Shirley W. Dunn, who has published two books about the Mohicans (The Mohicans and Their Land 1609-1730
Books
Annette Gordon-Reed Wins Frederick Douglass Book Prize
Annette Gordon-Reed, Professor of Law at New York Law School, Professor of History at Rutgers University-Newark, and Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard University, has been selected as the winner of the 2009 Frederick Douglass Book Prize, awarded for the best book written in English on slavery or abolition. Gordon-Reed won for her book, The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family
awarded by Yale University’s Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition, sponsored by the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History.
The award is named for Frederick Douglass (1818-1895), the slave who escaped bondage to emerge as one of the great American abolitionists, reformers, writers, and orators of the 19th century.
In addition to Gordon-Reed, the other finalists for the prize were Thavolia Glymph for Out of the House of Bondage: The Transformation of the Plantation Household
This year’s finalists were selected from a field of over fifty entries by a jury of scholars that included Robert Bonner (Dartmouth College), Rita Roberts (Scripps College), and Pier Larson (Johns Hopkins University). The winner was selected by a review committee of representatives from the Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance and Abolition, the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, and Yale University.
“In Annette Gordon Reed’s The Hemingses of Monticello, an enslaved Virginia family is delivered —- but not disassociated —- from Thomas Jefferson’s well-known sexual liaison with Sally Hemings,” says Bonner, the 2009 Douglass Prize Jury Chair and Associate Professor of History at Dartmouth College. “The book judiciously blends the best of recent slavery scholarship with shrewd commentary on the legal structure of Chesapeake society before and after the American Revolution. Its meticulous account of the mid-eighteenth century intertwining of the black Hemingses and white Wayles families sheds new light on Jefferson’s subsequent conjoining with a young female slave who was already his kin by marriage. By exploring those dynamic commitments and evasions that shaped Monticello routines, the path-breaking book provides a testament to the complexity of human relationships within slave societies and to the haphazard possibilities for both intimacy and betrayal.”
The Frederick Douglass Book Prize was established in 1999 to stimulate scholarship in the field of slavery and abolition by honoring outstanding books. Previous winners were Ira Berlin and Philip D. Morgan in 1999- David Eltis, 2000- David Blight, 2001- Robert Harms and John Stauffer, 2002- James F. Brooks and Seymour Drescher, 2003- Jean Fagan Yellin, 2004- Laurent Dubois, 2005- Rebecca J. Scott, 2006- Christopher Leslie Brown, 2007- and Stephanie E. Smallwood, 2008.
Inside The Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City
A new book, Inside the Apple: A Streetwise History of New York City
This fast-paced narrative history unfolds in mini-chapters designed to guide you to obscure and prominent historic places throughout the city. The supplemental maps and step-by-step directions make using the book to explore the city in a new way easy and accessible. The book is broken down into several parts that include New Amsterdam, the Revolutionary Era, and the Birth of New Republic- The Great Port, 1805-1835- The Growth of the Immigrant City, 1836-1865- The City in Transition, 1866-1897- The New Beautiful City, 1898-1919- Boom and Bust, 1920-1945- and the City Since World War Two.
The layout makes reading the book as a traditional history possible and brings to life the city’s fascinating and dramatic past for locals, tourists, and anyone eager to better know the stories and places of New York City history. Also check out the authors’ blog.
A New Book Highlights Brooklyns Evergreens Cemetery
Organized in 1849 as a non-sectarian cemetery Evergreens Cemetery in Brooklyn (it actually borders Brooklyn and Queens) and covers 225 acres and is the resting place of over a half million people. This remarkable cemetery of rolling hills and gently sloping meadows features several thousand trees and flowering shrubs in a park like setting and is on the National Register of Historic Places. It is also the subject of an outstanding new book, Green Oasis in Brooklyn: The Evergreens Cemetery 1849-2008
This oversize book filled with unique and picturesque photographs by Ken Druse, traces the history of the Evergreens Cemetery beginning with the land on which the cemetery was founded, and it’s design by some of the most acclaimed architects of their time, Alexander Jackson Davis and Andrew Jackson Downing. It also shows how the forces that shaped the history of New York – population growth, immigration and growing wealth – also shaped the Evergreens. Among the monuments of fascinating characters buried there are those of Brooklyn’s Eastern District Fire Department (site of a statue memorializing a fireman who died in the Brooklyn Theatre Fire of 1876), Chinese American plots, the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire Memorial, Stranger’s mound (pauper’s graves), the graves of more then 500 entertainers, the 20th Regiment of U.S. Colored Troops plot, Yusef Hawkins (the 16-year-old African American youth who was shot to death in 1989 in Bensonhurst sparking racial tensions), Max Weber, Anthony Comstock, and literally thousands of other notable people.
Take a listen to NPR’s recent tour of The Evergreens here.
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Revisiting Great Literature With Penguin Classics on Air
“Penguin Classics On Air” is an online radio series devoted to the discussion and exploration of some of Penguin Classics’ more than 1400 titles from many eras, cultures and regions of the world. The program is hosted by Penguin Classics Editorial Director Elda Rotor and features in-depth conversations on new, timely and rediscovered classics between Elda Rotor or Classics editor John Siciliano and scholars, translators, or experts of a specific Penguin Classic.
The show wraps up with Associate Publisher Stephen Morrison offering a sampling of the Classic by reading the first pages from one of the works discussed. In addition, each episode of “Penguin Classics On Air” features a review by Alan Walker, Senior Director of Academic Marketing, on one of the Classics he’s recently read, as he fulfills his mission to read one Penguin Classic by an author per letter of the alphabet from A to Z.
As a sample of the goods, take a look at The Birth of Knickerbocker: Washington Irving’s A History of New York. Elda Rotor interviews Betsy Bradley, the introducer and editor of Washington Irving’s A History of New York , Irving’s popular first book is an early nineteenth century satirical novel of colonial New Amsterdam. It follows the fictional historian Diedrich Knickerbocker as he narrates the development of New York cultural life—from the creation of the doughnut to the creation of Wall Street. Alan Walker introduces listeners to The Emigrants by Gilbert Imlay and Stephen Morrison offers up the opening to Washington Irving’s beloved story “Rip Van Winkle.” in his segment, “First Pages.”
Four New Diaries By Upstate New York Teenagers
Four new books provide readers with first person narratives of rural Upstate New York teenage life in the 1860s through the 1890s. These accounts of young peoples’ lives on the farm, or in the home, offers a unique perspective and serves as an important primary resource in the study of American history.
The first is A Darned Good Time
Second in the series is My Centennial Diary – A Year in the Life of a Country Boy
Third in the series, My Story – A Year in the Life of a Country Girl, is by 15-year old Ida Burnett of Logan, New York (in Schuyler County) in 1880. Ida churned butter, milked cows, sewed her own underwear, canned fruit, but also had time for boys and parties. She lived in the country in Upstate New York and in the whole year did not venture any farther than twenty miles from home. The book will be released soon.
The fourth (forthcoming) will be Home in the Hills by 14–year old Edna Kendall of Altay, New York (in Schuyler County) in 1891. It will be available in early 2010.
You can check out these and more publications from the New York History Review Press at http://www.newyorkhistoryreview.com.
Uncovering The Roots of NYCs Preservation Movement
The controversial demolition of Pennsylvania Station in 1963 is often said to have given birth to New York City’s historic preservation movement. As Randall Mason reveals in his new book The Once and Future New York: Historic Preservation and the Modern City
Rich with archival research, The Once and Future New York documents the emergence of historic preservation in New York at the turn of the twentieth century. The book counters the charge that preservationists were antiquarians concerned only with significant buildings. Primarily using three significant projects – City Hall Park restoration, the failed attempt to save St. John’s Chapel, and the building of the Bronx River Parkway – Mason argues that historic preservation in this period, rather than being fundamentally opposed to growth, was integral to modern urban development.
For more information, including the table of contents, visit the book’s webpage:
http://www.upress.umn.edu/Books/M/mason_once.html
Upcoming Events For New Adirondack Book
There are several book signings and other events for the new book Historic Tales from the Adirondack Almanack
August 8: An informal talk about Adirondack blogging, trends in local media history, the new book, and their connection to Hulett’s Landing at 7:30 pm, this Saturday, August 8th, at the Hulett’s Landing Casino.
August 9: Book signing at The Adirondack Reader in Inlet, NY on Sunday, August 9th from 1-3pm
September 12: Book signing at The Open Door Bookstore in Schenectady on Saturday, September 12th from 1-2:30pm.
September 19: Book signing at Bookstore Plus in Lake Placid on Saturday, September 19th at 2:00pm.
Support The New York History Site, Buy A Book
In addition to our regular sponsor, there are now two new ways to support what you read here at New York History. Two new books, written by John Warren (that’s me!) have been published by The History Press. Historic Tales from the Adirondack Almanack
The second book is the first detailed history of the Poesten Kill which flows from the Petersburg Mountains in Eastern Rensselaer County to the Hudson River at Troy. It is now available at Amazon.,com
Upcoming Book Events
August 8, Hulett’s Landing, NY: An informal talk about Adirondack blogging, trends in local media history, the new book (Historic Tales from the Adirondack Almanack), and their connection to Hulett’s Landing at 7:30 pm, this Saturday, August 8th, at the Hulett’s Landing Casino.
August 9, Inlet, NY: Book signing (Historic Tales) at The Adirondack Reader in Inlet, NY on Sunday, August 9th from 1-3pm
September 12, Schenectady, NY: Book signing (Historic Tales) at The Open Door Bookstore in Schenectady on Saturday, September 12th from 1-2:30pm.
September 19, Lake Placid, NY: Book signing (Historic Tales) at Bookstore Plus in Lake Placid on Saturday, September 19th at 2:00pm.
Mad Ones: Media Darling Crazy Joe Gallo
Tom Folsom’s new book, The Mad Ones: Crazy Joe Gallo and the Revolution at the Edge of the Underworld, takes readers back to a time when Red Hook, Brooklyn called to mind a bloody guerrilla war with the mafia, and not a new IKEA store. Because he writes about the history and cultural fabric of the city in a fresh and inventive way Folsom recently appeared on Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show. You can also find a YouTube video of Folsom discussing what the neighborhood at the junction of Columbia and Union Streets in Red Hook was like before waterfront crime and the construction of the BQE and Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel.
Joe Gallo’s short life as gangster, gunman, and racketeer of the Profaci crime family (later known as the Colombo crime family) drew much media attention. Joey and his two brothers initiated one of the bloodiest mob conflicts since the Castellammarese War of 1931. He was an inspiration for Jimmy Breslin and Mario Puzo, considered a threat by both Jimmy Hoffa and Bobby Kennedy, and was teh subject of spreads in Life magazine and Women’s Wear Daily. His gangster chic was the popularized by Harvey Keitel in Reservoir Dogs. His death would be the subject of Bob Dylan’s 1976 song “Joey”.
The Mad Ones tells the story of the Gallo brothers, a trio of reckless young gangsters from Red Hook who staged a coup against the Mafia. In the book, author Tom Folsom recreates the New York City Joey Gallo and the Gallo brothers inhabited. To do this, Folsom—who went inside the FBI Witness Protection Program to research the critically acclaimed 