Current Reading - April 2021

On the recommendation of another LT member I picked up and just finished Trails of the Smoky Hill: From Coronado to the Cow Towns by Wayne C. Lee and Howard C. Raynesford. It covered a number of subjects, from the Indian Wars to the railroads to the cow towns, but by focusing on western Kansas and being more detailed about those places and events it made it more interesting to read.

I finished In Struggle: SNCC and the Black Awakening of the 1960s by Clayborne Carson. This extremely interesting volume traces the development, achievements and ultimate demise of the Southern Nonviolent Coordinating Committee one of the eminent organizations in the Civil Rights movement in the Deep South in the early- to mid-1960s. By the late 60s, the group had evolved to enter the forefront of the Black Nationalist movement. I think that, together, this book and Black Against Empire, the terrific history of the Black Panthers that I read last year, go a long way toward providing a good picture of the crucial events of those days.

Read another couple of books, although I didn't finish either, as I found them disappointing and I don't have enough time to finish books I'm not enjoying.

Rush: Revolution, Madness, and Benjamin Rush, the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father by Stephen Fried. I really thought I'd enjoy this because while I've head of Rush I never knew much about him. Unfortunately the author felt obliged to mention and discuss seeming every person Rush ever came in contact with while not stepping back and giving the narrative a bigger, overview look at the situation. Maybe in the past I would have struggled through and found the later activities of Rush in the revolution to be more interesting and make the poor early reading worthwhile, but not now.

Mars Gets New Chariots: The Iron Horse in Combat, 1861-65 by Lt Col Alan Koenig. A very odd name of course, but with possibilities as it try to discuss the role of the railroads in the American Civil War, as the author notes, with a closer look at their tactical use. Sadly the book, which is a doctoral thesis, is rather poorly written. Often a paragraph will start off with a theme statement then be followed by several examples, with little development or follow through on each one. Basically it is a collection of anecdotal events grouped by subject.

Finished an interesting and very well written Tycoon's War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer by Stephen Dando-Collins. The sub-title is accurate but rather misleading about the content of the book. The book is really a biography of William Walker, probably the most famous of the mid-nineteenth century filibusters. I have read bits and pieces about Walker and his actions in Nicaragua, but this book really does a fine job of telling the whole story, which is rather fascinating. Vanderbilt's involvement was more in the way of funding a multi-national coalition which overthrew Walker, as well as sending in various agents.

A few years ago I read a two volume history of the War of 1812 by Pierre Berton, a noted Canadian author of non-fiction, especially Canadiana and Canadian history. The work was very interesting to me since it looked at the War from a Canadian point of view and so I started collecting books on battles and campaigns that occurred on the U.S./Canadian border.

I just finished on of those books, Strange Fatality: The Battle of Stoney Creek, 1813 by James E. Elliott. The book actually covers the entire, short campaign from the initial American invasion of the Niagara peninsula through their defeat at Stoney Creek and subsequent withdrawal back to the Niagara river. It is an interesting story about how a poorly trained, equipped and led American force almost caused the capitulation of Upper Canada but after a confusing night action were so rattled that they retreated pell-mell back to their starting point and threw away almost everything they had gained.

Also contained in the book is a look at later efforts to explore and preserve the battlefield. There are other interesting features in the book, including numerous appendices covering weapons, orders of battle and casualties. The book has a plethora of end notes for those who enjoy exploring those. Very highly recommended.

I finished The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together by Heather McGhee. Although the title doesn't suggest this books as history per se, McGhee runs down the racist, anti-Black roots (i.e. "history") of many of the major societal problems in America today, examining at the same time the ways in which these policies have also greatly harmed whites along the way. Her thesis, as per the title, is that working and middle class whites have been sold a "Zero Sum" philosophy: if Blacks "win," whites, by definition, "lose." So, for one easy example, welfare programs that would help many more whites than Blacks must be bad nevertheless, because Blacks are "takers" who don't deserve taxpayer help. Never mind the number of poor whites who would be lifted as well.

McGhee uses as her operating metaphor (as per the book's cover art) the history of public swimming pools. During the middle part of the 20th century, communities across the country, including across the South, had built public swimming pools. They were symbols in many cases of civic pride, gathering places for often thousands of people. However, when the law mandated that these pools be integrated, community after community closed the facilities, often filling the pools in and covering them over, rather than comply with that new law. So not only were Blacks kept out, but tens of thousands of white people lost their public swimming pools as well.

The Sum of Us examines the housing/mortgage crisis, environmental racism, redlining, voting rights, disengenuous "color blindness" and several more issues all come under McGhee's microscope to convincing effect. There is also a chapter on the psychic toll that racism takes on whites called "The Hidden Wound," the title taken from Wendell Berry's 1968 book of the same name.