Chicago History in Song by the History Singers

Kathryn and John Atwood at Thomas Ford

Chicago has a dramatic history, only some of which has been commemorated in song. Kathryn and John Atwood of the History Singers have found major historical subjects that have no surviving songs to sing to later generations. Among the stories unsung were the Haymarket Riot, the sinking of the Eastland, and the eviction of the Potawatomi Indians from the region. Being devoted folksingers, they have written their own pieces which they debuted at the Thomas Ford Memorial Library on February 21 for one of our Elmer Kennedy History Lectures.

Kathryn and John added their songs to others they have collected for a new program they call Chicago History in Song. They started with an old favorite called "El-A-Noy" which was used to promote the selling and settling of the state in the 1830s and ended with the blues classic "Sweet Home Chicago." In between, they sang about the Chicago Fire of 1871, the First Ward rule of Bathhouse John Coughlin, and the woe of the Chicago Cubs, as well as the three subjects in the first paragraph above. They introduce each song with a bit of history to explain its significance.

If we had a house band at Thomas Ford Memorial Library, it would be the History Singers, who have presented at least a half dozen of their programs as our history lectures or for our Friday at the Ford coffeehouse. Kathryn and John are always warm, friendly, and entertaining, and they always have some new or forgotten songs to share. We have enjoyed debuting their latest offering.

Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World by Tom Zoellner

The story of uranium is, of course, an epic that has no end (thankfully). Tom Zoellner brings us up to date with Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World. It is tale that begins with the formation of the earth, but being more concerned with human pursuit of wealth, power, and a better life through uranium, he starts in the the Middle Ages. When Czech miners dug for silver at St. Joachimsthal, they also found a greasy, dark matter that stuck to their picks. They called it pechblende, meaning bad-luck rock, and tossed it aside. Within fifteen years of mine operation, many of these men began to cough, spit blood, and die without a known cause. The silver soon ran out, the tragedy was forgotten, and the piles of waste surrounded the neglected mines for several centuries.

Zoellner picks up the story in 1896 when French chemist Henri Becquerel discovered strange emissions in his cathode ray experiments, leading the Curies to begin their studies of radioactivity. For the next several decades, most scientists thought rare radioactive elements would be of most use in medicine. Early in the 20th century, only novelist H. G. Wells suggested that an unnamed rock could produce both great energy for industry and powerful bombs for the military conquest, but his idea was considered fantasy.

The search for uranium began in earnest during World War II. Here is a part of the story that will surprise many readers. Even as the physicists of the Manhattan Project worked to build a weapon to give the Allies an edge to end the war, the potential for atomic weaponry was not realized. Military intelligence assured the president and his defense council that very little uranium existed anywhere and that only one mine in the Congo had ore worth extracting. Because the U.S. had firm control of that one mine, there was no danger of a proliferation of atomic weapons. Also, agents reported that Soviet scientists would never be able to understand how to build a bomb.

Of course, uranium turned out to be in many places, especially behind the Iron Curtain, and nations large and small sought supplies to become players in the atomic age. Building bombs is not difficult with highly enriched uranium. Fortunately, enriching uranium is still a very difficult and costly process.

In the last two thirds of Uranium, Zoellner takes readers to remote locations in many countries, including the Congo, Niger, western Australia, Israel, Iran, Pakistan, India, former states of the Soviet Union, and the desert southwest of the United States, places were ore is mined, refined, and shaped into weapons. He also follows international inspectors working to lessen the threat of terrorists obtaining weapons-grade material. Through his reporting of this research, he recounts 70 years of science, diplomacy, and fear. Readers who enjoyed his The Heartless Stone: A Journey Through the World of Diamonds will recognize and appreciate his quick-moving narrative.

Zoellner, Tom. Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock That Shaped the World. Viking, 2009. 337p. ISBN 9780670020645.

Skin, a Film Directed by Anthony Fabian

Genetic science was not well understood by common people in the 1950s when a dark-skinned girl was born to Abraham and Sannie Laing, white Afrikaners living in the East Transvaal of South Africa. History was also misunderstood, as white Afrikaners had been taught that their ancestors had settled an empty land long before the arrival of dark tribes that they forced to work their crops and mines. The idea that many of them were of mixed race seemed ridiculous to them. With their own prejudices against blacks, her parents raised Sandra as white, not preparing her for the protest that arose when they sent her to boarding school. Nor did they imagine the three decades of trouble dramatized by director Anthony Fabian in his 2008 film Skin.

With a talented cast from Great Britain, South Africa, and other Commonwealth countries, Skin portrays the pervasive prejudice of 1950s to 1990s. Shopkeeper Abraham Laing (played by Sam Neill) will not allow the blacks to hand him money; glaring at them, he taps on the counter when they try to do so. Other people stare at Sandra (played by Sophie Okonedo) when she goes into a restaurant with date who talks constantly of chicken farming. When Sandra's racial classification is contested in court, crowds fill the courtroom and the streets. Her ever-changing legal status makes her life difficult, but is almost irrelevant in the end. She is seen as an outsider by everyone.

Skin is an excellent choice for film groups, for it is artfully made and has troubled characters with perplexing situations worthy of discussion. Viewers at the Thomas Ford Memorial Library were sympathetic and wanted to learn more about the Apartheid Era and current South African affairs. Because its distribution in the U.S. was very limited, many libraries can debut it to their communities. We had our best turn out of the season.

Trailer on You-Tube

Skin. E1 Entertainment, 2011. 107 minutes. ISBN 9781417233816

Twenty Chickens for a Saddle: The Story of an African Childhood by Robyn Scott

I enjoy two kinds of memoirs. The first is the kind that resonates with my own experiences. When I recognize the similarities in my life and that of the author, I feel the importance of my own story and often find new perspectives to contemplate. I may understand my family, friends, and myself better. The second kind describes a life very unlike my own. From reading such a book, I learn of other places, cultures, and aspirations, challenging me to envision other ways, making me sympathetic to the world as a whole. Twenty Chickens for a Saddle: The Story of an African Childhood by Robyn Scott is mostly the second kind of memoir.

I say mostly, because there is always some commonality. We all breathe, eat, sleep, and desire a good life. We all have families. But the particulars of Scott's childhood memoir are far different from my own. She was born in New Zealand and spent most of childhood in Botswana, where her father was a flying doctor skilled in alternative medicine. She was home schooled because her mother disliked the routine and repetition of regular schools. With her brother and sister, the African landscape was their primary school room; they swan in sight of crocodiles, learned to watch for snakes, and rescued injured animals. When she wanted a new saddle for riding their free-spirited horses, her father suggested that she raise free range chickens to sell their eggs to earn the funds. Living in what was a converted cow barn, her unorthodox family was unlike other white families who lived in cookie cutter houses.

To her credit, Scott is not self-centered in her memoir, as she devotes much of Twenty Chickens for a Saddle to stories about her parents, siblings, grandparents, and three nations of Botswana, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. In fifteen years, he witnessed black/white relationships, deteriorating economies, and the spread of AIDS, as well as her parents' struggles with broken dreams. She recounts the time with much wit (despite her father's claim that she had none), almost always tempering a sad story with a funny one. Readers who enjoy the Botswana of The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency books may also enjoy Twenty Chickens for a Saddle.

Scott, Robyn. Twenty Chickens for a Saddle: The Story of an African Childhood. Penguin Press, 2008. 453p. ISBN 9781594201592.

Chicago Stories: Tales of the City

A recent Forbes magazine analysis proclaimed Chicago the 6th most miserable place in the country, based on living conditions, traffic, weather, etc. I actually like the place, though there is tremendous opportunity for improvement, but I can see the ranking as a cumulation of many historical factors, all of which can be found in Chicago Stories: Tales of the City edited by John Miller and Genevieve Anderson.

What has gone wrong in Chicago:

• The Great Fire of 1871 
• The prostitution of 19th century farm girls 
• The pitiful play of baseball teams 
• The race riot of 1919 
• The poverty of the South and West sides 
• The avarice of the North Side 
• The riots during the 1968 Democratic Convention 

In the hands of great writers, these miserable affairs often become compelling novels, histories, memoirs, and essays.

For the reader, Chicago Stories is like a sampler box of chocolates. You may like chocolate covered cherries and lemon creams but not chocolate turtles. While I enjoyed reading the short story "Looking for Mr. Green" by Saul Bellow, a selection from The Untouchables by Eliot Ness, and a selection from Boss by Mike Royko, I was rather disappointed by a selection from Hull House by Jane Addams and a profile from Division Street: America by Studs Terkel. Like with chocolates, each reading was a mystery before the tasting. More often than not, the experience was pleasurable.

Chicago Stories: Tales of the City. Chronicle Books, 1993. 242p. ISBN 0811801640.

Summer Side of Life by Gordon Lightfoot

How much do I like the music of Gordon Lightfoot? I can quantify. I have been listening to the folk singer for 42 years. I still have five of his vinyl LPs, and I now have eight of his albums on compact discs. The last number rose when I went on a minor eek-they-are-going-to-stop-making-CDs buying spree. Among the titles I purchased to fill in my collection of Lightfoot in his prime was Summer Side of Life, which I had heard but never personally owned. Because it was less familiar to me, it was like finding a new Lightfoot album, and I have listened to it numerous times in the past two months.

While there were many great songs in Lightfoot's early period, he garnered more attention between 1970 and 1976, when he issued an album a year. Summer Side of Life came out in 1971, right between If You Could Read My Mind (1970) and Don Quixote (1972). I don't remember any of the tracks from the 1971 collection getting much radio airplay. Lightfoot wrote all the songs. Some listeners might remember "Talking in Your Sleep" which has the same love-gone-wrong feel as "If You Could Read My Mind," one of Lightfoot's most replayed songs on oldies radio. "Cotton Jenny" was a hit for Anne Murray, but most baby boomers probably never heard Lightfoot's rendition. 

The singer/songwriter and his long-standing band showed much versatility on Summer Side of Life. "10 Degrees & Getting Colder" is a good down-on-my-luck-on-the-road song. "Miguel" is a Mexican border ballad that may remind some listeners to Marty Robbins' "El Paso." "Redwood Hill" is sort of country swing. "Nous Vivons Ensemble" and "Cabaret" are ambitious art songs, such as Judy Collins would have sung at the time. It is all good listening and representative of a great musical career.

Lightfoot, Gordon. Summer Side of Life. Warner Brothers, 1971.

Lee Murdock at Friday at the Ford

This will be a week for music reviews. In Monday's post, I mentioned my library's concert series Friday at the Ford. Five times each year, we present folk, jazz, or classical music in a small, friendly space on a Friday night. Relaxed musicians and audience members might even talk during a show. The concerts are absolutely free to attend thanks to the support of the Western Springs Library Friends.

In January 2012, we brought back Lee Murdock, an Illinois-based folk singer who has researched and performed many songs about the Great Lakes in his over thirty years on the stage. He began his hour-long concert with "Remember the Night of the Phoenix," a song that tells from three viewpoints about a fire on a steamship outside of Sheboygan in 1847. To lighten the mood, he followed with a humorous piece called "The Lumberman's Alphabet," which is not really a lake song. Murdock explained that he has recently been widening his repertoire, especially to include instrumental pieces, such as his haunting 12-string guitar rendition of "In the Bleak Midwinter."

Throughout the concert, Murdock told stories, some about the places that he had visited and others about the history that he had uncovered. One of my favorites was his account of the Lincoln-Douglas debates of the 1850s, which led to a song called "I Am a Peaceful Democrat." The singer also invited us to sing along on several songs. The audience did well, especially during the encore on "The Erie Canal."

Sales of Murdock's CDs after the concert were brisk. I got two, including his recent A Wordless Christmas, 20 carols and holiday songs on guitar (in 14 tracks), which we will enjoy at our house next December. I also bought The View from the Harbor, which includes an entertaining song by the same title about a retired sailor who holds court in a pub. I'll probably listen to it often while gardening this summer. You can learn more about Murdoch and his music at his website.

Ac•Rock at the Library

Do you think of libraries as venues for music? Not as a rule in most communities, but we do pretty well at Thomas Ford with our Friday at the Ford concerts and our annual An Evening at the Opera. We may also bring in music for special occasions, as we did for the 80th Anniversary Party, when Miss Uma booked Ac•Rock, an a cappella quartet that rips the guitars and drums out of rock and roll to let their voices carry the beat and melody. Their hour-long concert for families drew quite a crowd to our basement community room, where their riotous harmonies and crazed antics delighted listeners. It was great to clap and sing along to a series of familiar songs ranging from doo-wop to hard rock.

Ac-Rock has honed its entertainment skills and developed programs for different audiences. With the family program, we got elements from both school assembly presentations and serious concerts. Of course, nothing ever seems very serious for the quartet with its constant banter and slapstick gymnastics. Still, the singers let us know about the basic history and musical foundations of a capella singing. The pleased audience bought up dozens of Ac•Rock CDs after the show.

I took home their CD Acapellago, which dates from 1999, making it the second of their six albums. I bought it for the songs at the bottom of the menu - "Witch Doctor" and "Some Kind of Wonderful" - but found my favorites have turned out to be tracks 2, 4, 6, and 10 - "Come Go with Me," "Vehicle," "Bus Stop," and "409." On "Vehicle" they actual allow a guitar solo from Jim Peterik of the original Ides of March. Harry Nilson's "Coconuts" seems too long, but I am otherwise very happy with the selection and tempted to order more online at the Ac•Rock website. Luckily for us, Ac•Rock donated a portion of the after concert sales back to the library.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick: Fourteen Amazing Authors Tell the Tales

In 1984, children's book author and illustrator Chris Van Allsburg published a small collection of unusual drawings supposedly given to him by the children's book acquisition editor Peter Wenders, whose publishing firm is oddly not named. Van Allsburg said in the introduction that Wenders said that a man name Harris Burdick brought the drawings to Wenders in 1954, promised more drawings and stories, but then disappeared. All efforts to locate the secretive illustrator were unsuccessful. In the meantime, Wenders children had all written stories to go with the drawings. Around 1983, Wenders showed these and the drawings to Van Allsburg who thought other children would also enjoy writing stories to explain them. So The Mysteries of Harris Burdick became a frequently used book by writing teachers in schools across the country.

In 1993, novelist Stephen King got into the act and wrote a story for one of the pictures, that of a three-story house rising above its lawn like a rocket just launching. Perhaps this was the seed from which Van Allsburg's new book sprouted. King is joined by thirteen other famous authors, each contributing a story for the drawing of their choice. Sherman Alexie, Jules Feifer, and Kate DiCamillo are among the esteemed group. In late 2011, The Chronicles of Harris Burdick was published.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick has been popular, so I just got it from my library last week, and it leapt to the top of my bookstack. Once I did start, I tried to space reading out a little to savor them, but I finished quickly anyway thoroughly satisfied. I especially liked "The Harp" by Linda Sue Park, "The Seven Chairs" by Lois Lowry, and "Oscar and Alphonse" by Van Allsburg. Also, "Just Desert" by M. T. Anderson, which describes exactly the fear that I used to have when I was about twelve.

Though described as a children's book, you are never too old to enjoy the good stories in The Chronicles of Harris Burdick.

The Chronicles of Harris Burdick. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2011. 195p. ISBN 9780547548104.

The Lost Panoramas: When Chicago Changed Its River and the Lands Beyond by Richard Cahan and Michael Williams

When I moved to Chicago over thirty years ago, I wished that I could time travel to see the city and the region before it had been transformed by massive public works and intense population. I found exhibits at the Chicago Historical Society revealing, and since then I have enjoyed many books, but I always look for more windows to the past. That is why I appreciated an exhibit of photographs from the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago that Bonnie and I saw at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum last year. Those photos and many more are now part of a big photo book The Lost Panoramas: When Chicago Changed Its River and the Lands Beyond by Richard Cahan and Michael Williams.

Why did the Sanitary District of Chicago (predecessor of the MWRDGC) take thousands of pictures along the Chicago, Des Plaines, and Illinois rivers between 1894 and 1928? The District anticipated lawsuits from property owners along the rivers affected by the digging of the Chicago Sanitary Canal to reverse the flow of the Chicago River, which sent all of the sewage and industrial waste away from Lake Michigan and the city into the center of the state, and it believed it could prove dilution rendered the wastes inoffensive and of no harm to the people downstream. Of course, this proved wrong in the long run, but District lawyers won many cases with the photos.

The legacy left by the photographers has transcended the narrow intent of the District Board and politicians to defend Chicago's cause. As shown in the recent book, their photographs captured a rich and fertile downstate landscape with small towns, farms, and woodlands. In the city, however, they showed terrible industrial abuse of the river from the uncontrolled flow of wastes from factories and the southside stockyards. If I had a time machine, I'd steer away from the river in the city. Until such a machine is developed, I'll enjoy more photo books like The Lost Panoramas.

Cahan, Richard and Michael Williams. The Lost Panoramas: When Chicago Changed Its River and the Lands Beyond. Cityfiles Press, 2011. 160p. ISBN 9780978545079.

Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust by Immaculee Ilibagiza

Eighteen years have passed since the genocide in Rwanda, a tragedy that should be remembered for eighteen hundred years and never repeated. The historical record, however, shows that lethal clashes between Tutsis and Hutus have occurred every other decade since the country's campaign for independence began in the 1950s. A million people may have died in 1994. How can the cycle be broken?

In Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust, genocide survivor Immaculee Ilibagiza offer forgiveness as the key. Ilibagiza has so much to forgive. Her parents and two of her three brothers were brutally murdered in the Interhamwe uprising following the downing of Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana's plane. Ilibagiza fled to the home of a Hutu minister who hid her and seven other women in a very small bathroom for 91 days while the massacre of Tutsis literally took place outside the tiny window through which she would sometimes peek. She survived by frequently reciting the prayers of the rosary, pausing and sometimes skipping the "as we forgive those who sin against us" statement in The Lord's Prayer. Her conscience would not rest, however, and she decided that the call to forgive is the challenge of her life.

Left to Tell is a natural for discussion groups. The book group from my church found it a very moving account but had several unanswered questions. The most puzzling was how Ilibagiza could spend 91 days with a group of women and say so little about them in her book. How could they all have maintained such quiet and discipline for three months? Also, is Ilibagiza's support of current president Paul Kagame consistent with her principles?

Group Left to Tell with the book An Ordinary Man by Paul Rusesabagina and films Hotel Rwanda and Munyurangabo, and you can get idea of what happened in Africa eighteen years ago.

Ilibagiza, Immaculee. Left to Tell: Discovering God Amidst the Rwandan Holocaust. Hay House, 2006. 215p. ISBN 1401908969

Forgotten Bookmarks: A Bookseller's Collection of Odd Things Lost Between the Pages by Michael Popek

What have you used to mark your spot in a book? A business card, a sales slip, a to-do list, a newspaper clipping, a photograph, or a letter from a friend or relative? Used bookseller Michael Popek has found these and many more curious items between the pages of books old and new. He reports his discoveries on his blog Forgotten Bookmarks and has now collected some of his favorites in a nicely illustrated book Forgotten Bookmarks: A Bookseller's Collection of Odd Things Lost Between the Pages.

In Forgotten Bookmarks, Popek presents exactly what he found - an artifact in a book - and usually adds a transcription of any handwritten messages. Like Popek, we get to puzzle over the significance of the item and whether there is some specific reason why it was in the book. Many of the items must have been the first thing at hand when the reader stopped reading, but other seem to have more connection, such as a poem "A Prayer for My Daughter" found inside the book Cutting: Understanding and Overcoming Self-Mutilation. Family photos stuck in Bibles is easy to understand, and it seems natural to find a postcard of New York's East River Bridge in The Old New York Frontier. I liked that he found a baseball card of Pee Wee Reese in The Best of Baseball. I used to use a Lou Brock card as a bookmark.

Like Popek, we sometimes find items in books returned to the library, but they are usually checkout receipts or library-produced bookmarks. Because these books were borrowed instead of owned, the readers were probably more careful to remove items from them. Still, we find a leather bookmark or a tassel every now and then. They go to our lost and found, if you are looking for one you are missing.

Popek, Michael. Forgotten Bookmarks: A Bookseller's Collection of Odd Things Lost Between the Pages. Perigee Book, 2011. 182p. ISBN 9780399537011.

First Family: Abigail and John Adams by Joseph J. Ellis

Long before Bill and Hillary or Barack and Michelle, couples who closely collaborate in politics and policy, there were John and Abigail. If you call them "the Adams family," as Joseph J. Ellis sometimes does in his dual biography First Family: Abigail and John Adams, I think of Gomez and Morticia (Addams, but you do not hear the extra d when listening to the audiobook), but if you say John and Abigail, I know just who you mean. Their relationship is one of the most celebrated in American history, thanks to their roles in the American Revolution and early republic and to the survival of their many letters. Many authors have mined those letters to write books. Ellis's work is a fine example of well-chosen pieces to tell how a serious farmer/lawyer and his wife from New England helped shape and lead a new nation.

Few couples write so many letters as did John and Abigail, but they were often apart for months and sometimes years, as John served as a delegate to the Colonial Congress that wrote the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution. He also travelled to Paris, Amsterdam, and London as a representative of the new republic, seeking aid and negotiating treaties. Meanwhile, Abigail raised their family and tended the farm, where she wrung the necks of chickens, split logs, and bought more land. In her letters, Abigail reported on the family business and advised John on the best ways to handle Benjamin Franklin, French aristocrats, British spies, rival Democratic Republicans, and his own cabinet.

With such good sources, Ellis probably found the book almost wrote itself (except it must have been difficult to pare down to under 300 pages). If you are like me, you'll find it compelling to read.

Ellis, Joseph J. First Family: Abigail and John Adams. Knopf, 2010. 299p. ISBN 9780307269621 or Books on Tape, 2010. 9 compact discs. ISBN 9780307737786.

Below Stairs: The Classic Maid's Memoir That Inspired Upstairs, Downstairs and Downton Abbey by Margaret Powell

When poor British school girl Margaret Powell was thirteen, she won a scholarship to continue her education, but when her parents discovered it would be five more years before their daughter could earn a wage, they said "no" to the offer. She was pulled out of school and hired as a day maid that year. When she turned fourteen, she was hired by a laundry that fired her a year later because a fourteen year old could be paid less. Within another year, her mother placed her as a kitchen maid in a big house, where her duties included making the morning fires, polishing the brass railings and door knockers, and ironing her employer's shoe laces before anyone in the great family was awake. Then she was all day in the kitchen. Being in the lowest of low positions, working for next to nothing, she was at least sheltered and no longer a mouth for her parents to feed. Some children worked as hard in the 1920s as they had in the time of Charles Dickens.

Having been a good student and a constant reader, Margaret aspired to leave service from the beginning, but it took her a couple of decades. In that time, she advanced through a number of kitchen positions in houses big and small, meeting many lifelong servants with many stories to tell. She recounted these times with humor and a sense of outrage in her 1968 book Below Stairs, just now published in the United States. The subtitled for the new edition claims the British book inspired the writing of scripts for both the 1970s TV series Upstairs, Downstairs and the new series Downton Abbey. Statements from creators of both series are found on the book jacket as proof. Fans of either or both series will delightfully recall many scenes as read.

For a book that is touted to have had such an impact, it is fairly short and quick to read. Discussion groups might like to pair it with episodes of either series or the movie The Remains of the Day.

Powell, Margaret. Below Stairs: The Classic Maid's Memoir That Inspired Upstairs, Downstairs and Downton Abbey. St. Martin's Press, 2012. 212p. ISBN 9781250005441.

Fresh Air with Terry Gross: Just for Laughs

Comedy is serious business, and interviewing contemporary comedians is like stepping into a minefield. A journalist could easily blunder and sound like a fool. Would you want to be stung by a Stephen Colbert or Don Rickles putdown? National Public Radio's Terry Gross, however, seems to relish the opportunity to question the men and women who make us laugh. She even requests an insult from Rickles in Fresh Air with Terry Gross: Just for Laughs. As the title suggests, there are many funny moments, but this is not all. The three CD audiobook is also filled with surprisingly frank discussion about dysfunctional families, racial and sexual stereotyping, societal hypocrisy, religion or lack of, and personal pain - all the putty from which comedy is made.

Not being a regular follower of celebrity news, I learned a lot about Steve Martin, Joan Rivers, Will Ferrell, and Tina Fey that others may have already known, but I doubt there are many interviews as candid about their lives good and bad. Saturday Night Live and 30 Rock comic Tracy Morgan both nearly melts down and nearly explodes. Sacha Baron Cohen speaks as himself instead of one of characters. George Carlin explains why he uses the seven forbidden words. Trey Parker and Matt Stone amusingly tell how they do the voices for South Park. I enjoyed every interview regardless of whether I actually care for the comedians' work.

My favorite track was Gross's interview of groundbreaking political comedian Mort Sahl, who actually wrote lines for both presidential candidates John Kennedy and Ronald Reagan (but not for Richard Nixon). Though liberal politically, he has enjoyed the company of many politicians and believes that former Secretary of Defense Alexander Haig was the funniest man he ever met. His entertaining interview adds history and emotional perspective to this wonderful collection.

Fresh Air with Terry Gross: Just for Laughs. HighBridge, 2010. 3 compact discs. ISBN 9781598878974.

Fifth Avenue, 5 A. M.: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman by Sam Wasson

Audrey Hepburn did not like Danish pastries, but she ate a sugary roll while wearing an elegant little black dress in front of the window of Tiffany's. She also insisted on playing respectable women in her films, but here she was as Holly Golightly, the quirky call girl created by Truman Capote in his novella Breakfast at Tiffany's. As a dedicated actress, she did what she had to do, but there was much about the movie adaptation that seemed awry. How had she come to be on location in Manhattan before daybreak? Film historian Sam Wasson recounts the story in Fifth Avenue, 5 A. M.: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman.

As Wasson tells the story, a slew of ambitious people had a hand in creating the famous film, and many of them were dismayed by the result. Probably no one was more disappointed than Truman Capote. His sad story was transformed into a light romantic comedy with a happy Hollywood ending. Screenwriter George Axelrod was angry that director Blake Edwards did not follow his script and added tangential scenes with new characters. Edith Head was upset that she was getting credit but not actually picking the clothes. Mel Ferrer was upset that his wife was playing a tart. One of the producers did not like the music, especially the song "Moon River." Only Edwards really seemed happy in the end, for he had created a crowd-pleasing movie that bumped him up the studio ladder. He'd get better movie assignments in the future.

Was Breakfast at Tiffany's a great cinematic achievement? Is it hard to assess fifty years later? Wasson slyly never really answers these questions, but in telling his episodic story, he gives readers much evidence with which to judge. Critics charged that the sources were disregarded, the plot was weak and nonsensical, and many people were offended by Mickey Rooney's role as Mr. Yunioshi. Many young women, however, saw Holly Golightly as a forerunner of the new woman, free to live alone, play the field, and buy elegant clothes despite a lack of societal status.

Regardless of what camp the reader joins in the debate, Fifth Avenue, 5 A. M. is a quick moving and entertaining window into the late 1950s and early 1960s. Boomers and anyone who studies film history will enjoy Wasson's book.

Wasson, Sam. Fifth Avenue, 5 A. M.: Audrey Hepburn, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and the Dawn of the Modern Woman. HarperStudio, 2010. 231p. ISBN 9780061774157

The Foremost Good Fortune: A Memoir by Susan Conley

While compiling my best biographies and memoirs list of 2011, I noticed that the Washington Post included The Foremost Good Fortune: A Memoir by Susan Conley. In it, the American novelist recounts her two years in Beijing with her banker husband and their two young sons. Knowing that I usually enjoy Americans-abroad stories and expecting a novelist to tell a good story, I borrowed it from the library. My expectations were well met.

In The Foremost Good Fortune, Conley describes the strangeness of her new urban life, seeing the Chinese city cleaned and polished to receive hundreds of thousands of visitors for the 2008 Olympics, while she searched through the international community for someone to be her friend and confidant. Struggling to learn Mandarin and feeling lost in Chinese markets, Conley often felt displaced, while her husband and sons thrived. They had a bank job and schools to attend each day, while she stayed in their cavernous eighth floor apartment or ventured out into the confusing Beijing neighborhoods. Then she discovered the lumps in her breasts.

Admitting her faults and fears, Conley draws readers close to her crisis. They listen to her deliberations, weigh the merits of her decisions, and celebrate her survival. They may also wonder how they would fare immersed in another culture. The Foremost Good Fortune would be a good choice for book discussion groups.

If you visit Susan Conley's blog, you can see some photos from her Beijing stay.

Conley, Susan. The Foremost Good Fortune: A Memoir. Alfred A. Knopf, 2011. 276p. ISBN 9780307594068.

The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris by David McCullough

"Who would not be an art student in Paris?" Robert Henri, 1888

Americans have been traveling to Paris for almost as long as there have been Americans of European lineage. Some made a special point of going to the French capital in the 1770s when they wanted to quit being British subjects. That Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and Thomas Jefferson went to ask the French to aid their cause is celebrated in many histories. The American Revolution might not have succeeded without French military and financial assistance, but after the war was won, French-American relations cooled somewhat for several decades.

In The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris, historian and frequent bestselling author David McCullough recounts the second great era of American pilgrimage to Paris, a period stretching from the 1830s to the beginning of the 20th century. The United States had firmly established itself as a nation with an expanding frontier and healthy economy, but some of the sons and daughters of the wealthy sought learning and pleasure that could only be found in Europe. Ignoring the prevailing sentiment against the Old World, young medical students, lawyers, writers, and artists boarded crowded wooded ships (and later steamships) for the long and dangerous voyage across the Atlantic to spend months or years away from family in Paris.

I was surprised to learn that in the early 19th century, Paris was the world's center for medical education. If they could prove worthy of admission, foreign students could attend any of the various hospital-based medical schools for free. Oliver Wendell Holmes and dozens of other Americans enrolled and learned about evidence-based diagnosis and other modern trends in the practice of medicine. Their generation then established their own medical schools in America.

McCullough profiles many individuals in the course of his epic book. Many of their names are familiar, such as James Fenimore Cooper, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Augustus Saint-Gaudens, Mary Cassatt, and John Singer Sargent. My favorite story, however, is about a lesser-known figure, Elihu B. Washburne, a former U.S. congressman who was sent by President Grant to be ambassador to France in 1869. Washburne was in his post at the start of the Franco-Prussian War. He helped many Americans and Germans escape the country before the Siege of Paris and personally directed humanitarian efforts throughout the war. He risked his own liberty and fortune to feed and rescue many innocent victims of the war. He also helped negotiate the peace agreement.

Readers who have enjoyed McCullough's award-winning biographies will find the author focuses sequentially on many figures in this new book, but he retains the intimate perspective of prior work as he uses many diaries and letters to let the individuals speak for themselves. Readers will, of course, also learn much about the character of Paris and Parisians. Now that it has dropped off the bestseller lists, there should be plenty of copies available in libraries.

McCullough, David. The Greater Journey: Americans in Paris. Simon and Schuster, 2011. 558p. ISBN 9781416571766.

also, Simon and Schuster Audio. 16 compact discs. ISBN 9781442344181.

The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Season One

It had been over 40 years since I had seen an episode of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. when a friend posted on Facebook a link to the TV show's theme music. The music came with a mix of stills and video from the show and rekindled my desire to see the old show. I had tried several years back and had not found any episodes on video, cable, or the Internet. This time I found the entire first season available in DVD from a neighboring public library. I placed a hold.

Once the big case with 29 episodes on 11 discs arrived, I was almost reluctant to look. Would the show be as cool as I remember? Would it be embarrassingly bad? How would I deal with that? Just laugh? I hoped to be pleasantly surprised.

Being the kind of person who starts at the beginning, I started with disc one, watched the pilot, and found myself in crisis mode right away. The plot was really weak, and Robert Vaughn as Napoleon Solo seemed to be smirking all the time. The sets seemed almost bare. David McCallum as Illya Kuryakin was hardly present. How could the executives at NBC have chosen to buy the series based on this pitiful effort? Either the 1960s were a more optimistic time or NBC must have thought we'd watch just about anything. Well, we would, if I remember correctly.

Thinking it had to get better, I watched the next three episodes, shown on NBC in the fall of 1964. I am happy to report that there was improvement. Napoleon Solo became more likable, and Illya Kuryakin became a bigger part of the story. The plots (while fairly simple) were at least easier to accept. As I watched, I started to think that the show resembled the first season of Star Trek (which debuted two years later). Both shows had rather plain, bare sets, except when the action moved outdoors. As in Star Trek, outdoor sequences were shot in California. In one scene, I almost expected to see Klingons come over the hill. And in every episode, Solo, like Captain Kirk, met a beautiful young woman who helped him foil Thrush and other international criminals. (Unlike Kirk, Solo refrained from any romantic attachment, but Kuryakin seemed interested in episode three.)

Like spy shows of any era (and Star Trek for that matter), The Man from U.N.C.L.E. displayed cutting-edge technology. In the intro to episodes two through four, Solo entered headquarters and flipped a switch that set lots of lights flashing on a mainframe computer. In one scene, the chief put a data card into a little window of a console and a slide show with audio then told the agents about a plot to use a gas that induced panic to overthrow an Eastern Bloc nation. The beautiful young secretaries in U.N.C.L.E. headquarters set up slide projectors in other scenes. While in the field, Solo had a communicator that he extracted from a cigarette case. He also had a small Polaroid-like camera that took pictures in the dark, revealing the image of the spy looking into Solo's large but bare motel room. Of course, the villains always had some newly developed secret weapon that Solo and Kuryakin had to disable or destroy.

I am not going to watch 25 further episodes, but I am general entertained by my trip into the past. The Man from U.N.C.L.E. is fun to watch even now.

The Man from U.N.C.L.E., Season One. Warner Brothers DVD/Turner Entertainment, 2008. 11 DVDs.

George Harrison: Living in the Material World by Olivia Harrison

It has been eleven years since guitarist, singer, songwriter, movie producer, and gardener/landscaper George Harrison died of cancer. I did not know about the gardening and landscaping part of his life until I read George Harrison: Living in the Material World, a photobiography by Olivia Harrison. He began gardening in 1970 when he purchased a rundown estate called Friar Park. What did a young man raised in streets of Liverpool know about shrubs and trees? Was it just natural to love plants? Was he impressed by the gardens of India while there seeking spiritual knowledge? Olivia Harrison doesn't tell, but she does include photos of the estate grounds before and after his work.

By the way, George Harrison was a Beatle, too, but he downplayed that after the band disbanded. Until his son Dhani was seven, he thought his dad was a gardener. He only learned of his father's fame from other kids at school. In her book, Olivia does document the Beatles years with photos, letters, and quotes, but her aim is to show it as a time of hard work and insanity more than a wonderful experience. She portrays Beatle George as a young man who struggled with his values and post-Beatle George as a man who sought peace within himself and with others in a troubled world. She includes many accounts and photos of his collaborations with Ravi Shankar and the international musicians in his band Dark Horse.

While George Harrison: Living in the Material World is primarily a photo album, with many of the photos coming from George's own camera, there is plenty to read as well. Allow yourself at least a couple of evenings to enjoy a tour through his unorthodox life.

Harrison, Olivia. George Harrison: Living in the Material World. Abrams, 2011. 397p. ISBN 9781419702204.