fires: The Mystery of John Colter and Yellowstone, Colter is a mystery.

I was drawn to this book because I have been to Yellowstone, where Colter's name is mentioned on history boards at many of the visitor's centers and in the books found in their bookshops. I could not help wonder what it would be like to explore such a wild and unforgiving place alone. The authors of this book did not tell me because Colter did not tell anybody. The authors did, however, lure me into contemplating the mystery of a man for whom there are no records prior to the Lewis and Clark journals and payroll.

If you chose to read this book about first encounters between native tribes and frontiersmen, get a good map of Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho for reference. Then get lost in a story of a time now so hard to imagine. Then read either Mrs. Dred Scott: A Life on Slavery's Frontier by Lea VanderVelde for another life of a person more imagined than known or Before Lewis and Clark: The Story of the Chouteaus, the French Dynasty That Ruled the American Frontier by Shirley Christian to learn more about the frontier into which Lewis, Clark, and Colter ventured.

Anglin, Ronald M. and Larry E. Morris. Gloomy Terrors and Hidden Fires: The Mystery of John Colter and Yellowstone. Rowman and Littlefield, 2014. 243 p. ISBN 9781442226005.

The Chapel of the Magi in Palazzo Medici by Franco Cardini

Bonnie and I bought several books on our trip to Florence and Rome. Of the three about specific historical sites, the most narrative is The Chapel of the Magi in Palazzo Medici by Franco Cardini. Unlike most books for tourists which include primarily photographs with captions, this book features detailed and illustrated essays on the history of the beautiful private chapel in what was once the palace of the Medici family in Florence.

The Medici were the most powerful of the families in the city state of Florence during the Renaissance, a time when there was a community obsession with the story of the magi bringing gifts to the baby Jesus. Annual Florentine Epiphany parades were elaborate, and leading financiers and merchants vied to lead them. Also, competition among the elite families as sponsors of art was fierce, and the painting of frescos in the Medici family chapel was as much about community standing as about personal pleasure in owning great art. After Gentile de Fabriano painted a renowned gilded alterpiece Adoration of the Magi for the Strozzi family, Cosimo de Medici had to have an even grander depiction of the Magi. Oddly, it is one without the Holy Family - just the Magi and their many attendants.

The small chapel with its grand frescos is one of our favorite places in Florence. Getting a book about its origins, the story in the frescos, and how the chapel has been preserved is just what a couple of librarians would do.

Cardini, Franco. The Chapel of the Magi in Palazzo Medici. Mandragora, 2001. 93p. ISBN 8885957641.

See the frescos here. The colors are richer that the website shows.

Rebel Souls: Walt Whitman and America's First Bohemians by Justin Martin

Ever heard of Pfaff's Restaurant and Lager Beer Saloon? I had not before reading Rebel Souls: Walt Whitman and America's First Bohemians by Justin Martin. When we visited manhattan, we may have passed right by the historic saloon's basement location on Broadway without knowing. Pfaff's (with a silent P) is where a literary circle met nightly in the late 1850s and early 1860s. Most of the authors, actors, and painters who hung out at Pfaff's have been forgotten, but they epitomize figures of tragic starving artists. Most died young with only one or two moments of fame, but they were joined by poet Walt Whitman, who became a primary character in the story of American literature.

Roughly half of Rebel Souls is about the time the circle met in the basement around a big table ruled by Henry Clapp, Jr., the King of Bohemia, a former temperance advocate turned whisky drinker and literary magazine editor. About a quarter to a third of the book focuses on Whitman. The second half of the book recounts the lives of circle after they ventured away, some participating in the Civil War.

Among those forgotten soon after their deaths:

• Fitz Hugh Ludlow, who wrote The Hasheesh Eater, which detailed his college experiments with drugs, and who later accompanied painter Albert Bierstadt on a western painting expedition. (Bierstadt stole Ludlow's wife.)
• Ada Clare, an actress and unwed mother who also wrote poetry and essays for Clapp's Saturday Press magazine.
• Fitz-James O'Brien, a journalist and cartoonist who died a lingering death after a battle injury as a Union soldier.
• Adah Isacs Menken, another actress, who seems to have foreshadowed Marilyn Monroe by a century.

Late on the scene were Artemus Ward, who essentially became America's first stand-up comic, and Edwin Booth, the Shakespearean actor whose brother assassinated the president.

Rebel Souls is rich with biographical profiles and historical incidents and will please readers interested in 19th century America. It may also connect with people who lived through the 1960s.

Martin, Justin. Rebel Souls: Walt Whitman and America's First Bohemians. Da Capo Press, 2014. 339p. ISBN 9780306822261.

A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story by Qais Akbar Omar

In the U.S., we have seen much of what has happened in Afghanistan since 2001. Even before that Afghanistan was often front page news, but our attention was sporadic. Our country boycotted the 1980 Summer Olympics after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in late 1979. We noted when the warlords of the Mujahedin pushed the Soviets out and were later themselves displaced by the Taliban. We decried human rights abuses and mourned the Taliban's destruction of the ancient Buddha statues in Banyan. But worrying about whether all our computers would crash on January 1, 2000 and about the value of our tech stocks, we lost track of Afghani news until we invaded the country in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 hijackings of American commercial aircraft by Al-Qaeda terrorists.

Qais Akbar Omar and his family never for a moment forgot what was happening in Afghanistan as they had to live every dangerous day. Omar recounts their experiences from 1991 to 2001 in A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story.

Omar was only nine years old in 1991 when the Mujahedin no longer had a common Soviet enemy to unify its ranks. Various warlords representing different ethnic groups began carving up the country and its capital Kabul, and factions began firing rockets in support of street fighting. Omar's moderately well-to-do family was forced out of the house that his grandfather had built on a hill and accept the hospitality of his father's carpet business partner in another neighborhood. Front lines of battle shifted around the city day by day for years. Omar and his father listened the BBC news in the morning to plan their daily errands.

A Fort of Nine Towers is a memoir filled with great characters, dangerous encounters, and success stories. I think it could make a riveting television mini-series. If done right, American and European viewers might get a better understanding of what happens in many countries when people are pawns to militarized governments that rule without their permission. Of course, reading will always more fulfilling than viewing a TV mini-series.

A Fort of Nine Towers has disturbing details that might turn away sensitive readers, but it is their loss if they can not overcome their reluctance to face reality. In the end, Omar's story offers both hope and caution for the future.

Omar, Qais Akbar. A Fort of Nine Towers: An Afghan Family Story. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013. 396p. ISBN 9780374157647.

Ghost Walls: The Story of a 17th Century Colonial Homestead by Sally M. Walker

Having enjoyed Written in Bone: Buried Lives of Jamestown and Colonial Maryland by Sally M. Walker in summer, I was excited in fall when I found a review of a forthcoming book by the author in Booklist. Seeing that her new book would also be about a site that some of my ancestors called home, I resolved to read Ghost Walls: The Story of a 17th Century Colonial Homestead. I made a copy of the review and kept it on my desk until the title appeared in our library system catalog.

Walker's first book on Colonial America dealt with forensic archeology and recounted stories that the bones of colonists told about how they lived and died. Her attention to stories remains the same in Ghost Walls, in which she describes a decades-long archaeological investigation focused on an important colonial building, the house built by John Lewger outside St. Mary's City in 1637. Instead of bones, the archaeologists seek architectural clues in the colors of dirt, as well as in artifacts and pollen counts.

Being the provincial secretary of the St. Mary's colony, Lewger built its largest home on a property he named St. John's. Its parlor served not only as his family's living area and bedroom, but also as the assembly room and courtroom for the colony. Before the 17th century ended, the house was sold several times and remodeled. It was finally an inn before being abandoned around 1695. Walker tells stories about each owner and family.

Walker also tells a contemporary story along with the history, recounting the effort from 1962 to 2008 to preserve the site and build a museum. Aimed at late elementary and middle school readers, Ghost Walls is a compact and informative tribute that will interest any one who enjoys good period history.

Walker, Sally M. Ghost Walls: The Story of a 17th Century Colonial Homestead. Carolrhoda Books, 2014. 136p. ISBN 9780761354086.

Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky

When I see articles about nonfiction readers' advisory or attend a workshop on that topic, I invariably notice a plug for the now considered-classic title Salt: A World History by Mark Kurlansky, published in 2002. Even librarians who mostly tout fiction seem to say they enjoyed it. It has been on my wishlist for years, and I finally borrowed it as an audio download in the final days of 2014. Was it really going to be as good as everyone said?

One positive for the audiobook is that it is read by the very talented Scott Brick. I have listened to numerous books by him. He can put life into a telephone directory. Luckily for Brick and for listeners, Kurlansky has filled his wide-ranging book with history from seemingly every place and period, noting many interesting facts, making intelligent observations, and providing recipes for food items that most people just buy at the store. Can you imagine adding 12 and a half ounces of salt to 25 pounds of sturgeon eggs to make your own caviar? Much of the text is entertaining, and the idea that salt has played a large role in agriculture, industry, commerce, cuisine, diplomacy, and empire-building is fascinating.

Still, I found the book at times more a historical litany than a plot-driven story. I considered dropping out at several points, but then I would be re-engaged by some country, person, or issue in which I have continuing interest.

I am glad to have stuck with Salt: A World History as the final chapters are some of the most engaging, including a section on the Morton Salt company of Chicago. Kurlansky addresses our current salt economy at the end. Another good reason staying the course is seeing that l there is a consistent thread through world history - something that is more than salt but revealed by salt.

I am sure that I will be noticing links to the salt trade in history books and in my travels for years.

Kurlansky, Mark. Salt: A World History. Walker and Company, 2002. 484p. ISBN 0802713734.

Audiobook: 14 compact discs. Phoenix Books, 2006. ISBN 1597770973.

Minnesota Days: Our Heritage in Stories, Art, and Photos

When Laura and Luke, who live in Minneapolis, asked what I might like for Christmas, I suggested a book about Minnesota. I have been to the state 10 or 15 times since Laura moved there in 2011 and like the place. So I suggested something about its history, land, and culture. Minnesota Days: Our Heritage in Stories, Art, and Photos covers all three of those topics well.

Minnesota Days is a beautiful book filled with short pieces written by notable Minnesotans illustrated by Minnesota art works and photographs. Readers from any state will recognize some of the authors, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Sinclair Lewis, Laura Ingalls Wilder, Gordon Parks, and Garrison Keillor. Others journalists, historians, and novelists will be new to non-Minnesotans. Having read this book, I would like to read more by Grace H. Flandrau, Bill Holm, and Jon Hassler.

You can learn much just looking at the pictures, some of which are by famous Minnesotan photographers and artists. They show landscapes, wildlife, people, cities, and cuisine. I particularly want to call your attention to the topical map on page 106, "Minnesota Principle Hot Dishes by Region." Cheese scalloped potatoes, corny burger bake, wild rice casserole, German pork chop casserole, and jiffy tuna hot dish all appeal to me. A wandering tour of "the Land of Sky Blue Water" would be caloric.

If you are not in Minnesota, your library may not have Minnesota Days. Ask for an interlibrary loan. I am lucky to have my own copy. Thanks you, Laura and Luke.

Minnesota Days: Our Heritage in Stories, Art, and Photos edited by Michael Dregni. Voyageur Press, 1999. 160p. ISBN 0896584216.

The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights by Steve Sheinkin

With Black History Month in February, now is a good time to read The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights. This mostly forgotten story about segregation in the military during World War II recounts events that preceded the well-reported integration of major league baseball in 1947 and the civil rights protests of the 1950s and 1960s. The author Steve Sheinkin poses that the courage of the black sailors who refused to load ships Naval ships with bombs and ammunition days after an explosion that killed 320 black sailors gave direction to later civil rights efforts.

On July 17, 1944 at San Francisco Bay's Port Chicago, only black sailors died because only black sailors were on the docks loading Naval ships at the port. Many of them had wanted to be on battle ships in the Pacific, but the Navy had refused to assign them. Instead, they were assigned to very dangerous work for which they had no formal training. White commanders pressed them to load heavy weapons with increasing speed. According to some accounts, disaster was inevitable.

Few whites noticed the story of the disaster in newspapers filled with other war stories. Black newspapers and the NAACP noticed. The latter sent its attorney Thurgood Marshall to defend the 50 sailors who refused to load ships until safety issues were addressed.

A key part of The Port Chicago 50 is the military trial with examination of witnesses and impassioned arguments by the prosecutors and defending attorneys. After weeks of proceedings, the 50 were all found guilty within minutes and sentenced to 15 years of hard labor. Sheinkin recounts appeal efforts and how the men were very quietly released after the war ended.

The Port Chicago 50 is aimed at young readers by the same author who won awards for The Bomb. It is worth reading in print with illustrations or as an audiobook by readers of all ages.

Sheinkin, Steve. The Port Chicago 50: Disaster, Mutiny, and the Fight for Civil Rights. Roaring Brook Press, 2014. 200p. ISBN 9781596437968.

audiobook: Listening Library, 2014. 3 compact discs. ISBN 9780804167444.

Between Man and Beast: An Unlikely Explorer, the Evolution Debates, and the African Adventure That Took the Victorian World by Storm by Monte Reel

I had never heard of the African explorer Paul Du Chaillu. According to author Monte Reel, few people have, which was part of the appeal for him to write a book. Writing about Du Chaillu also gave Reel a vehicle for exploring the Victorian Age and its controversies and prejudices. The result of his research is Between Man and Beast: An Unlikely Explorer, the Evolution Debates, and the African Adventure That Took the Victorian World by Storm.

That Du Chaillu is called an African explorer can be interpreted a couple of ways. The obvious is that he explored Africa. He took two extended journeys into the interior from coastal Gabon in the 1856 and 1863 and is thought to be the first European to see a live gorilla. Before that only gorilla skeletons and skins had been collected and sent to the scientific societies in the capitals of Europe, where there was much skepticism of such an animal truly existing. After his first expedition, Du Chaillu took preserved gorillas to New York and London to both great acclaim and charges of fraud.

Du Chaillu's origins were obscure. His father was French and his mother was rarely mentioned. He said at different times that he was born in France, in New Orleans, and in French colonies. Many of his supporters believed him to be dark skinned from his years in the Africa sun. In fact, he was part African, born on the island of Reunion east of Madagascar. The author poses that perceptions of Du Chaillu's race factored in his failure to impress men of science with his observations, stories, and specimens. Though his books sold well initially, his fame was short-lived.

Reel's sympathetic account of Du Chaillu's brief career is filled with big names in science, including Sir Richard Burton, Richard Owen, Roderick Murchison, Charles Darwin, and Thomas Henry Huxley. They and others used Du Chaillu's accounts in their arguments over evolution. The explorer tried to stay neutral but others implied his allegiance or opposition. After two African trips, he gave up gorilla studies and devoted himself to less volatile Scandinavian topics.

Readers who enjoy history of exploration and science will appreciate Between Man and Beast. If you library does not have it, request an interlibrary loan.

Reel, Monte. Between Man and Beast: An Unlikely Explorer, the Evolution Debates, and the African Adventure That Took the Victorian World by Storm. Doubleday, 2013. 331p. ISBN 9780385534222.

On the High Line: Exploring America's Most Original Urban Park by Annik La Farge

When Bonnie and I visited Manhattan in May of 2013, the first place that my college roommate Robert took us was the High Line, an urban park created atop an abandoned elevated rail line on the west side of the island, running from Gansevoort Street north to 34th Street, over 20 blocks long. We climbed up the stairs at 20th Street to discover a wide walk surrounded by masses of flowers, shrubs, and trees. At some points along the popular walk, I noticed old steel rails and imagined they carried commuter trains, like the elevated lines of Chicago. But I misunderstood.

Annik La Farge tells the full story in On the High Line: Exploring America's Most Original Urban Park. The High Line opened in 1934 to get freight trains off the busy streets of the industrial west side. These trains delivered produce, raw materials, and manufactured goods from docks on the Hudson River to factories and warehouses, many with elevated rails running right into their buildings. The line was abandoned in 1980, and a debate about what to do with the property began. In the 1990s, naturalists noticed how abundantly wildflowers were growing all along the tracks and the effort to make a park began. Parts of it opened in 2003.

History is just a part of La Farge's book. Almost every page is filled with beautiful color photos of the park as it is today, and the author reports on ongoing projects on and around the High Line, which has proved to be a spark to urban renewal. Readers see that its great variety of spaces provide community gathering spots, places for quiet relaxation, great views of the Manhattan skyline, and a handy path for many New Yorkers going to work or out for the evening.

On the High Line is just what New York needs to combat the image of the city as gray and dreary place. It can go into either landscaping, travel, or history collections.

La Farge, Annik. On the High Line: Exploring America's Most Original Urban Park. Thames & Hudson, 2014. 226p. ISBN 9780500291412

Lives in Ruins: Archaeologists and the Seductive Lure of Human Rubble by Marilyn Johnson

Having enjoyed The Dead Beat and This Book is Overdue, books about obituary writers and librarians, I am a Marilyn Johnson fan. She is making her mark investigating professions that attract people more interested in discovery of facts than in their salaries. Her third book is Lives in Ruins: Archaeologists and the Seductive Lure of Human Rubble. Many have dreamed of careers in archaeology. Johnson's new book reveals the lives that they might have led.

Thanks to real archaeologists such as Howard Carter and Louis Leakey and fictional characters Amelia Peabody and Indiana Jones, many people think of archaeology as an exciting career. It can be, but the dramatic action rarely requires jumping from a horse onto a speeding train. Instead, the allure of archaeology comes from discovering revealing fragments of past cultures in the forms of pieces of pottery, buttons, old coins, building foundations, and human bones. In the field, archaeologists spend much of their time on the ground with a trowel and brushes, gently removing items from the soil, recording every possible fact about their locations.

If you had become an archaeologist, you might have traveled all over the world to collect artifacts, or you might have become involved in emergency investigations of real estate properties before building construction. In either case, you would have been sporadically employed, unless you were one of the lucky few to land academic positions. Many of the people Johnson profiles have had to hold second jobs or create their own foundations to investigate neglected historical sites. They are a fascinating group.

Armchair travelers will enjoy Lives in Ruins, as Johnson takes readers around the world, often to almost secret locations. They will also experience uncomfortable working conditions (not recommended for the claustrophobic) and attend professional conferences. It is as close as many of us will get to living the dream.

Johnson, Marilyn. Lives in Ruins: Archaeologists and the Seductive Lure of Human Rubble. Harper, 2014. 274p. ISBN 9780062127181.

Libraries in the Ancient World by Lionel Casson

The origins of libraries are as vague as the evolution of living species. Just when did a room full of clay tablets transform from an accounting office into a library? We will never really know because the evidence is lost. Whoever first kept a collection of documents other than sales receipts, perhaps a collection of letters, epitaphs, or royal proclamations, would not have foreseen the implications of his action. In Libraries in the Ancient World, Lionel Casson reports the first known library was in Nippur in southern Mesopotamia where archeologists have found a group of clay tablets dating from the third millennium BCE that served as a sort of reference collection; they listed geographical places and names of the gods, identified professions, offered exercises for improving writing skills, and recorded lyrics of hymns.

In the majority of chapters of Libraries in the Ancient World, Casson focuses on libraries from ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome, providing cities and dates, describing buildings, and reporting on collections. He also comments on what is known about the librarians and their staffs and what services were provided for readers. There was often a library catalogue, though it might be more of a chronological accession list on a tablet or scroll. Zenodotus at the library of Alexandria appears to have invented alphabetization. Some libraries inscribed the titles they held into the stone walls.

Through much of the ancient times, books were collections of papyrus or parchment scrolls that were either stacked on nooks or kept in buckets. Library staff usually brought groups of scrolls to the reader. No self-service. When codices (flat books made of papyrus or parchment between covers of wood or ivory) began to be used, librarians had to reorganize to shelve them. Libraries had to keep both scrolls and codices were centuries as the adaptation to the new technology was very slow. (Imagine that we still needed to keep 8 mm films and 8-track tapes in our public libraries.)

Where libraries got their books is a major topic in Casson's book. Remember that their was no printing press in the ancient world. Everything was handwritten. Usually authors wrote single copies for whatever purpose they had, and they would let others make copies. Of course, scholars did not have time to transcribe, so they assigned the work to their slaves. Libraries might acquire titles as gifts from authors or the scholars who had copies made, or the libraries assigned their own slaves to make copies. Libraries benefited greatly when local generals sacked other cities and brought back the books. In later periods there were bookstores, but copies of books made for profit were known to have more transcription errors. Libraries did not want hastily-made bookstore copies if there was any other choice.

Collecting books, cataloguing them, loaning them to readers, and adapting to changes in technology. We are still doing what we have always done. Check it out.

Casson, Lionel. Libraries in the Ancient World. Yale University Press, 2001. 177p. ISBN 9780300097214.

The Age of Vikings by Anders Winroth

Crime did pay. That seems to be one of the messages of The Age of the Vikings by Anders Winroth, a new history of the Norse warriors from Princeton University Press. Being from an academic press, the book is academic in tone, as you might expect, but there are interesting ideas and stories within its ten chapters. One is that the acquisition of booty from raiding coastal towns of Britain and continental Europe helped transform violent people of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden into mainstream European Christians. Winroth focuses on the 8th through 11th centuries during which the Scandinavians joined the European community.

Winroth describes Viking warfare, exploration, shipbuilding, trade, monarchies, religion, arts, and literature. There is sometimes not really as much detail as I would have liked, but there are many gaps in Viking story. Its warlords had skalds (poets), but they were
not concerned with written accounts, and the writers of rune stones were deliberately misleading. Scholars are still scratching their heads trying to sort out the truth about the Vikings.

Some readers will enjoy The Age of the Vikings because there are still some mysteries, such as just how did they make it to North America and why are there so many Arab coins found in Scandinavian digs? There is still something about which to wonder.

Winroth, Anders. The Age of the Vikings. Princeton University Press, 2014. 320p. ISBN 9780691149851.