DWD's Reviews

Published by Crown Publishers in March of 2012 Indomitable Will: LBJ in the Presidency is a biography composed mostly of snippets of interviews edited together to tell President Lyndon Johnson's story. The book is designed to give the reader a view of Lyndon Johnson - the man. Johnson was a controversial man  - easily one of the most controversial of the 1960's. He is easily caricatured and mis-characterized. This ambiguity is odd considering that he was one of the most successful presidents of all time when it came to pursuing and passing a legislative agenda. If not for the Vietnam War, his legacy might be much different today. Lyndon Baines Johnson (1908-1973) While I learned a lot more facts about Johnson than I knew before reading this book, I did not get a better read on the man himself. His motivations were so mixed and his outbursts so frequent that I could not (and still cannot) tell if he put himself behind legislation like the Civil Rights ...

Published by Blackstone Audio in 2012. Read by Joe Barrett Duration: 8 hours, 55 minutes . Unabridged James McPherson is undoubtedly the most popular living Civil War historian. He writes in a common, easy-to-understand style that flows nicely and does not dumb down the facts. His latest book, War on the Waters: The Union and Confederate Navies, 1861-1865 continues that tradition. Union Admiral David D. Porter - Leader of the Naval forces in the Vicksburg campaign. If you read a typical Civil War history you get a just a little bit of the information, usually in passing, about the war on the open sea, in the bays, harbors, up and down the rivers and even in the swamps. McPherson reverses that arrangement in this book and focuses on the strategies, personalities and challenges that faced both navies and mentions the land campaigns in passing. If you are a frequent reader of Civil War books, little of this material will be new. But, the special focus does make th...

A Trip Down Memory Lane Published in 1961 by The Bobbs-Merrill Company, Inc Intended for upper elementary students. Thirty-five years ago books like Lew Wallace: Boy Writer filled my library's book shelves in Hope, Indiana and I went through them like a hot knife through butter. I am sure they are a big reason why I enjoy history so much today. I remember enthusiastically reading about the adventures of young Daniel Boone, Abraham Lincoln and even about Martha Washington and other "yucky" girls as I worked my way down the shelf. Union Major General Lew Wallace (1827-1905) I have next to my computer a 1961 hardback copy of Lew Wallace: Boy Writer, part of the Childhood of Famous Americans series .  As suggested by the series title Lew Wallace: Boy Writer focuses on the childhood of future the Civil War general, territorial governor of New Mexico (during the days of Billy the Kid and the Lincoln County War) and author of Ben-Hur: A Tale of Christ . It featur...

A Dual Biography of Sorts Published by National Geographic in 2012. Note: This is a YA book aimed at 5th graders and above. This adult enjoyed the book also. From time to time the dual biography comes back into vogue. Dual biographies are a great way to compare and contrast two people's lives and, in this case, this style is used to compare and contrast two different organizations: The Ku Klux Klan and Superman, Inc. and see how these two radically different groups interacted. There is, of course, so such thing as Superman, Inc. - I made that up. Superman is owned by D.C. Comics, but there are people who make all sorts of decisions on how to present Superman. What will he stand for and stand against? What will the next comic be like? How about the next movie? Superman Versus the Ku Klux Klan   tells the story of the creation of Superman (and the two young Jewish boys from Ohio who created him) and how Superman quickly caught on once a publisher finally took him on in 1938. ...

Three stories in one: A biography, a mystery and an adventure Published in 2012 by Regnery History The USS Grunion was a top of the line submarine for the U.S. Navy in 1942. Literally, the fastest submarine in the fleet and outfitted with the latest in torpedo technology (magnet activated designed to go off near ships) and led by the highly-respected Lieutenant Commander Jim Abele, the USS Grunion was sent to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska to harass Japanese supply ships (for those who did not know, Japanese forces held parts of the Aleutian Islands for a little more than in a year from 1942 to 1943). The USS Grunion performed well, sinking two Japanese submarines and damaging a freighter despite problems with the torpedoes. What the crew of the USS Grunion did not know was that these advanced torpedoes did not work like they were supposed to. They did not track well towards their targets (although the magnetic trigger, called a magnetic pistol, was sup...

A Nifty Little Biography Published by Thomas Nelson in 2012. Jackson: The Iron-Willed Commander   is a welcome addition to a larger series called The Generals that offers relatively short biographies (about 200 pages) of America's better-known generals. This book is by no means the definitive biography of Andrew Jackson, but it is great introduction to this controversial man. Andrew Jackson lived most of his life on the American frontier. His most famous battle was, of course, the Battle of New Orleans in the last moments of the War of 1812 (technically, it took place after the treaty was signed) but by that time Jackson was a veteran of many battles. He had already fought the British in two wars, skirmished with the Spanish several times and was involved in multiple frontier wars with Native Americans. Throw in Jackson's willingness to duel and one quickly realizes that Jackson thrived on action and danger. A great deal of his life seems to be consumed by organizing for...

Four Classic Essays By a Noted Historian Collection published by Penguin Classics in 2008. The Significance of the Frontier in American History is a collection of four essays written by noted historian Frederick Jackson Turner from 1893 to 1910. Penguin Classics has re-issued these essays as part of its Great Ideas series. Frederick Jackson Turner is featured in just about every U.S. History textbook for his essay  The Significance of the Frontier in American History , written in 1893. I am embarrassed note that I had never read this classic essay until I read this collection, although I was familiar with its basic thesis. In this essay Turner notes that the 1890 census determined that as of 1890 there was no longer a definable "frontier." He asserts that this is the beginning of something new for the United States as it has always been defined by its (usually) westward boundary. Turner notes that the Western settlers came from all parts of the easte...

A Few Thoughts on Uncle Tom's Cabin First Published in 1852. Harriet Beecher Stowe sat down to write a book that would show the United States the evils of slavery. She wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly in response to the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, at the urging of her sister-in-law. She succeeded in fueling the debate over slavery and she pointed a finger of shame at the slave owners and at America as a whole. Harriett Beecher Stowe (1811-1896) It created a national sensation. Within ten years, it sold two million copies, making it the best-selling novel of all time in the United States, in proportion to population, according to noted Civil War historian James M. McPherson. The book was so controversial and so powerful that there were attempts to ban it in some parts of the South. Pro-slavery authors attempted to counter the book with their own books with titles like Uncle Robin, in His Cabin in Virginia, and Tom Without One in Boston in an attem...

Delivers what it promises Published by Creative Content Ltd in 2011. Narrated by Lorelei King Duration: 1 hour, 20 minutes Creative Content has a whole series of short audiobooks and kindle books in its "The Lowdown" series. The main feature of the series is that they are short (a little more than an hour or about 35 "pages" on the Kindle) and give the reader a quick look at a topic. In this case, the topic is the origin of the Vietnam War. Note, this is not a history of the entire war, but if you ever wondered just how the United States got involved in the Vietnam War, this nifty little history will do the job just fine. President Lyndon Johnson signs the Tonkin Gulf Resolution in August of 1964 Anderson roots his history in the aftermath of World War II. There are two major factors at play. The first is the desire of the French to re-establish their pre-war colonial empire and re-assert themselves as a major player on the world scene despite their be...

Published in 2012 by Thomas Nelson Grant: Savior of the Union is an enjoyable, easy-to-read biography of Ulysses S. Grant, the Union General that seemingly came from nowhere to become the man that engineered the conquest of  the Confederacy. Yockelson covers Grant's entire life and also a bit of his father's life, with an appropriate emphasis on Grant's military service in the Mexican War, his resignation from the army between the wars, his difficulties as a civilian and his return to the service once war broke out between the Union and the Confederacy. Two-thirds of the book covers the four years of service in the Civil War. His Presidency and retirement years are quickly brushed over. Grant's career is dealt with fairly throughout the book. His great decisions are applauded, his mistakes are pointed out (Cold Harbor, in particular) and the reader gets strong feel for his calm, determined leadership style and his emphasis on substance over style. This is a much...

Not what I'd hoped...  Directed by John Woo. Released in 2002. With the title Windtalkers you'd think it would be centered on the Windtalkers, those Navajo codetalkers in the Pacific Theater of World War II. I'd purposely ignored this movie until I had the time to watch it since I was interested in the topic and have a passing interest in the Navajo culture, having visited the Four Corners area several times and having read a bit about them. Anyway, I was hoping for a movie that focused on the Windtalkers themselves - why they fought for a society that had conquered them and now scorned them, what their motivations were, how their culture dealt with the separation from the Navajo lands, the death and destruction of the war (briefly touched on) and so on. That would have been much more interesting and important. Instead, we get a movie that should be called Messed Up In the Head Windtalker Babysitter - a movie about the white guy who minds the Navajo ...

A disappointment Published by Ballantine Books in 2006. To start, let me establish my bona fides as a fan of Mr. Thom's work. Three of his novels sit on a shelf less than two feet from this computer. I have the featured review on Amazon.com one of his novels ("The Red Heart"). One of his books is on my Favorite Books List on my profile page. I actually designed a long-term project for my world history classes using historical fiction with his books in mind, and I told him so when I met him at a state-wide conference for social studies teachers. So, I approached St. Patrick's Battalion with much hope. Instead of his usual quality, I found this book to be simplistic, with less detail and bent on beating two points home time after time: the Irish were treated brutally and shamefully by the U.S. army during the Mexican War and the Mexican War was an unjust war. James Alexander Thom Thom makes it clear in the opening dedication and acknowledgments that ...

The fictionalized version of a real-life runaway slave story. Originally published in 1996. Mary E. Lyons' book Letters from a Slave Girl is a fictionalized account of the true story of Harriet Jacobs, a slave girl from North Carolina who escaped and hid in her grandmother's attic for seven years, beginning in 1835, before making her way north to freedom. Lyons chose to use a fictional diary format to tell the story of Harriet Jacobs. In real life Jacobs could read and write and actually published a book about her life in 1861 called Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl . The reward notice for Harriet Jacobs The diary format has some strengths - it is an efficient way to note the passage of time and to tell about Harriet's feelings. However, it is not nearly as memorable as telling her story as a novel. The letters just do not have the same flow and impact as a story. The book also include a set of pictures of some of the real people and places involved,...

Published by Scholastic in January of 1994. The Glory Field is the story of an African-American family and their tie to a piece of land on Curry Island in South Carolina over the course of 250 years. Reminiscent of the James Michener sagas that follow the same format, The Glory Field is not nearly as detailed or as rich as a Michener selection. However, Michener's primary audience was adults and Myers' intended audience is young adults, most of whom would not have the patience or the courage to pick up a 1,000+ page book. Myers has broken this book up into a series of six stories, snapshots of the Lewis family throughout nearly 250 years of history. The quality of the stories goes up and down. The 2nd, 3rd and 4th stories are so-so. The first is vivid, strong and way too short. The last two are so strong that, in my mind, they saved the book. I was considering not including it in my classroom library because of the middle stories - they drug along and just didn...

Published in 2012 by Thomas Nelson Larry P. Arnn is the president of Hillsdale College and I suppose I should tell you that I receive Hillsdale's free monthly bulletin,  Imprimis , which features excerpts of speeches given by guests at Hillsdale College. President Arnn is featured annually so I was fairly familiar with his work before I picked up this book. In fact, that was the reason I picked it up in the first place. Arnn's key point in this book is that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution are highly inter-related and that the efforts of some politicians and academics to separate them are not only incorrect but are also symptomatic of a larger effort to redefine and dilute the rights and governments described in both documents. Arnn makes this point early and brilliantly in simple and soaring language. He demonstrates that the series of complaints against King George III in the Declaration describe how the King did not act as a faithful representa...

Published in 1991 by Silver Burdett Press 118 pages of text. 8 pages of timelines, sources and an index at the end. This book is part of a larger series (The History of the Civil War Series). It is very readable with a good balance of national history versus the biography of Swedish immigrant inventor John Ericsson, with the glaring exception I note below. John Ericsson (1803-1889) was almost the stereotypical nutty professor type inventor - he never properly patented many of his best inventions. Ericsson built a great number of inventions, but unlike Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Edison, he never really built any industries around them. He seemed to have trouble with personal relationships and was happiest when the was building in his laboratory. John Ericsson (1803-1889) Among other things, Ericsson invented a screw propeller, a "caloric" engine and, most importantly, he was the designer of the famed U.S.S. Monitor, the first ironclad in the Union navy, part...