Previous by DateNext by Date Date Index
Previous by ThreadNext by Thread Thread Index
LM_NET Archive



Profiles in Courage, by John F. Kennedy
During 1954-1955, John F. Kennedy, then a U.S. senator, chose eight of his 
historical colleagues to profile for their acts of astounding integrity in the face 
of overwhelming opposition. These heroes include John Quincy Adams, Daniel Webster, 
Thomas Hart Benton, and Robert A. Taft.  Awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 1957, 
Profiles in Courage -- now featuring a new Introduction by Caroline Kennedy, as 
well as Robert Kennedy's Foreword written for the 1964 memorial edition -- resounds 
with timeless lessons on the most cherished of virtues and is a powerful reminder 
of the strength of the human spirit. It is, as Robert Kennedy writes, "not just 
stories of the past but a book of hope and confidence for the future. What happens 
to the country, to the world, depends on what we do with what others have left us."

   Lies My Teacher Told Me, by James W. Loewen

Americans have lost touch with their history, and in this thought-provoking book, 
Professor James Loewen shows why. After surveying twelve leading high school 
American history texts, he has concluded that not one does a decent job of making 
history interesting or memorable. Marred by an embarrassing combination of blind 
patriotism, mindless optimism, sheer misinformation, and outright lies, these books 
omit almost all the ambiguity, passion, conflict, and drama from our past. In ten 
powerful chapters, Loewen reveals that:   The United States dropped three times as 
many tons of explosives in Vietman as it dropped in all theaters of World War II, 
including Hiroshima and Nagasaki.  Ponce de Leon went to Florida mainly to capture 
Native Americans as slaves for Hispaniola, not to find the mythical fountain of 
youth.  Woodrow Wilson, known as a progressive leader, was in fact a white 
supremacist who personally vetoed a clause on racial equality in the Covenant of 
the League of Nations.  The first colony to legalize slavery was not Virginia but 
Massachusetts.  From the truth about Columbus's historic voyages to an 8.5

of the Legacy Project, whose goal is to preserve the letters and memories of those 
who have served their nation. The letters seem to be uncommonly well chosen, making 
this one of the best collections this reviewer has encountered. A nice feature is a 
brief note in the Table of Contents describing each of the letters. Within the 
text, further notes put each missive within the context of its war, and often tell 
the ultimate fate of the writer. All that could be wished for would be a few 
letters from the American Revolution and the Mexican War, but no doubt thesewill be 
forthcoming in a future book. Category: History & Geography. KLIATT Codes: 
SA*-Exceptional book, recommended for senior high school students, advanced 
students, and adults.

   The Greatest Generation, by Tom Brokaw

In this book, Tom Brokaw goes out into America, to tell through the stories of 
individual men and women the story of a generation, America's citizen heroes and 
heroines who came of age during the Great Depression and the Second World War and 
went on to build modern America. This generation was united not only by a common 
purpose, but also by common values - duty, honor, economy, courage, service, love 
of family and country, and, above all, responsibility for oneself. In this book, 
you will meet people whose everyday lives reveal how a generation persevered 
through war, and were trained by it, and then went on to create interesting and 
useful lives and the America we have today.

   Rise to Rebellion, by Jeff Shaara

More than a powerful portrait of the people and purpose of the revolution, Rise to 
Rebellion is a vivid account of history's most pivotal events. The Boston Tea 
Party, the battles of Concord and Bunker Hill all are recreated with the kind of 
breathtaking detail only a master like Jeff Shaara can muster. His most impressive 
achievement, Rise to Rebellion reveals with new immediacy how philosophers became 
fighters, ideas their ammunition, and how a scattered group of colonies became the 
United States of America.

   Gods and General, by Jeff Shaara

Shaara has chosen four major figures of the Civil War: Generals Lee, Jackson, 
Hancock, and Chamberlain and woven an excellent novel told from their individual 
viewpoints. The author excels at showing the personalities and lives of these key 
men. The central person in each alternating chapter moves the story toward the 
bloody battles of the Wilderness and Chancellorsville, and finally to the eve of 
the Gettysburg campaign. The compassion and religious convictions of Lee and 
Jackson are contrasted with the equally strong beliefs of Hancock and Chamberlain 
against secession and the destruction of the Union. All are frustrated by the 
political and administrative blunders that affect both armies. The author 
skillfully involves readers with each of the participants. Those unfamiliar with 
the period will appreciate the introduction and afterword that place the events 
within the context of the men's lives. Factual detail and deft character 
development create fascinating historical fiction.

   Founding Mothers, by Cokie Roberts

ABC News political commentator and NPR news analyst Roberts didn't intend this as a 
general history of women's lives in early America-she just wanted to collect some 
great "stories of the women who influenced the Founding Fathers." For while we know 
the names of at least some of these women (Martha Washington, Abigail Adams, Eliza 
Pinckney), we know little about their roles in the Revolutionary War, the writing 
of the Constitution, or the politics of our early republic. In rough chronological 
order, Roberts introduces a variety of women, mostly wives, sisters or mothers of 
key men, exploring how they used their wit, wealth or connections to influence the 
men who made policy. As high-profile players married into each other's families, as 
wives died in childbirth and husbands remarried, it seems as if early America-or at 
least its upper crust-was indeed a very small world. Roberts's style is 
delightfully intimate and confiding: on the debate over Mrs. Benedict Arnold's 
infamy, she proclaims, "Peggy was in it from the beginning." Roberts also has an 
ear for juicy quotes; she recounts Aaron Burr's mother, Esther, bemoaning that when 
talking to a man with "mean thoughts of women," her tongue "hangs pretty loose," so 
she "talked him quite silent." In addition to telling wonderful stories, Roberts 
also presents a very readable, serviceable account of politics-male and female-in 
early America. If only our standard history textbooks were written with such flair!

   Letters of a Nation, by Andrew Carroll

Letters of a Nation is a unique and timeless collection of extraordinary letters 
spanning more than 350 years of American history, from the arrival of the Pilgrims 
to the present day. Many of the more than 200 letters are published here for the 
first time, and the correspondents are the celebrated and obscure, the powerful and 
powerless, including presidents, slaves, soldiers, prisoners, explorers, writers, 
revolutionaries, Native Americans, artists, religious and civil rights leaders, and 
people from all walks of life. From the serious (Harry Truman defending his use of 
the atomic bomb) to the surreal (Elvis Presley to Richard Nixon on fighting drugs 
in America), this collection of letters covers the full spectrum of human emotion, 
illuminates the American experience, and celebrates the simple yet lasting art of 
letter writing.

Dear Mrs. Roosevelt:  Letters from Children of the Great Depression,  Robert Cohen, 
ed.

"Impoverished young Americans had no greater champion during the Depression than 
Eleanor Roosevelt. As First Lady, Mrs. Roosevelt used her newspaper columns and 
radio broadcasts to crusade for expanded federal aid to children and teens deprived 
of adequate education, housing, clothing, and other necessities. She was the most 
visible spokesperson for the National Youth Administration, the New Deal's central 
agency for aiding needy youths, and she was adamant in insisting that federal aid 
to young people be administered without discrimination so that it reached blacks as 
well as whites, girls as well as boys." "This activism on their behalf made Mrs. 
Roosevelt a beloved figure among poor teens and children, who between 1933 and 1941 
wrote her thousands of letters describing their problems and asking for material 
assistance. Dear Mrs. Roosevelt presents nearly 200 of these extraordinary and 
deeply personal documents to open a window into the lives of the Depression's 
youngest victims." In their own words, the letter writers confide what it was like 
to be needy and young during the worst economic crisis in American history. They 
poignantly depict the mental, emotional, and physical tolls of poverty on their 
lives and their families. But their letters are more than a record of suffering; 
they are also a testament to the idealism of youth. Many young writers, for 
example, insisted that in a democratic society no one should be forced to drop out 
of school because of poverty and called for the New Deal to do more to right such 
inequities.

   The Journals of Lewis and Clark, by Barnard DeVoto

In 1803, when the United States purchased Louisiana from France, the great expanse 
of this new American territory was a blank - not only on the map but in our 
knowledge. President Thomas Jefferson keenly understood that the course of the 
nation's destiny lay westward and that a national "Voyage of Discovery" must be 
mounted to determine the nature and accessibility of the frontier. He commissioned 
his young secretary, Meriwether Lewis, to lead an intelligence-gathering expedition 
from the Missouri River to the northern Pacific coast and back. From 1804 to 1806, 
Lewis, accompanied by co-captain William Clark, the Shoshone guide Sacajawea, and 
thirty-two men, made the first trek across the Louisiana Purchase, mapping the 
rivers as he went, tracing the principal waterways to the sea, and establishing the 
American claim to the territories of Idaho, Washington, and Oregon. Together the 
captains kept a journal, a richly detailed record of the flora and fauna they 
sighted, the Indian tribes they encountered, and the awe-inspiring landscape they 
traversed, from their base camp near present-day St. Louis to the mouth of the 
Columbia River. In keeping this record they made an incomparable contribution to 
the literature of exploration and the writing of natural history.

   Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, by Dee Brown

Traditional texts glory in our nation's western expansion, the great conquest of 
the virgin frontier. But how did the original Americans -- the Dakota, Nez Perce, 
Ute, Ponca, Cheyenne, Navaho, Apache, and others -- feel about the coming of the 
white man, the expropriation of their land, the destruction of their way of life? 
What really happened to Geronimo, Chief Joseph, Cochise, Red Cloud, Little Wolf, 
and Sitting Bull as their people were killed or driven onto reservations during 
decades of broken promises, oppression, and war?  Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee is 
a meticulously documented account of the systematic plunder of the American Indians 
during the second half of the nineteenth century, battle by battle, massacre by 
massacre, broken treaty by broken treaty. Here -- reconstructed in vivid and 
heartbreaking detail -- is their side of the story. We can see their faces and hear 
their voices as they tried desperately to live in peace and harmony with the white 
man.  With forty-nine photographs of the great chiefs, their wives and warriors; 
with the words of the Indians themselves, culled from testimonies and transcripts 
and previously unpublished writings; with a straight-forward, eloquent, and epic 
style, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee presents a unique and disturbing history of 
the American West.

   Band of Brothers, by Stephen Ambrose

"As good a rifle company as any in the world, Easy Company, 506th Airborne 
Division, U.S. Army, kept getting the tough assignements - responsible for 
everything from parachuting into France early D-Day morning to the capture of 
Hitler's Eagle's Nest at Berchtesgaden. In Band of Brothers, Ambrose tells of the 
men in this brave unit who fought, went hungry, froze, and died, a company that 
took 150 percent casualties and considered the Purple Heart a badge of office. 
Drawing on hours of interviews with survivors as well as the soldiers' journals and 
letters, Stephen Ambrose recounts the stories, often in the men's own words, of 
these American heroes."

   To America, by Stephen Ambrose

"In To America, Stephen E. Ambrose reflects on his long career as an American 
historian and explains what an historian's job is all about. He celebrates 
America's spirit, which has carried us so far. He confronts its failures and 
struggles. As always in his much acclaimed work, Ambrose brings alive the men and 
women, famous and not, who have peopled our history and made the United States a 
model for the world." "Taking a few swings at today's political correctness, as 
well as his own early biases, Ambrose grapples with the country's historic sins of 
racism, its neglect and ill treatment of Native Americans, and its tragic errors 
(such as the war in Vietnam, which he ardently opposed on campus, where he was a 
professor). He reflects on some of the country's early founders who were 
progressive thinkers while living a contradiction as slaveholders, great men such 
as Washington and Jefferson. He contemplates the genius of Andrew Jackson's defeat 
of a vastly superior British force with a ragtag army in the War of 1812. He 
describes the grueling journey that Lewis and Clark made to open up the country, 
and the building of the railroad that joined it and produced great riches for a few 
barons." Ambrose explains the misunderstood presidency of Ulysses S. Grant, records 
the country's assumption of world power under the leadership of Theodore Roosevelt, 
and extols its heroic victory of World War II. He writes about women's rights and 
civil rights and immigration, founding museums, and nation-building. He contrasts 
the presidencies of Dwight Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Richard Nixon, and Lyndon 
B. Johnson. Throughout, Ambrose celebrates the unflappable American spirit.

  Citizen Soldiers, by Stephen Ambrose

In this riveting account, historian Stephen Ambrose continues where he left off in 
his #1 bestseller D-Day. Ambrose again follows the individual characters of this 
noble, brutal, and tragic war, from the high command down to the ordinary soldier, 
drawing on hundreds of interviews to re-create the war experience with startling 
clarity and immediacy. From the hedgerows of Normandy to the overrunning of 
Germany, Ambrose tells the real story of World War II from the perspective of the 
men and women who fought it.

   Dear America:  Letters Home from Vietnam,  Bernard Edelman, ed.

From the first impressions of troops newly arrived 'in country' to the agony of 
losing a friend in battle, these letters from over 100 men and women stationed in 
Vietnam tell a story more real and more powerful than any fiction.

   Born on the Fourth of July, by Ron Kovic

BOTFOJ tells all about the hell of war. This book is the personal tale of it's 
author Ron Kovic, that shows his dramatic transfer or coming of age if you will... 
He makes a complete 180 beginning the story as a Hawk and ending up a Dove. He is 
the typical all american boy, and loves his country, but all that changes in 
Vietnam. When he is wounded almost fatally, he becomes a parapalegic, and gets 
neglected in the veteran's hospitals in Vietnam. This is when the metamorphisis 
occurs. This is a must read for anyone studying the Vietnam war as a valuable first 
hand account. Some parallels can also be drawn between Kovic and Lieutenant Dan 
from Forrest Gump.  (customer review)

  The Autobiography of Malcolm X, by Malcolm X

With its first great victory in the landmark Supreme Court decision, Brown vs. 
Board of Education in 1954, the Civil Rights movement gained the powerful momentum 
it needed to sweep forward into its crucial decade, the 1960s. As voices of protest 
and change rose above the din of history and false promises, one sounded more 
urgently, more passionately than the rest. Malcolm X - once called the most 
dangerous man in America - challenged the world to listen and learn the truth as he 
experienced it. And his enduring message is as relevant today as when he first 
delivered it. This is the first hardcover edition of this classic autobiography 
since it was originally published in 1964. In its searing pages, Malcolm X the 
Muslim leader, firebrand, and anti-integrationist, tells the extraordinary story of 
his life and the growth of the Black Muslim movement to veteran writer and 
journalist Alex Haley. In a unique collaboration, Alex Haley worked with Malcolm X 
for nearly two years, interviewing, listening to, and understanding the most 
controversial leader of his time. Raised in Lansing, Michigan, Malcolm Little's 
road to world fame was as astonishing as it was unpredictable. After drifting from 
childhood poverty to petty crime, Malcolm found himself in jail. It was there that 
he came into contact with the teachings of a little-known Black Muslim leader named 
Elijah Muhammed. The newly renamed Malcolm X devoted himself body and soul to the 
teachings of Elijah Muhammed and the world of Islam, and became the Nation's 
foremost spokesman. When his own conscience forced him to break with Elijah 
Muhammed, Malcolm founded the Organization of Afro-American Unity, to reach African 
Americans across the country with an inspiring message of pride, power, and 
self-determination. The Autobiography of Malcolm X defines American culture and the 
African-American struggle for social and economic equality that has now become a 
battle for survival.

  Thirteen Days:  A Memoir of the Cuban Missile Crisis, by Robert Kennedy & Arthur 
Schlesinger

The unique, gripping account of the perilous showdown between the United States and 
the Soviet Union. During the thirteen days in October 1962 when the United States 
confronted the Soviet Union over its installation of missiles in Cuba, few people 
shared the behind-the-scenes story as it is told here by the late Senator Robert F. 
Kennedy. In a clear and simple record, he describes the personalities involved in 
the crisis, with particular attention to the actions and attitudes of his brother, 
President John F. Kennedy. He describes the daily, even hourly, exchanges between 
Russian representatives and American. In firsthand immediacy we see the frightening 
responsibility of two great nations holding the fate of the world in their hands.

  John Adams, by David McCullough

Told by one of our country's greatest historians, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author 
of Truman, here is the extraordinary history of the birth of our country, seen 
through the lives of two extraordinary men: John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. 
Deftly, and with a key eye for detail, McCullough describes the childhood, youth, 
and coming of age of these two very different Americans who, though bitterly 
opposed to each other, profoundly influenced the destiny of America.

  Theodore Rex, by Edmund Morris

The most eagerly awaited presidential biography in years, Theodore Rex is a sequel 
to Edmund Morris's classic best-seller The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt. It begins by 
following the new President (still the youngest in American history) as he comes 
down from Mount Marcy, New York, to take his emergency oath of office in Buffalo, 
one hundred years ago.  A detailed prologue describes TR's assumption of power and 
journey to Washington, with the assassinated President McKinley riding behind him 
like a ghost of the nineteenth century. (Trains rumble throughout this irresistibly 
moving narrative, as TR crosses and recrosses the nation.) Traveling south through 
a succession of haunting landscapes, TR encounters harbingers of all the major 
issues of the new century - Imperialism, Industrialism, Conservation, Immigration, 
Labor, Race - plus the overall challenge that intimidated McKinley: how to harness 
America's new power as the world's richest nation.  Theodore Rex (the title is 
taken from a quip by Henry James) tells the story of the following seven and a half 
years - years in which TR entertains, infuriates, amuses, strong-arms, and seduces 
the body politic into a state of almost total subservience to his will. It is not 
always a pretty story: one of the revelations here is that TR was hated and feared 
by a substantial minority of his fellow citizens. Wall Street, the white South, 
Western lumber barons, even his own Republican leadership in Congress strive to 
harness his steadily increasing power.

  All the President's Men, by Carl Berstein & Bob Woodward

This landmark book details all the events of the biggest political scandal in the 
history of this nation--Watergate. Woodward and Bernstein kept the headlines 
coming, delivering revelation after amazing revelation to a shocked public. 

  1968, by Mark Kurlansky

"In 1968, Mark Kurlansky brings to life the cultural and political history of that 
world-changing year of social upheaval. To some, it was the year of sex, drugs, and 
rock and roll. Yet it was also the year of the Martin Luther King, Jr., and Bobby 
Kennedy assassinations; the riots at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago; 
Prague Spring; the antiwar movement and the Tet Offensive; Black Power; the 
generation gap; avant-garde theater; the upsurge of the women's movement; and the 
beginning of the end for the Soviet Union. From New York, Miami, Berkeley, and 
Chicago to Paris, Prague, Rome, Berlin, Warsaw, Tokyo, and Mexico City, spontaneous 
uprisings occurred simultaneously around the globe." "Kurlansky shows how the 
coming of live television made 1968 the first global year. It was the year that an 
awestruck world watched the first live telecast from outer space, and that TV 
brought that day's battle - the Vietnam War's Tet Offensive - into America's living 
rooms on the evening news. Television also shocked the world with seventeen minutes 
of police clubbing demonstrators at the Chicago convention, live film of unarmed 
students facing down Soviet tanks in Czechoslovakia, and a war of starvation in 
Biafra. The impact was huge, not only on the antiwar movement, but also on the 
medium of television itself. The fact that one now needed television to make things 
happen was a cultural revelation with enormous consequences." In many ways, this 
momentous year led us to where we are today. Whether through youth and music, 
politics and war, economics and the media, Mark Kurlansky shows how, in 1968, 
twelve volatile months transformed who we were as a people. But above all, he gives 
a new insight into the underlying causes of the unique historical phenomenon that 
was the year 1968.

  Black Like Me, by John Howard Griffin

In the Deep South of the 1950s, journalist John Howard Griffin decided to cross the 
color line. Using medication that darkened his skin to deep brown, he exchanged his 
privileged life as a Southern white man for the disenfranchised world of an 
unemployed black man. His audacious, still chillingly relevant eyewitness history 
is a work about race and humanity-that in this new millennium still has something 
important to say to every American.

--------------------------------------------------------------------
Please note: All LM_NET postings are protected by copyright law.
  You can prevent most e-mail filters from deleting LM_NET postings
  by adding LM_NET@LISTSERV.SYR.EDU to your e-mail address book.
To change your LM_NET status, e-mail to: listserv@listserv.syr.edu
In the message write EITHER: 1) SIGNOFF LM_NET  2) SET LM_NET NOMAIL
3) SET LM_NET MAIL  4) SET LM_NET DIGEST  * Allow for confirmation.
 * LM_NET Help & Information: http://www.eduref.org/lm_net/
 * LM_NET Archive: http://www.eduref.org/lm_net/archive/
 * EL-Announce with LM_NET Select: http://elann.biglist.com/sub/
 * LM_NET Supporters: http://www.eduref.org/lm_net/ven.html
--------------------------------------------------------------------


LM_NET Mailing List Home