Farewell to February

Over at Random Jottings, Elaine is writing about harbingers of spring including pictures of tulips. Unfortunately here in New Jersey there is a winter storm watch in effect for Sunday night into Monday with the threat of 8 inches of snow. Carol and I are just back from visiting Paul and Sarah in Massachusetts where the prediction is up to 20 inches - as Carol said, "we are out of here!" On these visits we stay in Concord which is famous both for its revolutionary war history and for the famous writers who have lived there over the years - it is a very nice place and well worth visiting.

On Friday, we took a side trip to Harvard (or as DT calls it - the St. Leo's of the north) to visit the Lincoln exhibit at the Houghton Library. To me the most interesting thing in the exhibit was part of Lincoln's reading copy of his first inaugural. The first draft of the speech was written in Springfield and printed so that Lincoln could work on revisions which he did during his long journey to Washington. This is also the speech that was greatly improved by some suggestions by William Seward - Lincoln's Secretary of State. On display was the first and last page - the last page was key because it showed the famous peroration of the speech ("the better angels of our nature"), handwritten on to the printed copy.

We had our usual dinner and breakfast with Sarah and Paul which was very enjoyable and both of them are doing well. Paul and I made a visit to a local independent bookstore to talk about a possible book signing regarding "The Major League Pennant Races of 1916." While the owner was certainly pleasant, he wasn't very optimistic so it remains to be seen whether anything will come of it - ultimately it is up to Paul.

While there we did establish some basic parameters for a 2009 baseball marathon. We were introduced to this idea a number of years ago by two of my cousins who are basically professional fans. Our most memorable marathon was in 2001 when Paul and I went to California and saw seven games in five cities over a seven day period. The 2009 marathon will be somewhat more modest. The focal point will be seeing both the Cubs and White Sox play in Chicago and a side visit to Milwaukee to see the Brewers. We have been to Wrigley Field before, but the other stadiums will be new to our list. I think Paul has been to over 20 stadiums while I am in the high teens. The aforementioned cousins have been to 49 major league stadiums - I said they were professional fans.

Paul and I also talked about the possibility of working on another book together, possibly a history of the 1889 baseball season. This is before the American League was founded when the National League and the American Association were the two major leagues. There were close pennant races in both leagues - the Dodgers and St. Louis in the American Association and the Giants and Boston Beaneaters in the National League.

Any such project wouldn't start until the second half of 2010 and I am not at all sure it will happen. I have been thinking a lot about future books and since I don't have unlimited writing years left, I have focusing on what books do I especially want to see completed. Right now the two main ones are a book about early baseball in New Jersey (1855-1870), no book about that period has been written and it should be. The other one is a book about Shakespeare's history plays - this is something I have a lot of passion about - the premise that these plays have important messages for all time and the idea that they very enjoyable - simply a lot of fun. No decision has to be made at the moment, but that's where I am at the moment.

So it is farewell to February and hello to March. I have a talk about the 33rd New Jersey coming up plus I am scheduled to teach a class about the 33rd at the Life Long Learning Program at Caldwell College. And, of course, there is the New Jersey Historical Society, St. Paul's Church and NJ Civil War 150 - all of which will keep me plenty busy. Retirement is great, but I continue to work far too hard!

Remembering the Heroes - Part II John (1849-1939) & Maria (1853-1945) Proctor

Earlier this month the totally unexpected discovery of a picture of my great-great paternal grandfather, John Zinn, prompted a post on our immigrant ancestors as family heroes. Although it was not on my immediate agenda, I made a trip to the Hackensack public library looking for the newspaper the picture appeared in and, I was sure, other new information about my Zinn ancestors. Of course, in research little goes as one expects and the trip turned up absolutely nothing. I should have remembered that Hackensack didn't have daily newspapers in the 19th
century and the only weekly papers didn't have photographs at all, much less the one I was looking for.

However subsequent to that I made another discovery, not quite as dramatic or groundbreaking (in my little world), but still important. One of the genealogy websites that I subscribe to had added a number of Trenton newspapers from the 1880's through 1922. This opened up a fertile and very accessible source of research on my maternal side.

My mother was the daughter of Mary Proctor and James W. Winder both of whom were born in England and came to this country as children with their parents in the 19th century. Both families, who I am sure didn't know each other in England, settled in Trenton, New Jersey - a city closely connected to the pottery industries in England. They became relatively prominent residents of New Jersey's capital city so that a search for their names turns up a fair number of articles.

I am gradually working my way through the Proctors, John and Maria (pictured above on their 54th wedding anniversary in 1929) came to the United States in 1881. They made the trip with their three children, all under the age of five, and with Maria about six months pregnant. They had six more children in this country so with a family of nine, one of their names is in the newspapers of the era on a regular basis. John Proctor himself was one of eleven children and, as far as I know, the only one to leave England. The conventional wisdom is that they left England for economic reasons which is probably true although I wonder why they were the only ones to leave. While John and Maria lived in Chesterton in Staffordshire, their families (Proctors and Lingards) have very deep roots in the neighboring village of Audley.

English census data lists John as a carpenter or joiner and a number of his ancestors were wheelwrights. According to one source, a wheelwright was a much more skilled trade than being a carpenter. In any event, John apparently started out as a carpenter in Trenton, but gradually expanded into becoming a general contractor. Starting in the 1903-05 period there are numerous newspaper listings of the building contracts he has been awarded. Once I finish the research I will try to analyze the scope of his work, but it seems like he had a fairly sizable business. I also found that his son John Lingard Proctor apparently played some baseball in that same period, at shortstop - a position that I also have some experience with - it must be in the genes. I was surprised to learn that John himself was pretty active in politics beginning after he had been here only about 10 years.

I still have a lot more to go through here and since John and Maria lived until the 30's and 40's, I hope the site will continue to add more years. Unlike the case of my Zinn ancestors, I have been to both Audley and Chesterton - worshipping in the church where John and Maria were married, walking on the street they lived in and, hopefully, taking a picture of their house. The morning we left Audley in 2000, I tried to put myself in John's position as he loaded his three children, his pregnant wife and their belongings into a wagon on the way to the train on the way to Liverpool and ultimately America. Neither John nor Maria could have had any idea what they were in for, what it would be like and it would it work, and yet they did it - which makes them heroes in my book.

2009 Reading and Writing Goals - 2009 - First Check In

At the end of 2008, for the first time in my life, I established some personal goals in the areas of reading and writing. As we close in on the end of February, I thought this would be a good time for a first check in. In terms of reading, the goal was simple -keep a record of every book I read so that at the end of the year I will know how many books I have read and be able to choose my favorites.

So far so good, I keep a notebook handy where I faithfully write down each book read. As of today there are six and while it is possible I may finish "Mary Barton" by next Saturday, I tend to doubt it. At that rate I will read about 35-40 books, somewhat less than my estimate of 50, but that is somewhat due to focusing on some longer books - especially "Daniel Deronda" at almost 700 pages. 700 pages of what is not the most accessible writing. "Mrs Fytton's Country Life" on the other hand took only two days.

As noted earlier this month, I want to fit in some lighter reading, if I can work this out so that I can read it along with other things, not instead of as happened with "Mrs Fytton." What seems to work best for me is one work of fiction and one of non-fiction, the question is can I expand this to include lighter works like Angela Thirkell's novels. Another concern is something my cultural buddy, DT, pointed out to me recently. Since the summer I haven't been reading much Shakespeare criticism which is essential for a number of reasons. As result I am about to try a new strategy - one work of serious fiction ("Mary Barton" at present), one of non-fiction (to be decided), a piece of light fiction (the next Thirkell novel) and a few pages each day or so of Shakespeare criticism (Jonathan Bate's - "The Genius of Shakespeare" which I just started tonight).

My first writing goal was to finish the final editing on "The Major League Pennant Races of 1916" which was done on time and the book has now been published. The second was to finish my five team histories for the pioneer project history of early base ball clubs by March 1st. That is right on schedule as I have only a final proofread to go before sending them on to the editor. I find final proofreads very difficult - after reading my own work a certain number of times, it is hard to pay sufficient attention. But I will do my best and then get them off more less on time.

The next step is to finish editing William Lloyd's Civil War letters by the beginning of the 2009 Rutgers football season. In addition to the editing I still have to do some detailed research on Lloyd's lengthy post Civil War life. Once that is done the next step is to take a break from all aspects of book writing and focus on family history in anticipation of a 2010 trip to England. This schedule may be thrown off somewhat by a new project being considered by the New Jersey Civil War 150th Anniversary committee - a book of essays/articles about New Jersey and the Civil War.

Although I am focused on all of this it is hard not to spend time thinking about other book possibilities. One issue is whether to try something of larger or broader interest or to focus on narrower related topics especially those related to New Jersey history. For example, the work on the pioneer project could easily be expanded into a history of early baseball in New Jersey. To my knowledge no such work has ever been written and it should be.

At the same time working on a topic of broader appeal like a major league baseball season was very enjoyable. There are a couple of other baseball topics, but there are other areas of interest as well. I have been reading portions of Allen Nevins' classic "The Ordeal of the Union" to learn more about the Kansas-Nebraska Act. Among other things it brought Lincoln back into politics and it seems to be a major issue that has not had a full length book treatment. And then there is, of course, Shakespeare - a book about the history plays. That's one book that I definitely want to write - something I have been passionate about for almost 50 years - the question is when is the right time.

I don't want to be morbid about it, but I am 62 years old so I don't have unlimited writing time ahead of me. So I have to be intentional and make some tough choices. Most of the time I feel that the Shakespeare book should come next - starting in 2010, but it doesn't take much to get me interested in some of the other possibilities. Decisions - decisions. So I guess where we stand at the end of February is on target in terms of the goals, but with a lot of thinking to be done. A DT time if there ever was one.

Nothing to Fear

I bought Adam Cohen's new book about the FDR's 100 days in a weak moment - "The Major League Pennant Races of 1916" had just been published and I decided to reward myself with actually buying a new book. This book had just been reviewed in the New York Times, receiving very favorable comments other than what was felt to be unfair treatment of Herbert Hoover's efforts to deal with the depression.

After finishing the book last night, I realize that this is one of those books that is interesting to read, but not necessary to own. As the Times critic noted it is informative because of the picture it gives of the contributions of Roosevelt's inner circle especially Frances Perkins, Raymond Moley, Henry Wallace, Lewis Douglas, and Harry Hopkins. Of this group I had heard of all, but Douglas although I knew very little about the rest.

Wallace's part in the book focuses on his role as Secretary of Agriculture dealing with the farm crisis. Wallace went on to be FDR's vice president in 1940 and, if he head not been replaced with Truman, would have been president when Roosevelt died in 1945. As the New Deal developed Wallace became more and more liberal to the point that he was ultimately accused of Communist or leftist sympathies. This is not the picture shown by Cohen so it was a helpful correction of that portrayal.

I did know that Frances Perkins was the first female cabinet member, but was not aware of the extent to her life long struggles for the rights of working people. According to Cohen, she had a major part in pushing the reluctant Roosevelt towards massive public works projects as part of the solution to the depression. There were two things I was very surprised to learn about Roosevelt - the first was that the inclusion of FDIC insurance in the Glass Steagal banking act was done over his objection and threatened veto.

The second and more important is that the second major piece of legislation of the 100 days was a bill giving the president and, therefore, Douglas, broad powers to cut government spending. One of the enduring lessons of the New Deal and Keynesian economics was the use of government spending including deficit spending to improve bad economic times. Yet Roosevelt came to office pledged to cut government spending and for a long time supported Douglas' efforts to do just that. Had there not been a banking crisis requiring the first legislation to focus on banking, this would have been the first law proposed in the New Deal.

Cohen's major point is that the New Deal and especially the 100 days represented a major turning point in American history. Afterwards no one would argue that government had a responsibility to help citizens in need - there might be different Republican and Democratic approaches, but the premise would never be questioned. The ideal or value of rugged individualism was gone forever.

Like a number of books I have read recently, "Nothing to Fear," presents the story of a brief, but important period in American history. It, therefore, makes that history more accessible to the main stream reading public who would not endure a full length history of FDR's 12 plus years as president. Such books have less appeal to me because I prefer the more in depth approach when I am very interested in something. However, the New Deal is not one of my major interests so it may be just as well that I read this small part of the story. Now if I had only been smart enough to borrow it from the library instead of buying it and having no further use for it.

"Daniel Deronda" - Further Thoughts

I want to post some further thoughts on “Daniel Deronda,” but in fairness want to note that some of what follows reveals some of the plot so the reader is warned!

At the end of his introduction to the Oxford World Classic edition, Graham Handley writes about Grandcourt’s final effort to humiliate Gwendolyn. Gwendolyn married Grandcourt for financial reasons, knowing full well that Grandcourt had fathered children by a Mrs. Dasher, who he had refused to marry. In his will, made after his marriage, Grandcourt declares that if Gwendolyn does not “provide” him with a male heir that the bulk of his estate goes to his son by Mrs. Dasher. Gwendolyn receives only the use of the undesirable house where the Dasher family is exiled and 2000 pounds per year. Gwendolyn’s family and other supporters are greatly disturbed by this poor treatment.

Gwendolyn herself knew of the provision for the Dashers, but was probably not aware of what was left to her. But to everyone’s surprise the only question for her is whether to accept anything at all from Grandcourt. This is not the first time Eliot’s work where a female character has to make a choice involving money and love. I am thinking particularly of situations in “Middlemarch” and “Felix Holt: The Radical.” In those cases if the character chooses love, she loses the money or at least a significant amount of money. Here Gwendolyn first chose money over love (or at least some future possibility of love), but in the end values her integrity more than money.

As anyone who reads nineteenth century literature knows, these were not easy decisions. Middle class women without independent means had few acceptable means of earning a living. The most traditional being the unenviable lot of a governess which is, in fact, the choice Gwendolyn spurns to marry Grandcourt in the first place. A consistent thread throughout Eliot’s writing is that women should listen to their conscience, not financial need, in making such decisions.

This is especially interesting to me since in the Clarendon edition of “Adam Bede,” Eliot is quoted to the effect that her primary audience is young men. That certainly was a major theme of “Adam Bede,” which was her first novel, but it also continues throughout her work. It is certainly fair to say that the experiences of the young men in “Daniel Deronda” are also intended to speak to that audience. Although I did not enjoy this novel any where near as much as her other work, Eliot still has something important to say, both to her time and to ours.

"Daniel Deronda"

For random reflections on George Eliot's last novel, please go to www.victorianchallenge.blogspot.com

The Pearl Theatre - The Acting's the Thing

One of the advantages of living so close to New York City is the easy access to such a broad range of cultural opportunities especially with regard to the theater. However it can still be a challenge, even for someone who reads the New York Times everyday, to find some of the excellent offerings that don't receive extensive media coverage or attention. A case in point is the Pearl Theatre Company located on St. Mark's Place in the East Village.

Back in the fall of 2007 there was a very brief, very positive review in the Times of this theater's production of Hamlet. I don't remember what it was that appealed to me, but I think it was probably something along the lines that the production was basic Shakespeare without so many of the changes that add little and to me take so much away. In any event, Carol and I saw the production one Sunday afternoon in October and it was great and at very reasonable prices. Especially noteworthy was Sean McNall in the title role.

Our experience made me pay attention to the Pearl's web site and their annual schedule of classical plays typically including one Shakespeare play, although we had not gone back since Hamlet. Then in one of those grace filled moments, my God-daughter Emily Ewing became an intern at the Pearl after graduating with a theater major from Smith College. Emily is the daughter of my close friend, Edie Ewing who died this past December, I was honored to speak at her funeral and posted that eulogy on this blog.

One of the commitments I made to myself after the funeral was to do a better job of staying in touch with Emily. She suggested we come to a play at the Pearl and she would have dinner afterwards. So Carol and I did so this past Saturday, Valentine's Day to see the company's production of Twelfth Night. I have to admit that I went with the idea that I was not going to like the play. To date my interest in Shakespeare has been pretty much focused on the history plays with some excursions into the great tragedies. My only prior experience with a comedy was The Merry Wives at Windsor which I really didn't enjoy. I think there is only so much comedy to be found in mistaken or hidden identities which to me pretty quickly degenerates in slapstick.

So after going into this exercise with a bad attitude it was no little surprise that I found that I really enjoyed the show. It was very funny with the identical twin confusion not over done. Once again I was greatly impressed with the quality of acting by the Pearl's company. Sean McNall moved from Hamlet to Feste the fool and played the part brilliantly. Also on hand from the Hamlet production were Robin Leslie Brown (Gertrude/Maria) and Dominic Cuskern (Polonius/Malvolio). The rest of the cast was new to me, but they were all good and I especially enjoyed Bradford Cover as Sir Toby Belch. He very took a Falstaff like approach to the part which I greatly enjoyed.

After the play we were fortunate enough to have dinner with Emily which gave us a great opportunity to understand what goes on behind the scenes (literally and figuratively). It's natural,I think, to underestimate how much is really involved in making the whole thing work and work, not just once, but throughout the run. Emily told us that at the same time Twelfth Night is going on the company is rehearsing for its next production Tartuffe - all of which sounds exhausting to me. She suggested broadening our horizons by coming back for that play and I think we might do just that.

Just before we went to dinner, Emily introduced us to Shepard Sobel, the retiring Artistic Director. When she told him that I was her God-father, it was a wonderful feeling, one of many high points of a great afternoon and evening. Emily sent us home via the R train to the Port Authority and our car - a total trip of about an hour - pretty good to the East Village. The Pearl is a Pearl and I highly recommend it.

Looking For Lincoln

I know that I have mentioned that my running buddy and fellow Shakespeare connoisseur, DT, is a greater believer in brevity. Since he tends to apply that belief more to others than himself, I usually don't try to pay much attention to his wishes. However, this post about the PBS documentary Looking for Lincoln is going to be different. I have written quite a lot about our sixteenth President since starting this blog so I only want to make a few comments about this almost two hour show that aired on February 11th, the eve of the Lincoln Bicentennial.

Hosted and written by the African-American scholar, Henry Louis Gates, I had some trepidation about what the show would be like. At the Lincoln Forum in November I heard something about positions that Gates was taking about Lincoln that sounded like buying into the view that Lincoln was a racist and not worthy of the the high reputation that he holds today. I was pleasantly surprised to find that this was not the case. It was a very even handed effort to understand Lincoln especially from the point of view of an African-American who had inherited the worshipful views of earlier generations of Afro-Americans, who was now coming to terms with statements and actions of Lincoln that were not inspired by the "better angels" of his nature.

The show took the form of Gates traveling to many Lincoln sites, doing research and talking to Lincoln scholars and others including Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. One thing that I found important was when Doris Kearns Goodwin told Gates that the posthumous hero worship given to Lincoln was certainly not his fault or his responsibility. By the end of the show it seemed like the election of President Obama had helped Gates to see Lincoln in a more objective, but still positive light.

The one major criticism, I had of the show is that there were times when it seemed like Gates was trying to treat the Civil War and the issue of slavery as if they were two things that just happened to be going on simultaneously rather than two things that were intertwined with one another. Since college I have always believed that slavery was the cause of the war, states rights and other issues not withstanding. There always seemed to be a comprise out of those other places where state rights and union broke down, but this was not the case with the slavery.

As an amateur, little-if at all, known historian I also have to admit to some jealousy as to the access that Gates enjoyed. It reminded me of something about Jon Meacham's book, "American Lion." In the acknowledgements Meacham thanks his fact checkers - all six of them! Since I only have one fact checker, proof-reader etc, I hope I can be forgiven some level of envy. In Gates' case the advantages of this kind of access was graphically illustrated when he is show reading one of Lincoln's note books, without the protective gloves required by almost every museum and, is at one point, shown lying on a couch reading the invaluable historical document. Still the show was well done and I think it will help the general public get a fuller picture of this great man.

Remembering the Heroes - John Zinn (1827-1897)

On Sunday afternoon, after finishing my post on "Mrs. Fytton's Country Life," I had a few minutes to kill and innocently did a google search on my name. To my surprise up came John Zinn followed by Hackensack Bergen County. Since my grandfather, great-grandfather and great-great-grandfather were all named John Zinn and lived at least part of their lives in Hackensack, this was of no small interest to me. I immediately went to the site and found that in 2007 someone had posted on a genealogy board about a picture that they had of John Zinn and
Philip Shafer recognizing them as the last surviving charter members.

The person who wrote post confirmed that Philip Shafer had lived in Hackensack and he surmised that John Zinn did too. The post said that the picture was from around 1880 which suggested pretty clearly that this had to be my great-great-grandfather, John Zinn who was born in the village of Maar in the province of Hesse in Germany in 1827 and died in Hackensack in 1897.

Since I had never seen a picture of this ancestor I was more than a little excited and e-mailed the person who wrote the post as quickly as these aged fingers could type. Since the post was from 2007 all kinds of horrible thoughts went through my mind, suppose the person had a different e-mail address, suppose they had moved or even worse died. Fortunately my e-mail did not bounce back which was a good sign and I then waited more or less impatiently.

After 24 hours my patience was rewarded with an e-mail and the attached picture which I think has to be from the Bergen Record. The person who had made the original post had gotten the picture from his mother who didn't know what it was that the two men were surviving charter members of. Based on the research I had already done it seems pretty certain to me that this refers to the Third Protestant Reformed Church of Hackensack which was formed in early 1858. Surviving minutes of the church's initial meetings name both men as founders - in fact, the first officers of the church. There is no small irony to the fact that my ancestor was the treasurer of the church since I spent about 25 years as the Treasurer of the Episcopal Diocese of Newark and am still the Treasurer of St. Paul's Church in Paterson. The fact that my maternal grandfather, James W. Winder was also a church treasurer adds even more evidence to the idea that there is something hereditary at work.

Obviously I would have been very grateful to find a picture of any ancestor, but this John Zinn is no ordinary ancestor. Born in Germany in 1827, it appears that in the spring of 1849, he endured a seven week ocean voyage in a wooden ship arriving in the United States on July 3rd. I have never discovered why he left Germany, but it seems reasonable to believe that after the unsuccessful revolutions of 1848, he decided to seek a new life in a new land. By 1850, he was married and the father of another John Zinn and the rest as they say is history.

About five years ago I attended a conference on genealogy where the keynote speaker was John Colletta, the author of "They Came In Ships: A Guide to Finding Your Immigrant Ancestor's Arrival Record." A very engaging speaker, John made two important points. The first is that we should try to find pictures of the ship our ancestors came on or of at least a similar ship so that we can ask ourselves - what were they thinking about spending all that time in a ship like that. More important was his second point, when he said that the ancestors who made the fateful decision to come here, endured the journey and the hardships of a new life in a new land are the heroes of our family histories. All too frequently we think heroes have to be great warriors or leaders who did big things on a big stage. It is nice to know that every family has its own heroes.

While it wasn't on my immediate agenda, this find, no not a find, but a gift, has got me thinking about some trips to the municipal library in Hackensack where they have old issues of the Bergen Record on microfilm. Thinking about it the picture probably marks some anniversary of the church's founding so it probably makes sense to start around 1893 and work backwards. However long it takes, I am confident I will learn more about my family's history and for this gift and what it can lead to, I am very grateful.

Mrs. Fytton's Country Life

I should have realized that if I was going to factor in a third book of lighter reading on top of heavier fiction and non-fiction books that one possibility was getting caught up in the lighter reading and neglecting the other. Sort of a path of least resistance approach to reading, which come to think of sounds like DT's approach to life, but I digress. That possibility
is exactly what happened as after finishing "Diary of a Provincial Lady, I moved on to read and finish Mavis Cheek's, "Mrs Fytton's Country Life," while making very little progress in "Daniel Deronda."

This is another novel about life in an English country village, but this time more modern - probably about the 1990's. Angela Fytton's husband has divorced her and married a younger woman. Part of Angela's strategy to get him back (don't ask) is to move to a small village in Somerset. Among other things this means the two teenage children from their marriage will move in with her former husband and wife numero dos producing, as expected, chaos and tension.

Cheek has thereby created a two for one dynamic in this case, the first and second wives in conflict over the one husband. This is resolved in what seems to be a highly improbable manner especially since it is not clear if all parties are aware of the resolution.

I could take or leave this part of the book especially since some of it has far more detail than I needed to know. Of far more interest to me was another major theme of the book, an in depth exploration of English country life. First Cheek establishes how physically difficult that life was especially for women. It reminded me of Robert Caro's first volume of his biography of Lyndon Johnson where he describes the difficult time women of the Texas hill country had doing basic washing and ironing in a world without electricity. One of Johnson's first political achievements was convincing the Federal government to electrify the hill country even though it didn't meet their population density standards.

Having established this Cheek goes on to look at two different approaches to those trying to move back to that life. One is that of Dave the Bread and his wife, Wanda who basically try to cheat local residents with fraudulent goods made to look like original country products - for example bread bought commercially and promoted as being home baked. The other, in a lot more detail, is Angela's attempt to go back to that simpler form of country living. As she proceed step by step, Cheek raises and answers interesting questions about the basic integrity of doing this.

When I first started reading this book, I thought it was going to be a slapstick novel something like the Chevy Chase movie, "Funny Farm." A situation where unsuspecting people move into the country only to find a eccentric characters who help deflate, if not, defeat their dream. However, this was not at all the case in "Mrs. Fyttons Country Life," the intersection of Angela's efforts and those kind of scenarios with her neighbors are limited and don't usually bring the two things into conflict. This allows the story to build towards it conclusion which, if not satisfying in terms of the human relations (especially the 2/1 dynamic), is very satisfying in terms of exploration of English country life. Now its back to "Daniel Deronda" and no more light reading until it is done.

Discerning a Call

Last Wednesday, Carol and I went to the Rockland County Civil War Roundtable in Pearl River, New York where I had been asked to speak about my book "The Mutinous Regiment: The Thirty-third New Jersey in the Civil War." This is probably at least the sixth different talk I have given about the 33rd, but it was a very different experience in a very positive way. Since then I have been trying to figure out why it was so different and whether there is a message there about my focus for the future.

One thing that was different was that I changed the talk. In every prior presentation I have talked about how the regiment was formed, where the name the "Mutinous Regiment" comes from and then given a summary of the regiment's experience. After the last talk I gave back in November at a New Jersey group, a woman complimented me on the talk saying that I had told "the whole story." That stuck with me because that night I sold only one copy of the book which I thought was unusual for a group focused on New Jersey's role in the war.

Thinking about this, I decided that I shouldn't provide quite so much information and thereby give people more incentive to buy the book. The Pearl River meeting was the first time I tried the new approach which was to follow the story of the regiment's founding with a more in depth presentation of the Atlanta campaign and the regiment's role in that campaign. That night I sold 11 books, six before the meeting and five afterwards. I don't want to jump to conclusion that the change in the speech accounted for such a dramatic difference in sales, but I think it played a role.

The meeting was also very different in that the group was really engaged in the question and answer period which became almost a discussion - it had to have lasted close to 1/2 hour - as long as the talk itself. Carol certainly made a difference during that discussion, suggesting additional information I should add such as talking about the letters of William Lloyd. So there were some different elements present, but I am not sure how much they were a factor individually or collectively.

Thinking about it today, I think that the change in the presentation made a difference not because I didn't tell the whole story, but because the story I did tell was dramatic - and the story of the Atlanta campaign is interesting. The experience has led me to wonder if I have a gift for this kind of thing - taking a factual story and telling it in an interesting way that gets people interested both in discussion and in buying books. By a gift I mean something that is God given, not something that is due to something I have done.

All of this has made me wonder if this is some kind of a secular call as to what I should focus on in the near future. I greatly enjoy research and writing as well as making presentations about what I have found. At this point at least the idea of concentrating on this has some real appeal both from the enjoyment and some potential financial rewards. I want to be careful, however, not to get carried away with something that may have been a passing fancy. I do know that I have been somewhat frustrated recently about other things limiting my time for writing, but also for simply working on promoting and speaking about both books. It's something that needs some thought which I certainly intend to give it!

Diary of a Provincial Lady

Clearly and obviously different books are read at different paces. If that needed any confirmation, and it probably didn't, that I started "Diary of a Provincial Lady" (almost 400 pages) on the 30th and finished it yesterday, February 2nd is further confirmation of this fact. As noted in the last post this is another of Elaine's suggestions and once again she is right on the mark.

The book purports to be the diary of a lady living in the English countryside around 1930 who appears to be struggling to maintain an upper middle class life style on a very inadequate income. Pictured in the club chair to the right is her husband, Robert -sleeping/reading the Times. It doesn't appear that Robert has any kind of paying job or if he does it is never mentioned. In addition not doing much, Robert seldom has much to say no matter what the situation or what his wife says to him.

Early in the book that leads to one of the many diary entries where having written something the provincial lady then puts down a mental note or query to herself. In this case she asks whether it is possible that even if her husband doesn't say anything, he may actually have been listening. Such comments/questions fill the book and are usually both funny and honest. There really isn't a plot to the book, merely a series of scenes where little seems to go as the provincial lady plans, but everyone survives none the less.

This is not in any way to suggest the book is not worth reading, in fact, I fully recommend it. The characters, the humour and the endless trials and tribulations of the household and the village make for relaxing reading. The setting of most of the book is the English countryside - I think it was in Elaine's post about such books that I first heard about it. While we learn much about the characters in this locale, we don't learn much about the setting itself which was something I missed.

As an American who has always lived in the New York metropolitan area, I am not sure what the attraction of the English countryside has for me. But I know it is real both in what I read and the last two times that I visited England - especially the villages in Staffordshire and Gloucester shire that my ancestors came from. Elaine has written how much she also loves these books, but has also noted that she probably couldn't tolerate living in one. Ultimately that would probably be true for me as well, although I would guess that with today's technology one could live in such a place and not experience the limitations of the past.

I believe that E.M. Delafield wrote some further books about the provincial lady in other locales. While I probably won't enjoy them as much as this one, I will take a look at them. In the meantime I am moving on to Mavis Cheek's "Mrs Fyton's Country Life" while still working my way through "Daniel Deronda." I have gotten a little bogged down in the latter book and we will see if I am as positive about it as I am about the rest of George Eliot's work.