David L. Finnigan, originally from Lincoln, now of Springfield, was a graduate student in architecture at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale in 2018 and was reading a book about English palaces. He says, “My first thought was that it is too bad we don’t have something like that here. Then, it dawned on me – we do. […]
Books
Posted inArts & Culture
Dealing with dangerous ideas
The later 1960s are widely recognized as a period of intense upheaval in the United States. However, the unrest developed over time, as the two controversies discussed in Matthew C. Ehrlich’s Dangerous Ideas on Campus: Sex, Conspiracy, and Academic Freedom in the Age of JFK show (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2021, $24.95). The two […]
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The Black Man’s President
The Black Man’s President Abraham Lincoln’s legacy on race, reconsidered, stands up to critics BOOK REVIEW | James Krohe Jr. We used to put on pedestals countrymen deserving of honor for civic generosity or courage on behalf of good causes. Of late, we have taken down more statues than we have put up as the […]
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Race in the world of sports
Tackling the issue of race in the world of sports is a difficult venture. On one side stand many political leaders and commentators, strong proponents of the “shut up and dribble” philosophy, who believe that athletes should simply silently perform in their respective sports. On the other side are those athletes at all levels who […]
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Insane treatment of women
Readers of Kate Moore’s new book will not be silenced. Anyone who delves into The Woman They Could Not Silence likely will come away aghast at the treatment of women, especially the book’s subject, Elizabeth Packard, at the state insane asylum in Jacksonville in the mid-1800s. In an October Zoom discussion sponsored by the Illinois […]
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Upheaval in Alton
The 1830s were a volatile decade in the United States. Andrew Jackson, president until 1837, encouraged more rights for working class white males at the expense of the elite. Many Easterners moved to the Midwest. Various innovations led to a booming economy, which then busted in the Panic of 1837. Antislavery sentiment began to grow […]
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The devil comes to Illinois
Jake Brosky, the crack detective for the St. Louis World, is back in Taylor Pensoneau’s third novel, Devil on the Prairie. Set primarily in Illinois, this is the third novel in Pensoneau’s trilogy. The fictional story is infused with historical events and actual places from small towns in Illinois to the streets of Paris, hotels […]
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How did these women get this way?
James Traveler is the pen name of U. William Huck. He was born in Bremerhaven, Germany, in 1949, and immigrated to the United States in 1955. He attended public schools in New York and college at Syracuse and State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. He received his doctorate in zoology […]
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Memories of a state government insider
Zack Stamp’s 2021 memoir, Things as I Remember Them, provides insights to the inner workings of state government. Political junkies and anyone who worked in and around state government over the past several decades will recognize many familiar names peppered throughout his entertaining stories. Stamp worked inside state government for nearly 40 years. He worked […]
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From Rochester to the world stage
When Ray Bruzan of Rochester researched a previous book, published in 2017, he discovered that an internationally known violinist had been born in Rochester in 1887. He had never before heard of Louis Persinger; to help others know of this amazing virtuoso, Bruzan wrote a children’s book, The Violinist of Rockychester. Now, Bruzan has published […]
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Punks on the prairie
What do you do when you want to be part of a music scene, but you live in a small Midwestern city or town, where most culture is slow to filter through? You build it yourself. That’s what the book Punks in Peoria: Making a Scene in the American Heartland, published in June by University […]
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House divided
Hear the name “Lincoln” and you see the man splitting rails, say, or on a debate platform towering over Stephen A. Douglas. Few recall the soon-to-be president being shooed out the front door of his house in a hail of potatoes. But that image of Lincoln was as valid as the others, as we learn […]
