On Dupont Circle: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt

In On Dupont Circle: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt and the Progressives Who Shaped Our World (2012, Counterpoint Press), Author James Srodes offers an inside and sometimes scandalous portrait of the twelve young men and women who made up the famous Dupont Circle Set.

Prize-winning author James Srodes offers a vivid and scintillating portrait of the twelve young men and women, who, on the eve of World War I, came together in Washington, D.C.’s Dupont Circle neighborhood. They were ambitious for personal and social advancement, and what bound them together was a sheer determination to remake America and the rest of the world in their progressive image. Read more

Q&A: Douglas Cubbison on British General Burgoyne

Douglas R. Cubbison is a military historian, who authored Burgoyne and the Saratoga Campaign: His Papers (2012, Arthur H. Clark Company), which presents the documents and letters of British General John Burgoyne.
 In 1777, Burgoyne began an attempt to divide the rebellious United States in the American Revolutionary War by moving south from the British Canada to gain control of the Hudson River Valley, separating the New England states from those to the south.

After Burgoyne’s early capture of Fort Ticonderoga, his campaign had become bogged down in difficulties and ended with surrender on October 17 of his entire army after the Battles of Saratoga.
Read more

Steuben County: Walking Seasonal Roads

Seasonal roads are defined as one-lane dirt roads not maintained during the winter. They function as connectors linking farmers to their fields, neighbors to neighbors, or two more well-traveled roads to each other. Some access hunting lands and recreational areas. Some pass by or lead to cemeteries. They can be abandoned as people move and towns fade.

Having traveled nearly every seasonal road in Steuben County, NY, Mary A. Hood finds in Walking Seasonal Roads (2012, Syracuse University Press) that they provide the ideal vantage to contemplate the meaning of place, offering intimate contact with plant and wildlife and the beauty of a rural landscape. Each road reveals how our land is used, how our land is protected, and how environmental factors have had their impact. Read more

Daughter of Troy: Lily, Duchess of Marlborough

When Sally Svenson, an summer resident of Lake Luzerne and occasional contributor to Adirondack Life magazine, was writing Adirondack Churches: A History of Design and Building (2006, North Country Books) , she stumbled upon the life of Eliza Warren Price, known as Lily, Duchess of Marlborough.

Lily, who was born in Troy, NY in 1854, was reported in an old history to have provided the funds for a chapel at st. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Lake Luzerne. That turned out to be a questionable assertion, but Svenson found Lily’s obituary in the New York Times and was hooked on her incredible life story which is told in Lily, Duchess of Marlborough (1854-1909): A Portrait with Husbands (2011, Dog Ear Publishing). Read more

Booker T. Washingtons Presidental Dinner with TR

Prior to 1901, no black man, woman, or child had ever been invited to have dinner with the President at the White House.  In Guest of Honor: Booker T. Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, and the White House Dinner that Shocked a Nation (2012, Atria Books), historian Deborah Davis puts a spotlight a 1901 dinner invitation by President Theodore Roosevelt to African-American educator and activist Booker T. Washington. The event marked the first ever invitation of its kind of a Black American to the White House. Read more

New Book: 50+ Adirondack North Country Stories

New Larry Gooley BookRegular Adirondack Almanack and New York History contributor Lawrence P. Gooley has published a new collection of his stories in Adirondack & North Country Gold: 50+ New & True Stories You’re Sure to Love (2012, Bloated Toe Publishing).

Gooley, whose diligence in local publishing is only matched by his research and storytelling acumen, has collected 343 pages worth of his finest short historical essays, some of which have never been published. &#8220This could well have been two books, and possibly three (it’s well over 100,000 words), but I wanted to do a big collection,&#8221 Gooley said.

Chapters 5, 15, 25, and 35 are the book’s anchor pieces: they’re longer stories of some truly amazing North Country natives. Chapter 15, the story of local cluster -balloonist and daredevil Garrett Cashman, earned Gooley a mention in Smithsonian Air & Space Magazine. Those familiar with Gooley’s Oliver’s War: An Adirondack Rebel Battles the Rockefeller Fortune (which won the Adirondack Literary Award for Best Book of Nonfiction in 2008), or his regional best seller Terror in the Adirondacks: The True Story of Serial Killer Robert F. Garrow, will be at home with Gooley’s folksy and comfortable storytelling style, his deep appreciation for in-depth research, and his uncanny ability to know a great story when he sees one.

Gooley will be on the road this summer promoting the new book, and is finishing work on a collection of 25 regional murder stories (all with at least one remarkable twist). In the meantime with his partner, Jill McKee, Gooley runs Bloated Toe Enterprises, which has recently expanded to include web design services.

Bloated Toe’s unusual business model was featured in Publisher’s Weekly in April 2011. The company also operates an online store to support the work of other regional folks. The North Country Store features more than 100 book titles and 60 CDs and DVDs, along with a variety of other area products. That’s also where you can find Adirondack & North Country Gold and all of Gooley’s books.  

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers.

New Seaway Guide: Sailors, Keepers, Shipwrecks, and the Maid

As Nik Wallenda prepares to walk over Niagara Falls, the newest book in the Great Lakes Seaway Trail Guidebook Series &#8211 Sailors, Keepers, Shipwrecks, and The Maid &#8211 tells the stories of the Falls’ first tightrope walkers and other daredevils, the famous, and fascinating everyday people who have lived, worked, played and traveled along the Lake Erie, Niagara River, Lake Ontario and St. Lawrence River shorelines in New York and Pennsylvania.

Readers will discover interesting details about American Presidents, pirates, pioneers, chefs, lighthouse keepers, artists, and adventurers in the collection of vignettes enhanced by historic photographs, art, illustrations and maps.


The Maid in the new book’s title is the Maid of the Mist tour boat, a Niagara Falls tradition since 1846 and co-sponsor of the book project.

The guide’s introduction encourages driving the full 518 miles of the National Scenic Byway and stopping at a series of Great Lakes Seaway Trail “Outdoor Storyteller” signs to learn more facts about local architecture, agriculture, maritime, military and natural history.

The new book is written by Steve Benson and published by the nonprofit tourism promoter Seaway Trail, Inc., Sackets Harbor, NY. Benson is also co-author of Great Lakes Seaway Trail’s French and Indian War guidebook Waterways of Way: The Struggle for Empire 1754-1763.

Learn more about the Great Lakes Seaway Trail series of travel guides voted “Best of the Byways” by the American Recreation Coalition online at www.seawaytrail.com  or call 315-646-1000 x200.

Lake Erie region stories in Sailors, Keepers, Shipwrecks, and the Maid include: tales of fish wars and Lake Erie’s fury, the Erie Triangle, Dan Rice and Daniel Dobbins, War of 1812 combatants, grape growers, Celeron’s many legacies, the Dunkirk Lighthouse and notable shipwrecks.

Buffalo/Niagara Falls region stories include: Frank Lloyd Wright’s architectural masterpieces, a tale of pistols at 12 paces, shipwrecks and pirates, Underground Railroad heroes, the ghost of the French Castle, and the “Cat-of-the-Mist.”

Rochester/Central Lake Ontario region stories include: War of 1812 heroine Bathshua Sheffield Brown (her ancestors operate Brown’s Berry Patch, Waterport, NY)- Sam Patch, the Yankee Leaper- photography pioneer George Eastman, the Underground Railroad on Sodus Bay.

Eastern Lake Ontario region stories include: Harriet Tubman and other Underground Railroad heroes, “The Big Cheese,” the War of 1812 Battle of Big Sandy, a female Commandant at Sackets Harbor, a tale of two wrecks, and The Whittlesey Woman.

Thousand Islands/St. Lawrence River region stories include: skiffs, steamships, and yachts- pirate Bill Johnston- a Maple Island murder mystery- two castles- artist Frederic Remington, Fort de La Presentation, and the 1760 Battle of the 1000 Islands.

New Book: The Mafia at War

The Mafia at War: The Shocking True Story of America’s Wartime Pact with Organized Crime (2012, Skyhorse Publishing) is a dramatic account of how a criminal organization exploited the grim realities of war to revive its fortunes and dominate global crime. Anyone with a passion or interest in World War II or the history of organized crime in America will find it engrossing reading.

Using firsthand testimonies and declassified intelligence reports, author Tim Newark (the author of several crime and military history books) traces the relationship between the Mafia, Hitler, and Mussolini, and tells the remarkable story of Mafia—Allied collaboration during World War II. For The Mafia at War, Newark also carried out archival research in London, New York, Washington, and Sicily.

Newark shows how Jewish gangsters clashed with Nazis on the streets of New York City- how Mafiosi nearly issued contracts to kill top Nazis, including Hitler- how British “Bobbies” patrolled the then deadly streets of Palermo- and how Mafia-backed bandits conducted a guerilla war for Sicilian independence including General Eisenhower’s arming of the Mafia during the invasion of Sicily.

Author Tim Newark is also the author of Boardwalk Gangster: The Real Lucky LucianoEmpire of Crime: Organised Crime in the British Empire– and Highlander. He has also worked as a TV scriptwriter and historical consultant, resulting in seven TV documentary series for BBC Worldwide and the History Channel, including the thirteen-part TV series Hitler’s Bodyguard. He contributes book reviews to the Financial Times. Visit www.timnewark.com.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Book Features Confederates at Elmira Prison Camp

Michel Fortlouis, a young Confederate soldier, weary of war, was captured by Union troops at Clinton, Louisiana, thirty miles from his home of New Roads. It was August 1864, in the last year of the Civil War. Corporal Fortlouis was shipped north to the Union Prison Camp at Elmira, New York, where he died of pneumonia within ten days of his arrival. More than 12,000 young Southern men passed through the camp. Many suffered the harsh winter. Nearly 3,000 died.

In their Honor &#8211 Soldiers of the Confederacy &#8211 The Elmira Prison Camp (2009, New York History Review) remembers these men and boys, and tells their stories. Research by author Diane Janowski, who lives in Elmira, brings an  awareness of the soldiers’ relationships &#8211 brothers, fathers and sons, cousins and friends. Descendants of the soldiers have contributed harrowing stories of survival or despair. They were captured together. Some made it home.

&#8220This is a different kind of book about the Elmira Prison Camp,&#8221 Janowski says. &#8220Many writers and scholars in recent years have done a fine job researching and publishing information about the prison camp’s horrors. I decided to ask the families of some of the prisoners. With 21st century technology I found some families that were willing to talk about this difficult subject.&#8221

The book is not about war strategy, nor conditions inside the camp, the first 40 pages or so offers personal accounts of how the men and boys ended up in Elmira. The rest of In their Honor’s 218 pages  includes photos and diagrams of the camp and a complete revised list of the Confederate dead at Woodlawn National Cemetery.

Note: Books noticed on this site have been provided by the publishers. Purchases made through this Amazon link help support this site.

Schenectady Civilian Conservation Corps Reunion

On Saturday, June 16, 2012, the Schenectady County Historical Society will host a reunion of Civilian Conservation Corps alumni, family, & friends from 2:00-4:00 p.m. at 32 Washington Avenue, Schenectady. Marty Podskoch, author of Adirondack Civilian Conservation Corps Camps: Their History, Memories and Legacy, will give a short presentation and will invite participants to share their memories of the camps.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) began on March 31, 1933 under President Roosevelt’s “New Deal” to relieve the poverty and unemployment of the Depression. Camps were set up in many New York towns, state parks, and forests. Workers built trails, roads, campsites and dams, stocked fish, built and maintained fire tower observer’s cabins and telephone lines, fought fires, and planted millions of trees. The CCC disbanded in 1942 due to the need for men in World War II.
Marty Podskoch is a retired teacher and is the author of six books: Fire Towers of the Catskills: Their History and Lore, two volumes of Adirondack fire tower books: Adirondack Fire Towers: Their History and Lore, the Southern Districts, and Northern Districts and two other books, Adirondack Stories: Historical Sketches and Adirondack Stories II: Historical Sketches, from his weekly illustrated newspaper column.

After 5 years of research and interviews, Marty Podskoch has completed his new book, Adirondack Civilian Conservation Corps Camps: Their History, Memories and Legacy. The 344-page book contains over 500 pictures and illustrations, 26 maps, and 25 charts. The author will have all of his books available after the presentation for sale and signing.

For more information on the reunion or to RSVP, contact Melissa Tacke, Librarian/Archivist at the Schenectady County Historical Society, by phone at 518-374-0263, option “3”, or by email at [email protected]. The Schenectady County Historical Society is wheelchair accessible, with off-street parking behind the building and overflow parking next door at the YWCA.