World War I by blog

I picked up The National Post while in town on Saturday afternoon, and found this article about a blog created by Bill Lamin of Cornwall, using his grandfather Harry Lamin's letters home from the front during World War I. Grandson Bill is posting the letters 90 years to the date they were written by grandfather Harry.

The blog is WW1: Experiences of an English Soldier.

Bill Lamin has also created a blog with entries from the official War Diary of the 9th Battalion of York & Lancaster Regiment.

Quickie thumbnail reviews of Cybils middle grade/young adult nonfiction nominees, Part I

Not all of them, just the ones the publishers were kind enough to send along, because with the short list ready to be announced tomorrow, I want to finally finally finally pick up the pile of books from the carpet and put things away -- on the shelves for the keepers, in the library bag for donation for the rest. Some of the links that follow are Cybils Amazon associate ones.

Smart-Opedia: The Amazing Book About Everything
translated by Eve Drobot
Maple Tree Press

This one is up first because every minute this one has been out of Davy's possession, it's been almost physically painful. For me too, what with the constant noisy reminders and bee-like buzzing around ("Could I please have my Bookopedia back now? Now? Soon? Now? Please? M-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-m!). In fact, he took such an instant like to this book right after it arrived -- and it was one of the first, thank you very much to the kind folks at the Canadian publishing house, Maple Tree Press -- that I decided to give it to him for his birthday. I told him it was his present from the Cybils and Maple Tree. And then promptly took it back to put on the pile for consideration. We've been having a tug of war over it ever since, and more than once I've had to steal it out of the bed of a sleeping child.

Smart-opedia is about as close to the entire world in only 200 charmingly illustrated pages as you're going to get, with entries on everything from animals and art, history and human rights, to space and cyberspace, most with a double-page spread. Entertainingly and clearly presented, this is a one-volume reference book that eight- to twelve-year olds (and probably their younger and older siblings, and parents too) will be reaching for even when no homework assignment is in sight, one reason why you might want to consider springing for the hardcover instead of the only slighter cheaper paperback edition. Home schoolers will find this delightful for free, pleasure reading. By the way, those charming illustrations are the work of no fewer than 17 different artists, who've somehow managed to make their styles look of a piece. Very similar in style and tone as the Usborne reference books, but nowhere as busy.

Ms. Drobot has done a masterful job singlehandedly translating a team effort originally published in France; near as I can tell, this is the original French version, from publisher Editions (Fernand) Nathan. Maple Tree recommends this for ages nine to 12, but I'd follow the original publisher and get it into kids' hands much earlier, at ages six or seven or whenever they're reading well on their own. By the time they're nine or 10, it will be a good friend and constant companion. This one's definitely a keeper for us.

From Slave to Superstar of the Wild West: The Awesome Story of Jim Beckwourth
by Tom DeMund
Legends of the West Publishing Company

A solid and engaging biography of American frontiersman Jim Beckwourth, From Slave to Sueprstar of the Wild West has definitely been a labor of love for author DeMund, who self-published the book and sent it along to me with a delightful letter. The book is written in a very companionable, casual tone, the author more or less taking the young reader aside to tell his tale, made all the more interesting by the fact that it's true.

Aside from the word "Awesome" in the subtitle (I tend to find it overused and it makes me cringe), there's very little about this book I didn't like. And a great deal that I did, especially Chapter 0, "Why Write -- or Read -- a Book about Jim?", which functions as the author's historical note the reader. Not only is at the front of the book where it should be, along with instructions to "Please read this Chapter 0 before charging on to Chapter 1", but it also includes a Special Note on Names of Groups,

To be considerate of people's feelings today, I should use the words African American, Native American, and Hispanic American. But during Jim's lifetime those words were unknown. Because this book is all about Jim's time (around 1800 to 1866), I've used the words used in that era. African Americans were called Negroes or blacks, Native Americans were called Indians, and Hispanic Americans were called Mexicans. know that I'm not being incorrect by modern standards, but for proper historical flavor I've used the words from the years between 1800 and 1866. I hope you won't object.

Short, sweet, to the point, and much appreciated. The back of the book includes a timeline, comprehensive bibliography, and index. The Wild West is a popular subject around here, so this lively, comprehensive biography is definitely a keeper for us. Especially ecommended for ages eight or nine to 12 or so.

Another Book About Design: Complicated Doesn't Make It Bad
by Mark Gonyea
Henry Holt and Co.

A vibrant, punchy explanation of basic graphic design for kids ages eight to 12 or so. A very effective way of presenting concepts such as color, shape, size, and space to a young audience, and a boon to young designers and design fans, who likely won't look at their favorite comic books the same way. A keeper, and we plan to take it along to the next art lesson to show the kids' teacher.

Artist to Artist: 23 Major Illustrators Talk to Children about Their Art
compiled by the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art
Philomel

For families who read a good deal of picture books, this book will be an absolute delight. You'll find many old and exceedingly talented friends here, from Mitsumasa Anno, Eric Carle, Tomie dePaola, and Mordicai Gerstein, to Steven Kellogg, Leo Lionni, Wendell Minor, Alice Provensen, Sabuda and Reinhart, Maurice Sendak, Rosemary Wells, and Paul O. Zelinsky. Each artist gets four pages, with one page of text to tell the first-person story of how he or she (though the 23 artists represented are almost all men), grew into, and as, an artist; two pages of how they make their art; and the last page as a self-portrait. A very special book for children, and their parents, who want a peek into the artist's studio. When Davy picked up the book, it opened immediately to Sabuda's and Reinhart's special pop-up, and Davy gasped. As Robert Sabuda writes in his section, "all of the hard work is worth it when someone opens the pop-up and exclaims 'WOW!'". This book gives you the how and the wow. A keeper for us.

Ox, House, Stick: The Story of Our Alphabet
by Don Robb, illustrated by Anne Smith
Charlesbridge

This is the kind of title that home schoolers tend to snap up, while the general reading public gives it a wide berth, in part because the material is considerably more interesting for those kids who already know something about ancient history and even, dare I suggest, some Latin and Greek (at the very least word roots). Which is a shame, because Don Robb gives a brief overview of the history of our alphabet, followed by a story for each letter, all delightfully illustrated by Anne Smith in her first children's book. A wonderful addition to ancient history and English -- and ancient -- language studies, not to mention the perfect book to hand to the son or daughter who asks where the alphabet came from. And to those youngsters who think of the alphabet as something to be texted with thumbs, well, you don't know what you're missing.

Robb is also the author of the picture books This Is America: The American Spirit In Places And People, illustrated by Christine Joy Pratt; and, especially useful this year, Hail to the Chief: The American Presidency, illustrated by Alan Witschonke

Across the Wide Ocean: The Why, How, and Where of Navigation for Humans and Animals at Sea
by Karen Romano Young
Harper Collins (Greenwillow)

A fascinating account about the how the mysterious deep is navigated, in turn, by a sea turtle, a sailboat, a whale, a submarine, a shark, and a container ship. Young discusses currents, magnetic force, and navigation in a lively fashion. Unfortunately, the book's design is too lively, and too dark as well, in shades of blue meant to evoke the ocean. By the end I was feeling more than a tad dizzy and seasick, which was a shame because with some restraint, this would have been a perfect ride. A keeper, but the kids will have to read it on their own next time.


Math Doesn't Suck: How to Survive Middle-School Math Without Losing Your Mind or Breaking a Nail
by Danica McKellar
Hudson Street Press

Somewhere in this world there's a happy medium between Hollywood actors who have co-authored groundbreaking mathematical physics theorems and Disney Princess Queen Bee Wannabees who detest math. This book isn't it.

Which is a great shame, because underneath, way way underneath, all the cutsy-ness and pop culture expectations of girls worried about breaking nails and "running through the snow in pearls and four-inch heels" (as Ms. McKellar tells us her sister did, and at Harvard Law of all places -- like, ohmygod!), and the execrable title, is a decent guide to upper elementary/middle school math, with some handy tips and tricks.

The entire style of the book undermines Ms. McKellar's message, that "math is actually a good thing", because "Most of all, working on math sharpens your brain, actually making you smarter in all areas. Intelligence is real, it's lasting, and no one can take it away from you. Ever." Especially when you are having trouble staying upright tripping across Harvard Yard in your four-inch heels. Though much as Ms. McKellar keeps telling her audience how cool it is to be smart, it's hard to believe it as she tries so hard to appeal to her "I'd rather be shopping" audience. Another duality that disturbs me is the fact that though the book is meant for middle school girls, it goes on and on about bikini waxes, "perfect black heels", sparkly diamonds, and iced lattes. Maybe middle school in Hollywood is different than it is here. And what the heck do they shop for when they hit high school?

As the home schooling mother of a 10-year-old daughter who has her struggles with math, this might have a been a good choice with a different presentation. Laura's just too much of a tomboy, and isn't as steeped in pop culture and worried about her looks as the book assumes she is, so the approach would be a huge turnoff for. A good choice for middle school girls who don't favor the Teen Cosmo style, by the way, is Math Smarts: Tips, Tricks, and Secrets for Making Math More Fun! by Lynette Long for the American Girl Library. And for girls and boys, Marilyn Burns's Math for Smarty Pants. By contrast, as you can probably guess, I don't much care for Burns's The I Hate Mathematics Book, either. I understand the idea behind the "I Hate Math"/"Math Sucks" type of books, but introducing ideas like that kids when they're having trouble tends to cause more trouble than it solves. I'd like to see Ms. McKellar follow this book up with another one for young girls who, as she was 20 years ago, are unapologetically smart, interested in math and science even when the work gets tough, and like their studies. You know, the ones who would rather draw, ride horses, read a book, go for a hike, help a friend, or practice gymnastics than go shopping. And the ones who know that iced lattes at age 10 will stunt their growth, if not their bank accounts.

School canceled, on account of

snow and hunting.

We were surprised Sunday by a goodly snowfall overnight, and then a bit more Sunday night. Enough for the kids to make this before lunchtime yesterday,















It doubles as a (very) small sledding hill.

Last night the temperature dropped down to about -20C (just below 0F), the coldest weather so far this season; winter is here, no matter what the calendar says.

Tom shot a deer this morning, and he and the kids are at his parents skinning it before taking it to the butcher, who will cut and wrap the meat for us. It started snowing again, so thickly I can barely see the road from the front door, just after they left.

Davy already has plans for the hide, which we'll send to the local taxidermist for tanning (though Davy wants to try tanning it himself, which I don't think he's quite old enough for; I found this online* but figure I'd be buying it at my own peril since he's only seven), and Tom will have his hands full because Davy also wants some of the sinew to make a bow and for various Native sewing projects. Davy lately has been eating, breathing, sleeping (the books live under his pillow) the teachings of W. Ben Hunt, especially his Complete Book of Indian Crafts and Lore (a Golden Book), and Davy knows that Ben would want him to get the sinew. All of it. Of cousre, I mean need that deerskin/buckskin book so I know what to do with that sinew. Besides store it in my deep freeze.

* * *

A W. Ben Hunt library (these are all still in print); if you or your kids like old Boy Scout manuals and the books of Dan Beard and Ernest Thompson Seton, you'll like these:

How to Build and Furnish a Log Cabin

Rustic Construction

American Indian Beadwork

These Ben Hunt titles are out-of-print but worth tracking down:

The Golden Book of Crafts and Hobbies

The Golden Book of Indian Crafts and Lore

Ben Hunt's Big Book of Whittling



* not for the faint of heart or stomach when it comes to book titles, there is also this (consider yourself warned before you click away). I'll admit to being a wee bit intrigued since Davy says that Ben Hunt said that traditional tanning methods yield a leather that's much softer and more waterproof than modern chemical methods. By the way, we hear a lot of "Ben Hunt says" around here, and I've learned that he's usually right.

By the way, the above link at www.paleotechnics.com has some nifty things on the "arts and technologies of early peoples", including

a list of primitive living skills gatherings, mostly in the US, and

information on school programs for kids

Following up on David McCullough

I ran out of time yesterday, and wanted to add this list of suggested readings to go with my post yesterday about David McCullough's new 1776: The Illustrated Edition, the illustrated and abridged edition of Mr. McCullough's original 1776.

All of the children's books listed below are narrative histories and overviews of the period, rather than books about a particular element of the American Revolution (which means the list doesn't include any biographies or the terrific Jean Fritz books, such as And Then What Happened, Paul Revere?). And interestingly, all are illustrated (the first two are picture books) and by authors who have written extensively for children about history, especially American history.

For children (ages 8 or 9 and up/younger as a readaloud):

Liberty or Death: The American Revolution: 1763-1783 by Betsy Maestro with illustrations by Giulio Maestro, from the Maestros' wonderful "American Story" series

George vs. George: The American Revolution as Seen from Both Sides by Rosalyn Schanzer (useful for Canadians and other Loyalist types)

For children (ages 10 or so and up):

Give Me Liberty: The Story of the Declaration of Independence by Russell Freedman

For children (ages 12 or so and up):

The Real Revolution: The Global Story of American Independence by Marc Aronson; nifty free teacher guides at Marc Aronson's website.

"Education truly begins at home"

A couple of months ago my father told me about the advance copy he had recently received of Pulitzer Prize-winning historian David McCullough's new illustrated edition of 1776, which he's saving for us and described as "an enormous book stuffed with removable facsimiles of various documents".

So I was interested to read The Wall Street Journal's Author Q&A interview this past weekend with Mr. McCullough. Especially when interviewer Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg asked the noted historian [emphases mine],

What do you think is the best way to get young people interested in history?

Mr. McCullough: Barbara Tuchman was once asked about this problem. She said there's no trick to interesting young people in history. All you have to do is tell stories. History shouldn't be taught as a memorization of dates or quotations, or as a huge survey. It is most appealing to anyone, but particularly the young, when you take a defined subject and bring it to life by telling the story. It's what happened to whom and why, and the fact that these were human beings just like you.

It's a wonder to me how many volumes of history -- and even some biographies -- don't tell you what people looked like, or what they sounded like. That's what everybody wants. It's in our human nature. All the great old fabled stores began…once upon a time, long, long ago, and immediately we're interested. The two most popular movies are about history: "Gone with the Wind," and "Titanic."

WSJ.com: What's the major issue with teaching history?

Mr. McCullough: The problem with education today, whether it's in history or literature or science, is us. Education truly begins at home. We've got to bring back talk about the story, about our country, who we are, why we have the blessings we enjoy and what struggles were part of that story. We also need to discuss what mistakes were made, and what noble achievements were accomplished.

We're raising generations who are historically illiterate. It's appalling. And it's our fault. We've got to do a better job of educating our teachers and not just raise their salaries. We have to raise the appreciation level of their work throughout our entire society.

There was a marvelous specialist in education in England at the turn of the century, Charlotte Mason, who wrote about how we learn. She said that history ought to be taught in a way that the student begins to understand that history is an inexhaustible storehouse of ideas. How different that is from a lot of boring dates and names and battles. Remove the music, poetry and humor from history and you squeeze out everything that touches the soul.

WSJ.com: How does that relate to your new book?

Mr. McCullough: There is nothing like the experience of holding originals in your own hands. It's a tactile connection to a vanished time and people. I think the closest thing to it is if you are in the real room where something of consequence happened, you feel it. And I think that this collection comes as close to giving one that sense as anything could.

I remember as a kid going to Williamsburg, Va., and in a shop I got a facsimile of the Declaration of Independence. That was one of the best things I had, and I hope a lot of young people will have that feeling with this book. ...

WSJ.com: What's next?

Mr. McCullough: I'm working on a book about Americans in Paris. It will cover the 19th and 20th centuries. It will be about writers and painters, but also about physicians, sculptors and composers, from Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. to Mary Cassatt to George Gershwin to Edith Wharton. It's about creative ambition and the American desire to venture forth where others haven't gone. It's also about American masterpieces that we take to be so representative of us but only happened because of the experiences of those who went to Paris. I'm learning so much. It's the kick of learning that spurs you on.

Read the entire interview here.

G is for guitar...and giddy

Our first two back-to-school days, which ended up being out-of-the-house days, proved to be a wonderful way to ease back into the swing of things. The local author reading, and getting to meet him, inspired Laura and she's been scribbling away ever since, with plans to write up our adventure with the hawk. Afterwards, we dropped off Tom's lunchbox with plans to head home for lunch ourselves, to find that his current clients had invited us to pick as many apples from their trees as we wished. Since the apples, some crabs and other quite good-sized ones, were already falling off the trees, the kids and I headed to the supermarket, picked up a couple of sandwiches to share and some empty cardboard boxes, and returned to pick apples. Nothing like an apple for the teacher and then some. We'll press them for cider.

Yesterday it was back to the library for a meeting, home for lunch, and back to town afterwards for an afternoon of music lessons. Laura is taking piano and voice again, Davy has started with voice, and Daniel was absolved from piano lessons for evermore. In place of piano, Daniel, and Davy too, started guitar lessons, and were beyond giddy leaving lessons with their two guitars (one small, the other smaller). They adored the teacher, the lesson, the guitars, the picks, the music (a few chords of "We Will Rock You" to be followed, in the next week or two, by, of course, "Smoke on the Water"), and Davy was excited to learn that their new teacher also knows how to play and teach the banjo, instrument of his dreams for lo these past three years (the teacher and I decided that it would be a better idea to start with the guitar and then move to banjo). They would have played their new instruments in the truck on the way home if I had let them but had to wait until our arrival home, where they played for their sister, their father, and me. Then Davy wandered around until suppertime with his guitar in its case slung across his back, like a teeny tiny itinerant musician.

The boys were up unusually early this morning, to practice the guitar, of course ("I heard you rummaging around in bed so I figured you were still sleeping so I waited until I heard you open the sock drawer," my almost-seven-year-old Woody Guthrie told me breathlessly, even before his usual "Good morning", leaving me wondering a) if I really do rummage in my sleep and b) where did that kid learn that word). Later in the day, he spent a good 10 minutes in front the calendar, moaning that it would be "a whole 'nother week 'til the next lesson", darn it all, and why can't we go back tomorrow? I plan on using most of this enthusiasm and interest for the kids' science studies this year, as the kids explore the physics of sound and music with the help of their new instruments and Rubber-Band Banjos and Java Jive Bass.

The rest of the day wasn't nearly exciting, especially as I insisted on getting back to our usual schedule, hitting the books and such. Though we started the day without math books and with a new multiplication board game (from the Frank Schaffer folks), simple and fun. Then moved on to penmanship for the boys, and Laura wrote a letter. We started our new readaloud, Laura Ingalls Wilder's Farmer Boy, while the kids decided to map out on the chalkboard what Almanzo's family's farmyard must have looked like with the three big barns. Then some world history with Story of the World (volume 3) and my new summertime find, the out-of-print Golden History of the World by Jane Werner Watson, 1955; Davy likes it and its illustrations almost as much he likes guitar lessons. Now that Davy is just about seven, I'll see if we can get through World War II by the end of the year. I'd like to get through the second part of the 20th century with just Laura thereafter, and I'm mulling over an idea already for her history studies next year, when she'll begin the cycle again with ancient studies. My idea is something along the lines of "History, heroes, and hubris"; the thought started percolating quite against my will, and after some recent conversations and a radio interview on modern heroes, within the past month, and then just last week I ran across a copy of the May 2007 issue of Calliope Magazine all about the Epic Heroes of ancient history, with a number of articles by editors Rosalie F. Baker and Charles F. Baker (poking around the Calliope website, I learned that a free teacher's guide is available for that issue and others as a PDF). I'll have to check History Odyssey 's Ancients, Level Three (meant for the rhetoric stage), to see if it fits the general idea of what I'm looking for, or if I'll have to cobble together something for Laura on my own. Though it's early days and the plan is just a glimmer in my eye, I'm leaning toward the latter, but using two books HO/Ancients/3 does, Classical Ingenuity: The Legacy of Greek and Roman Architects, Artists, and Inventors and The Classical Companion, both by Callipoe editors Rosalie and Charles Baker. Must see if I can find the books at the library.

Sorry, I think this post is much too rambly. I guess the boys aren't the only giddy and distracted ones...

Rewriting history? Or at least museum exhibits

at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa (via The Globe & Mail; emphasis in bold mine):

The battle's not over yet. But under pressure from Bomber Command veterans' groups and sympathetic politicians, the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa will adjust the wording on a panel dealing with the 1945 firebombing of Dresden.

"The final wording has not come out," Fredrik Eaton, chair of the museum board, told The Globe and Mail yesterday. "But we expect to have it installed by October."

Many observers warn of the precedent of a public museum adapting its texts in response to political pressure. "I am very disturbed," said Margaret MacMillan, warden of St. Antony's College at Oxford, author of Paris 1919, and a consultant to the museum on the controversy. "This exhibit was a fair one."

The fight over the 67-word panel, titled An Enduring Controversy, erupted shortly after the Canadian War Museum opened in May, 2005. A group of veterans objected to its saying that "the value and morality of the strategic bomber offensive against Germany remains bitterly contested," and to its contrasting 600,000 dead with the statement that "the raids resulted in only small reductions of German war production until late in the war."

For two years, the museum defended its independence. So did two of a panel of four independent historians, one of them Ms. MacMillan, hired earlier this year to investigate. (All historians found the panel factually accurate, but two questioned the tone.)

The veterans weren't satisfied. One in four Canadians who served in Bomber Command during the Second World War were killed, and the survivors insist on honouring those comrades' memory. Art Smith, a former Bomber Command captain and former Conservative MP, explained: "The words said that we were responsible for 600,000 dead. I took offence that we were just helter-skelter bombers. We always had justified targets."

The veterans threatened a boycott, attempted to have a private member's bill introduced, and finally got a senate subcommittee to look into their complaints. In June, the subcommittee urged the museum to compromise.

Then, Mr. Eaton volunteered to chair the board. "I thought the museum was taking the wrong slant," he said. "It wasn't right that the museum should fight with the vets. I determined to effect a solution."

Two weeks after Mr. Eaton became chair, museum CEO Joe Geurts - a dogged defender of his institution's curatorial independence - departed.

Ever since, board members, former board member and retired General Paul Manson, and the vets have been negotiating a new text. They'll continue into September.

"The museum staff and professional historians will write the text but will be guided by feelings of respect," said Victor Rabinovitch, president of the Canadian Museum of Civilization and the Canadian War Museum. "We'll find a way to incorporate the respect while remaining faithful to the historical record."

In fact, the veterans have given the museum a version they want substituted for the existing panel. But at nearly 300 words, it is far too long. Besides, one point the vets object to is true: The strategic value and morality of the Dresden bombing are contested.

No one questions the veterans' bravery, Ms. MacMillan insists. "But a museum is not a war memorial. It should allow the public to make up their own minds." She warned that the decision to alter an exhibition to satisfy the veterans could mean "whoever screams loudest can have their view made known."

Indeed, several groups are in the midst of doing just that. One, the National Association of Japanese Canadians, says that the war museum's version of the internment of Japanese Canadians underplays the racist and economic forces behind the internment; the NAJC also wants the museum to recognize that despite the treatment of Japanese Canadians, 150 volunteered to don uniforms and fight for Canada. NAJC president Grace Eiko Thomson met with Mr. Guerts four weeks before his departure.

Yesterday, Mr. Eaton said that the museum had been in touch with the Japanese Canadians. (Not recently, according to Ms. Thomson). "Everyone's knocking on the door," Mr. Eaton said.

Or in the words of Paul McCartney, "Open the door, and let 'em in, oh yeah..."

Respectable history for a general readership: bad news and a bit of good news

I'm slowly wading through news from the past week or two and was saddened to read in The New York Times (registration is free or use Bug Me Not) that the wonderful American Heritage Magazine has suspended publication with the April/May 2007 issue, now on newsstands. Editor Richard F. Snow, who started in the magazine's mailroom in 1965, told The Times earlier this month that the bimonthly magazine, owned by Forbes Inc., has been for sale since January, and "in the absence of a buyer ... the publishers have decided to put the next issue, June-July, on indefinite hold."

The good news is that at least for the present, American Heritage will continue to publish on its incredibly useful and informative (not to mention easy to navigate) website. Make use of it now while you can. You can, believe it or not, search the archives for articles in each and every print issue all the way back to the very first of December 1954, which includes the article on "The Writing of History: An English Authority Compares British and American Viewpoints" by D. W. Brogan. You can also revisit eminent American historian and first AH managing editor Bruce Catton's column, "Reading, Writing, and History" on the long-forgotten Cadwallader commotion. The AH website each day includes several features at the bottom of the page, including "today in history" and the quotation of the day. Today, the former includes the news thatin 1929, the Marx Brothers' first film, The Cocoanuts, opened; in 1883, the Brooklyn Bridge opened to traffic; in 1844, Samuel Morse sent the first telegram; and in 1830, the first American passenger railroad began service. The thought for the day is one of my favorite's from Mark Twain: "“It were not best that we should all think alike; it is difference of opinion that makes horse races.”

There's also a link on the home page to historian Bernard Weisberger's "Funeral Oration for American Heritage", published at History News Network [links provided by me],

Allow me to shed a sentimental senior tear or two for the dear, departed print version of American Heritage, executed by Forbes, Inc., for the crime of attracting only one third of a million (350,000 to be exact) regular readers. Whether the online edition is granted a full pardon or merely a reprieve seems unclear at this moment. It's all rather personal with me. I'm one of the earliest contributors, with a piece on revivalist star of the eighteen-seventies, Dwight L. Moody, in the August 1955 issue, Subsequently I wrote a very large quantity of reviews and articles on assorted topics, the last (on political polling) appearing in 2000 -- plus books for the then-independent American Heritage Corporation's juvenile, text-book and mail-order book divisions [many of which grace the Farm School shelves], all long since sold away or terminated with extreme prejudice. But the magazine was my true home, a perfect haven for an academically trained historian who enjoys the challenge of writing respectable history for a general readership. From 1970 to 1972 I was on full-time staff as an Associate Editor, a personal way station on the road to leaving college teaching. Finally, from 1989 to 1999 I was a regular columnist, connecting today's news with yesterday's history, much as HNN does now.

But it's those two years as Associate Editor that I recall most fondly. The company's offices were then in the Fred F. French building at 45th Street and 5th Avenue, handy to the restaurants, theaters and tourist attractions of midtown Manhattan. Bruce Catton was still there, friendly but usually secluded in his office and working on his own projects, but also doing a smooth, professional job of doctoring articles referred to him by Oliver Jensen, the active editor. ...

We had our squabbles, our jealousies, our complaints of the management and our share of the clashes between editorial and business departments. But I do not recall tension between the "picture people"--the highly competent pictorial research staff--and those of us on the "print side." We all agreed on the concept of a generously illustrated magazine, with words and images mutually reinforcing each other, that took history seriously. We liked and respected what we did, and this is not mere nostalgia for golden days of youthful aspiration--we were all well past thirty.

It is, of course, exactly that seriousness which critics of the magazine denied. They said its wish to entertain short-changed its power to instruct. I'll grant that there was a possible over-supply of drums and trumpets, "quaint corners of the past," and Great White Males in those early numbers. (Oliver Jensen stoutly denied this.) But there was also plenty of food for reflection. What was more, the pages included many articles by rising and already risen stars of the academy--Britons like B. H. Liddell Hart, J.H. Plumb and D.W. Brogan, and Americans like Allan Nevins, Richard B. Morris, Daniel Boorstin, Carl Degler, David Donald, T. Harry Williams and Bernard Bailyn. The thinking was that well-told narrative reclaimed history, for many readers, from memories of abominable teaching in their elementary and high schools, and that the amalgam of words and images opened minds and doors to further exploration. Of course scholarly analysis and critical examination of sources is urgent and can even occasionally be made intriguing. But I personally thought that the separate existence of "popular" history was saving the field from the flight into specialization and distance from the common concerns of life that befell academic philosophy and what was once called "political economy" and was read by most educated people. I have taken that philosophy with me into the areas of television documentaries. History deserves and has many mansions. [Emphasis mine, too.]

Read the rest here, especially Mr. Weisberger's thoughts on what led to the company's demise.

From the Times article [links provided by me, not NYT],

The magazine has always been a bit of an anomaly among American publications.

The circulation is currently 350,000, or as high as it has ever been, and hundreds of those readers can still be reliably counted on to write in arguing about the true causes of the Civil War or, as happened recently, to point out that the author of a World War II article doesn’t know the difference between the M-1 rifle and the M-16, which didn’t come in until Vietnam.

American Heritage was founded in 1954 by James Parton, Oliver Jensen and Joseph J. Thorndike Jr., refugees from Life, who from the beginning broke most of the rules of magazine publishing. They determined not to accept ads, for example — on the ground that there was a “basic incompatibility between the tones of the voice of history and of advertising” — and instead charged a yearly subscription of $10, a figure so steep at the time that readers were allowed to pay it in installments. They also published in clothbound, hardback volumes with full-color paintings mounted on the front.

The format was an instant hit with readers, who instead of tossing back issues often shelved them in their bookcases, but it initially confounded the United States Post Office, which decreed that American Heritage could use neither the book rate nor the periodical one. That ruling was eventually overturned, but not until the magazine had almost bankrupted itself by paying for parcel post.

The first editor of American Heritage was Bruce Catton, a Civil War historian who wrote in the inaugural issue in December 1954 that “the faith that moves us is, quite simply, the belief that our heritage is best understood by a study of the things that the ordinary folk of America have done and thought and dreamed since first they began to live here.” In the beginning, at least, that meant a fair amount of WASPy nostalgia and a steady ration of stories about the Civil War. That inaugural issue, for example, includes a piece about a Union general who was falsely accused of treason in 1862, as well as articles about the country store, the Fall River steamship line and a lament by Cleveland Amory about the decline of New York men’s clubs.

Mr. Snow, 59, went to work in the American Heritage mailroom in 1965, when Columbia University insisted he take a little time off, and joined the staff full time when he finally graduated, in 1970. He has been there ever since, and in 1990 he became the magazine’s sixth editor, succeeding Byron Dobell. ...

Mr. Snow has been at American Heritage long enough that he can remember when it was an empire in the mid-’60s, employing 400 people, with the magazine as a flagship for what was in effect a publishing company selling books, many of them by some of America’s best-known popular historians, by direct mail. He was managing editor in 1980, when the magazine ceased publishing in hardback (except for subscribers who wanted to shell out extra for what Mr. Snow now calls a “padded, leatheroid edition”), and in 1982 when, bowing to economic necessity, it began soliciting ads.

“We all felt very bad about taking advertising,” Mr. Snow recalled. “But it had the odd effect of making us feel we were in touch with the world. There was a sense of a living connection to a process that was actually sort of fun — or at least it was fun while we were getting ads.”

American Heritage remained more driven by circulation than by ads, however. According to Scott Masterson, a senior vice president at Forbes and president of American Heritage, the magazine was losing money when Forbes bought it in 1986 and then bounced back for a while. But in the late ’90s, Mr. Masterson said, it failed to reap the kind of profits that many magazines did, and after 2001 it experienced the same downturn that afflicted the magazine business in general and had trouble recovering.

Part of the problem was the Internet, Mr. Snow said. “We’re really a general interest magazine,” he said. “We don’t play to a history buff in any narrow sense — like the Civil War re-enactors, for example. They can go on the Web and get thousands and thousands of hits.”

Three years ago Mr. Snow and Mr. Masterson decided to embrace the magazine’s aging readership and rejiggered American Heritage to appeal more specifically to baby boomers, mostly publishing articles about things that had happened in their lifetime. The formula was an editorial success, Mr. Snow said, yielding articles like one that appeared in the February-March issue about the Wrecking Crew, an unheralded studio band that played on many hit records in the ’60s and ’70s. But it failed to provide the hoped-for bump on the business end. “Forbes has been very, very patient,” he said. “but basically they’ve been carrying us for a while.”

Read the rest here.

From Bruce Catton's inaugural essay cited by The Times, "What They Did There", American Heritage Magazine, December 1954:

The sun goes down every evening over the muzzle of a gun that has been a museum piece for nearly a century, and where there was a battlefield there is now a park, with green fields rolling west under the sunset haze to the misty blue mountain wall. You can see it all just about as it used to be, and to look at it brings up deep moods and sacred memories that are part of our American heritage.

Yet the moods and the memories are not quite enough, for Gettysburg battlefield—like any other historic site—is memorable not for its scenic and evocative qualities but because it symbolizes the struggles and the sacrifices and the terrible hopes of people in a great moment of crisis. The men who fought at Gettysburg are all gone now but once they were very much alive, contending desperately with a fate which was almost more than they could cope with; and as Mr. Lincoln remarked, the world can never forget what they did there.

It is precisely that question—What did men do there?—that animates every worth-while examination of the American past.

For history after all is the story of people: a statement that might seem too obvious to be worth making if it were not for the fact that history so often is presented in terms of vast incomprehensible forces moving far under the surface, carrying human beings along, helpless, and making them conform to a pattern whose true shape they never see. The pattern does exist, often enough, and it is important to trace it. Yet it is good to remember that it is the people who make the pattern, and not the other way around.

The editors of any magazine calling itself American Heritage must begin by stating the faith that moves them; and the faith that moves us is, quite simply, the belief that our heritage is best understood by a study of the things that the ordinary folk of America have done and thought and dreamed since first they began to live here. They have done and thought and dreamed some rather extraordinary things, as a matter of fact, whose true significance does not always appear on the surface.

For a great many of the things people do seem rather unimportant, at first glance. They sing tinkly little songs, or they give way to queer enthusiasms about race horses or steamboats or carved figureheads for sailing ships; they fall victim to fear and suspicion, and so work hardship on some of their fellows who are doing the best they can according to the lights that were given them; they paint pictures of Indians, or of fire engines, or of landscapes that seem to carry some important message in their play of light and shade and color: they dig for precious metals in forsaken pockets of dangerous mountain ranges, they drowse lazily about the cracker barrel in a crossroads grocery store, and sometimes a few of them strive frantically to get people to buy one brand of soap rather than another, or grow snobbish and form clubs so that they can live comfortably on a plane above their fellows. These things are not very important, probably, except that each one contributes its own bit to the heritage by which we live—and each one, therefore, is worth looking at, because in each one we see the enthusiasms, the foibles, the impelling drives or the wistful dreams of the men and women who have made America.

So we propose to look into all such things; and because the infinite drama of human life can come out most clearly when people are least conscious of drama, trying to handle the prosaic business of making a living on a day-to-day basis, we believe that we do not always need to go to what are supposed to be the great moments of history in order to show American history in the making. The fearful climax of Gettysburg compels the attention, to be sure. But Gettysburg would not have been what it was if there had not been generations of plain folk beforehand, laying out farms and working in shops and stores, quite unaware that they were on the high road to destiny but somehow living and working in such a way that when destiny came along they could meet it without batting an eye.

Our beat, in other words, is anything that ever happened in America. Our principal question is: What did men do there? Our chief requirement as we set out to tell about it all is that the things we talk about must be interesting. The games men have played and the songs they have sung, the delusions they have had and the victories and defeats they have experienced, the homes they have built and the clothing they have worn, the aberrations from which they have suffered and the soaring, inexpressible ideals they have served—all of these, in one way or another, go to make up the heritage which we as Americans have today, and all of these make up the field which we propose to cover in this magazine.

The fabric of American life is a seamless web. Everything fits in somewhere. History is a continuous process; it extends far back into the past, and it will go on—in spite of today’s uneasy qualms—far into the future. As editors of this magazine we can think of no more eternally fascinating task than that of examining this continuous process on a day-to-day basis. Sometimes we shall talk about great men and what they did, and sometimes we shall talk about the doings of wholly obscure people who made the great men possible. But always we intend to deal with that great, unfinished, and illogically inspiring story of the American people doing and being and becoming. Our American heritage is greater than any one of us. It can express itself in very homely truths; in the end, it can lift up our eyes beyond the glow in the sunset skies.

.

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. (1917-2007)

From his obituary in yesterday's New York Times:

Young Arthur first attended public schools in Cambridge, but his parents lost faith in public education in his sophomore year after a civics teacher informed Arthur’s class that inhabitants of Albania were called Albinos and had white hair and pink eyes. He was shipped to the Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire.

History and story: When "folklore and fact collide"

At the end of my hep cat post the other week, I mentioned all too briefly Chris Barton's post at Bartography about fictionalized versions of history in children's picture books. If you didn't notice the mention or read it then, go read it now (and not too quickly either), and come on back.

Since we started homeschooling three years ago, I've noticed that one question that comes up often in various home education online groups is "How do I teach history when I don't know much myself?" or "Which books are accurate?" or "How do I know which books are accurate?" Usually parents ask about solid books with unimpeachable research that they, often lacking the knowledge themselves, can trust. There's no easy answer beyond doing your own homework and a lot of reading before you teach your kids.

I was reminded last week of this dilemma and Chris's post while reading The New York Times article, "In [Frederick] Douglass Tribute, Slave Folklore and Fact Collide" (as usual, try Bug Me Not if you don't want to bother with free registration at The Times):

At the northwest corner of Central Park, construction is under way on Frederick Douglass Circle, a $15.5 million project honoring the escaped slave who became a world-renowned orator and abolitionist.

Beneath an eight-foot-tall sculpture of Douglass, the plans call for a huge quilt in granite, an array of squares, a symbol in each, supposedly part of a secret code sewn into family quilts and used along the Underground Railroad to aid slaves. Two plaques would explain this.

The only problem: According to many prominent historians, the secret code — the subject of a popular book that has been featured on no less a cultural touchstone than “The Oprah Winfrey Show” — never existed. And now the city is reconsidering the inclusion of the plaques, so as not to “publicize spurious history,” Kate D. Levin, the city’s commissioner of cultural affairs, said yesterday. ...

It’s “a myth, bordering on a hoax,” said David Blight, a Yale University historian who has written a book about Douglass and edited his autobiography. “To permanently associate Douglass’s life with this story instead of great, real stories is unfortunate at best.”

The quilt theory was first published in the 1999 book Hidden in Plain View, by Jacqueline Tobin, a journalist and college English instructor from Denver, and Raymond Dobard, a quilting and African textiles expert. It was based on the recollections of Ozella McDaniel Williams, a teacher in Los Angeles who became a quiltmaker in Charleston, S.C. “Ozella’s code,” the book says, was handed down from slave times from mother to daughter. Ms. Williams died in 1998.

In fact, one of the first books to suggest the idea of the quilt as a form of secret code is the 1993 children's fiction picture book, Sweet Clara and the Freedom Quilt by Deborah Hopkinson, who never tried to cloak her story as history (its follow-up, Under the Quilt of Night, is slightly less decisive). However, according to the Amazon page for the book, one reader's review of Sweet Clara states, "This is one of many books I purchased as a learning tool for the Education Committee of our local quilt guild. It's instrumental in showing our young people some of the history of quilting." Oh dear.

While there's certainly a place for folklore in history, it should always be identified as myth and not passed off as fact. Unfortunately, since the publication of both Sweet Clara and, six years later, Tobin's Hidden in Plain View, the idea of the quilt code has taken off as history and spawned, or has been included in, a number of children's books:

The Patchwork Path: A Quilt Map to Freedom by Bettye Stroud

The Secret to Freedom by Marcia Vaughan

The Mystery on the Underground Railroad by Carole Marsh

The Underground Railroad for Kids: From Slavery to Freedom with 21 Activities by Mary Kay Carson

Even National Geographic, which should know better, perpetuates the myth in a lesson plan, telling teachers to "Have students look at pictures and (for advanced readers) read about African-American quilting traditions. Ask them to look for quilting practices that might have helped slaves teach each other about the routes to freedom. Have the students describe the quilts they see and discuss how these long-established African quilting traditions may have helped slaves in the United States understand how to use quilts to communicate. Ask students if they think they would be able to effectively communicate important ideas with quilts."

In these books, the line between fact and fiction is pretty blurred, not just for younger children who aren't yet able to conduct their own research or know yet to question the source but for their unknowing parents and teachers as well.

Home educating parents and classroom teachers alike often prefer a "living books" approach, since real stories, especially when they're beautifully illustrated, are a wonderfully engaging way to attract and hold children's interest in a subject, not to mention an easy way to liven up what is often dismissed as "dry and dusty" history. And both home educating parents and teachers can have trouble teasing the myth from history; according to The Times article, "The codes are frequently taught in elementary schools (teachers have been eager to take up the quilting-codes theory because of its useful pedagogic elements — a secret code, artwork and a story of triumph), and the patterns represent a small industry within quiltmaking."

As Shelley Pearsall, who writes children's historical fiction, notes at the very worthwhile and comprehensive Underground Railroad Quilt website (for more on this site keep reading, below):

[The "Quilt Code"] enables schools to keep from tackling the realities of the runaway slave experience. I think it also diminishes the incredible courage, guts, and individual determination the journey required. There were no quilts -- there was hunger, there was fear, there was illness, there was bad weather, there was frequent misinformation and losing your way -- it was not a lovely journey of hopping from one quilt pattern to the next.

Mentioned just above, a solid source of information on the myth of the quilt code is Leigh Fellner's Underground Railroad/Quilt website, a "greatly expanded" version of Fellner's March 2003 article for Traditional Quiltworks magazine, and one of the few websites I've ever come across with a bibliography. Be sure to scroll all the way down on the website's main page. I've had this site bookmarked for a while, and was glad to see it included in J.L. Bell's Boston 1775 post on The Times article -- where Bell also notes that "there are many elementary school lesson plans about the 'quilt code,' despite all the serious historical questions" (and don't miss his paper on “grandmothers’ stories” of the Revolution). I'm pleased to see that Fellner updated the website as recently as last month. It includes a wealth of information, with a variety of links and the aforementioned bibliography/list of resources, including links to the article, Young Readers at Risk: Quilt Patterns and the Underground Railroad by Deborah Foley of Culver Academies; primary sources from the University of North Carolina, Library of Congress, and elsewhere; and, also from Culver Academies, a lesson plan of "Search Strategies for Researching the Lives of African Americans".

Beyond the quilt code myth, an excellent choice for adults is Passages to Freedom: The Underground Railroad in History and Memory edited by the aforementioned Dr. Blight of Yale, who specializes in historical memory; some of his other books include Race and Reunion: The Civil War in American Memory and Beyond the Battlefield: Race, Memory, and the American Civil War.

In a similar vein as Passages to Freedom but meant for children is Freedom Roads: Searching for the Underground Railroad by Joyce Hansen, Gary McGowan (published in 2003 by Cricket Books), mentioned by JoVE the other day; she writes,

"While the topic is the underground railroad (and it appears to have lots of good historical information on that), the approach is very focused on how historians know what they know. Each chapter looks at a different type of evidence and assesses its value and how it would be used by historians. I only skimmed the book but it looks like it is well presented with lots of pictures of actual artifacts, record books, etc. It also deals with how historians use a variety of sources to build up a picture of what happened."

I haven't seen the book but I'm intrigued and would be interested to hear from JoVE, Mother Crone, and others who've read and used it with children. According to the Booklist review at Amazon, "the authors examine the origins and development of the Underground Railroad, with a special focus on the varieties and limitations of historical evidence. ... Valuable as much for its approach as for its specific topic." A good lesson to learn regardless of the historical event or era.

Memory is a funny thing. Modern impressions of some events -- such as the quilt code or, say, Pickett's charge at the Battle of Gettysburg -- are based on myths and legends rather than on historical evidence. The interesting part, of course, is learning how and why those myths and legends arose in the first place, and then changed over time. Speaking of Pickett's charge, Pickett's Charge in History and Memory by Carol Reardon is terrific book (and just out in paperback). Yes, Reardon is a military historian, so you might be thinking of edging your way toward the nearest exit or at least a more popular David McCullough title. But give her book a chance if you're interested in how to teach and learn history. It's hard to find a better lesson about primary sources, how memory even indavertently manipulates public opinion, and the dangers of accepting even primary accounts of historical events as truth, colored as they can be by personal biases.

Other good books and articles:

The classic mystery novel The Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey, published in 1952. Tey's protagonist, Inspector Alan Grant of Scotland Yard, spends the entire book in a hospital bed. Where, bored by his confinement, he becomes fascinated with a portrait of Richard III and decides to delve into the mystery of the murder of the little princes in the Tower and the accuracy of Shakespeare's portrayal of the murderous hunchback. As Grant discovers, it's the victors who tend to write history.

Would JFK Have Pulled Us Out of Vietnam?: A tantalizing archival discovery suggests the perils of historical evidence, an article by Sheldon M. Stern, director of the American History Project for High School Students at the John F. Kennedy Library

Also by Sheldon Stern, the article Evidence! Evidence! All You People Talk about is Evidence!, at the Organization of American Historians website; the article was originally published in the March 1998 issue of History Matters!, the newsletter of the National Council for History Education.

Lesson plans from the Library of Congress, including The Historian's Sources and Using Primary Sources in the Classroom

Hardhat History, a website established by Professor Tom Isern originally for his undergraduate and graduate students at North Dakota State University "in their development as historical scholars".

James (Lies My Teacher Teacher Told Me) Loewen's Tips for Teachers, including Ideas for Dealing with Textbooks, Books and Periodicals Suggesting Alternate Approaches in History Teaching, Teaching American History Through Imaginative Literature ("American literature usefully ties in with American history, so long as that literature is historically accurate," writes Loewen), and more.

The American Historical Association's Guidelines for the preparation, evaluation and selection of history textbooks

And finally, even if you haven't discovered the writings of Ryszard Kapuscinski, who died recently, this appreciation today by Verlyn Klinkenborg of The New York Times:

Where does the truth of history lie? In coups and revolutions, in wars and treaties and the chronicles of our textbook heroes and antiheroes? Or does it lie in the pulse of ordinary life, in a dailiness that looks almost hallucinatory if you venture outside it? I think of Ryszard Kapuscinski, who died at 74 on Jan. 23, as an emissary between those two versions of history. His writing life divides between the conventional reporting he did for the Polish press agency PAP — a voluntary slavery, as he described it, that made the whole world available to him — and the literary journalism that has found its way into books like Imperium, The Soccer War and The Emperor.

He was both witness and reporter, and an enduring reminder of the fact that the two are not the same.

Read the last bit here, and read some Ryszard, too.

Updated, as I'm still going through The Times (in between bouts of wrestling the basement into shape before our departure and beginning to pack), to add today's op-ed piece, "History's Tangled Threads," by journalist and historian Fergus Bordewich in reply to last week's article. Mr. Bordewich is the author of Bound for Canaan: The Underground Railroad and the War for the Soul of America (2005). Also worth reading is his original blog post the other year on the myth and reality of the Underground Railroad.

The siren call of pirates

Bruce at wordswimmer, one of my fellow Cybils panelists, has a terrific review of the terrific poetry book, Blackbeard, The Pirate King by J. Patrick Lewis, published in 2006 by National Geographic.

As Bruce writes,

"Even if you already know the story of Blackbeard, who returns to life in all his trembling and fearsome glory in Blackbeard The Pirate King, J. Patrick Lewis' remarkable account of his life, you'll relish the chance to sail with Lewis as he captains this sturdy ship of verse through the stormy seas of Blackbeard's many voyages."

How could you possibly resist such an invitation? Blackbeard is one of my kids' favorites poetry books -- I'm fairly certain it's Daniel's absolute favorite, since he's been known to sleep with the book, which rarely makes it back to the shelf -- and one of the titles they expressly asked to keep at home on our own shelves. It was one of the best collections of original children's poetry of 2006 and deserves a wide readership, whether one's interest is pirates or poetry.

Homeschoolers in particular will marvel at the talent and interests of J. Patrick Lewis, who has cleverly and memorably versified everything from extinct animals to castles to world travels. Not to be missed is his pop-up poetry biography of Galileo. I'm looking forward to his The Brothers' War: Civil War Voices in Verse, to be published in the fall by National Geographic, just in time for our continuing American history studies.

And Susan at Chicken Spaghetti reviewed Blackbeard last fall here.

(Painting, "The Duel on the Beach" by N.C. Wyeth, 1931, to illustrate the swashbuckling Rafael Sabatini story of the same name; this illustration and many others accompany the poems in Blackbeard.)

On to the Revolution

Since the kids are about to start their study of the Revolutionary War for history, I was delighted to see that J.L. Bell at Boston 1775 today posted an entry on Boston's Expanding Borders -- his plans over the next few days to "highlight some free online resources that relate to Revolutionary New England". Nifty, and perfect timing.

I'll have to check through Boston 1775's archives and the sidebars for other good links we can use. Many thanks to J.L. Bell for this fine resource.

Good habits and the historical mind

I've just started catching up on my blog reading, and one of the places I turned to first was J.L. Bell's Boston 1775 (and I hope to get caught up at Bell's Oz and Ends sometime soon), where I found the recommendation for this "damn good article": "Teaching the Mind Good Habits" by Sam Wineburg, originally published in The Chronicle of Higher Education several years ago.

Wineburg is Professor of Education and History at Stanford University and author of Historical Thinking and Other Unnatural Acts: Charting the Future of Teaching the Past.

From the article:

When I've broached the topic of habits of mind with historians, I've often encountered an uncharacteristic reticence. Those who comment often refer to general critical-thinking skills that could apply just as easily to texts about astrophysics or wire-haired terriers as to historical documents. Yet across the many historians I've interviewed, from the most traditional diplomatic historian to the hippest adherent of the trendiest subfield, I've been able to discern the contours of a shared disciplinary culture. ...

For students, historical habits of mind constitute major intellectual hurdles. Students see their professors' thoughtsas finished products, tidied up and packaged for publicpresentation in books, articles, and lectures. Historians shield from view their raw thinking, the way they try to make sense of their subject.

We need to bring this messier form of expertise into the classroom. Students who believe that knowledge bursts Athena-like from the professor's head may never learn to think like historians, may never be able to reconstruct past worlds
from the most minimal of clues. We need to show students that the self-assured figure lecturing from the podium is not what a historian looks like in his or her office, puzzling through difficult texts.

In fact, the processes by which a scholar makes sense of material -- what I sometimes call the intermediate processes of cognition -- are powerful teaching tools. Historians can model in class how they read by having students bring in unfamiliar texts and demonstrating how to interpret and assess them. With a companion document, they can show the strategies they use to corroborate evidence and piece together a coherent context. Or professors could refer students to the useful Web site History Matters (http://www.historymatters.gmu.edu), whose section on making sense of evidence includes acclaimed historians' discussions of how they evaluate different genres of primary evidence.

"Island Story" at LibriVox

While discussing Charlotte Mason, Our Island Story by H.E. Marshall, and other history books for younguns with a new internet friend the other day, I stumbled across the news that Our Island Story is now available, since September, as a free audiobook from LibriVox; part one is here and part two is here.

Rather more economical than the pricey (around $30 a pop), though no doubt gorgeous, professional alternative from Naxos Audiobooks, which is offering the unabridged story on CD in three volumes and as a one CD abridged Best of Our Island Story collection.

Children's history book bonanza

I've been behind in my blog reading as well as posting about the good tidbits I've come across, so I'll start now. Consider it my belated Canadian Thanksgiving gift or early Halloween treat.

Chris Barton at Bartography has a post, U.S. History is for the birds, where Chris explains why he and his kids are going to continue their picture book study of American history but change from a chronological approach to a more thematic one. And the current theme is birds (something I can appreciate, with three kids who wanted to have "Bird School" all summer), with some terrific titles, including The Bald Eagle's View of American History by first-time children's author and stamp collector C.H. Colman and illustrated by Joanne Friar.

Karen at lightingthefires has a post stuffed with suggested Canadian historical fiction picture books, and if the books in that list aren't enough, she closes with a few other lists for good measure. I see some old favorites on Karen's list, and some exciting new prospects.

Then, there's the unflagging Fuse #8, in a category all by herself, who's been on a historical fiction roll that I hope isn't coming to an end anytime soon. These are all new titles, brand new for 2006. For each title, listed in no particular order, I've put the link to Fuse #8's review first, followed by a link to the book itself:

Review of Hattie Big Sky by Kirby Lawson, about Hattie, age sixteen in 1917 and an orphan with her own Montana homestead.

Review of Something Out of Nothing: Marie Curie and Radium by Carla Killough McClafferty

Review of Escaping into the Night by D. Dina Friedman, about a young Jewish girl's escape from the Warsaw Ghetto.

Review of A True and Faithful Narrative by Katherine Sturtevant, set in Restoration England

Review of Desperate Journey by Jim Murphy, set in the early days along the Erie Canal.

Review of Porch Lies: Tales of Slicksters, Tricksters, and Other Wily Characters by Patricia McKissack; not exactly historical fiction, but sounds like a dandy yarn with good pictures to boot.

Review of Hero of the High Seas: John Paul Jones and the American Revolution by Michael L. Cooper; from National Geographic Children's Books.

Review of Bread and Roses, Too by Katherine Paterson, inspired by the 1912 "Bread and Roses strike" in the textile mills of Lawrence, Massachusetts.

Review of The Green Glass Sea by Ellen Klages, set in 1943, about young Dewey Kerrigan whose father has been working in Los Alamos on a top secret and mysterious “gadget” that will help America win the war.

Review of The Wonder Kid by George Harrar, set in the 1950's and touching on the golden era of comic books, polio, and fallout shelters.

Review of Homefront by Doris Gwaltney; life for 12-year-old Margaret Ann, who lives in a small southern town during WWII, is difficult enough even before the arrival of her pretty but scheming English cousin.

Thanks, all!

Proud mother moment

Had word over the weekend that seven-year-old Daniel's story about the Charter Oak had won author Jennifer Armstrong's first writing contest just for homeschoolers; the contest had been the kids' writing project for the month of September, a way of easing them back into school and writing with a fun assignment. The prize is an autographed copy of Jennifer's new book, The American Story: 100 True Tales from American History, which makes all of us here very, very excited. Daniel, my hockey fan, is especially thrilled that Jennifer promised to mail the book from Detroit, home of the Red Wings. Thank you, so much, Jennifer! This is the second writing contest Daniel has won this year, and a big boost for a boy who most times would rather be outside with a penknife rather than a pen.

Jennifer has been busy lately; besides two new books and all of the associated travelling, which you can read about at her main blog, she has revamped her website and started a new blog just for contests (bookmark and Blogline it!) with the promise of new contests each month.