Illinois Books

Rosen's work should be a classic. It looks at important works of English literature and shows clearly how ideas about men have evolved. I found this book very interesting and very helpful.

Professor Maud's book provides welcome relief from sensationalist biography. By tracing Olson's reading, and thus establishing a chronological framework for the poet's thinking, Maud does not confuse with editorial and/or emotional bias. For readers unable to make the trip to the various archives of Olson's work around the US, this book is a valuable reference. The extensive notes provide a place for the interested scholar to get lost in for hours. Extensive and intensive if a little dry, this book is worth the read as a companion to Olson's work.

This wonderful book shows how mistaken the popular view of Queen Victoria is, of a dull, straightlaced humorous woman. In fact, she was a fun-loving person with a wonderful sense of humour, and quite surprisingly broad-minded. Her life was filled with laughter, and this book is full of marvellous anecdotes about her. Her opinions wer often very unconventional, for instance she was sympathetic towards unhappily married women, even to the point of condoning adultery, a very unusal view for her time. She was fiercely opposed to the sabbatarian movement, which wanted to prevent people from enjoying themselves on Sunday. She surrounded herself with people who amused her (only a person with a strong sense of humour could have tolerated john Brown. )You cannot read this book without becoming an ardent fan of this most misunderstood Queen.

In 1989, Chicago began an experiment with radical decentralization of power and authority. This book tells the story of what happened to Chicago's elementary schools in the first four years of this reform. Implicit in this reform is the theory that expanded local democratic participation would stimulate organizational change within schools, which in turn would foster improved teaching and learning. Using this theory as a framework, the authors marshal massive quantitative and qualitative data to examine how the reform actually unfolded at the school level.With longitudinal case study data on 22 schools, survey responses from principals and teachers in 269 schools, and supplementary system-wide administrative data, the authors identify four types of school politics: strong democracy, consolidated principal power, maintenance, and adversarial. In addition, they classify school change efforts as either systemic or unfocused. Bringing these strands together, the authors determine that, in about a third of the schools, expanded local democratic participation served as a strong lever for introducing systemic change focused on improved instruction. Finally, case studies of six actively restructuring schools illustrate how under decentralization the principal's role is recast, social support for change can grow, and ideas and information from external sources are brought to bear on school change initiatives. Few studies intertwine so completely extensive narratives and rigorous quantitative analyses. The result is a complex picture of the Chicago reform that joins the politics of local control to school change.This volume is intended for scholars in the fields of urban education, public policy, sociology of education, anthropology of education, and politics of education. Comprehensive and descriptive, it is an engaging text for graduate students and upper-level undergraduates. Local, state, and federal policymakers who are concerned with urban education will find new and insightful material. The book should be on reading lists and in professional development seminars for school principals who want to garner community support for change and for school community leaders who want more responsive local institutions. Finally, educators, administrators, and activists in Chicago will appreciate this detailed analysis of the early years of reform.

This is a first-rate digest of Harbison's larger work, the definitive work on Irish High Crosses. My wife and I stumbled onto the book in a Kells bookstore. She was looking for examples of crosses featuring griffins -- and they are noted herein! Harbison maps the route to all the ancient crosses and gives a thumbnail sketch of iconography. Also a great gift to lovers of things Irish and arm-chair travelers. Thank you, Peter Harbison and artist Hilary Gilmore!

I own the Chicago and Alton Railroad book and have owned this book since February 2007. The book describes the rich history of the Chicago and Alton Railroad. I love the photos of the Alton Limited, Abraham Lincoln and Ann Rutledge passenger trains. There is even a photo of Abraham Lincoln when he lived in Springfield, Illinois. The Chicago and Alton Railroad was the shortest route between Chicago Union Station and St. Louis Union Station. Today this route is used by Amtrak and Union Pacific.

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Richard Wallin and company have prepared the definitive history of the Chicago & Illinois Midland Railroad. This 1979 publication is illustrated with 355 black and white photos and maps that document this short railroad (121 route miles). This book has rare and valuable photos of the locomotives and industries of the C&IM as well and extensive and informative text. If this is your railroad, you must have a copy. 240 pages, hardback.

When it comes to travel and transportation, most methods just improve something people can do by themselves. Boats, cars, trains, etc. merely improve people's ability to walk, run and swim. But flight has always been something completely new.

Dave Young shows how flight had many roots in the Chicago area (the Wright brothers studied the work of Octave Chanute) and them fully blossomed. Since the early days of airports, Chicago has always, except for a short period, had the world's busiest airport (first Chicago Municipal/Midway, O'Hare and then O'Hare again). It is no wonder that aviation has such a rich history in Chicago.

The rich history is illustrated and illuminated by wonderful and rare photos that captivate the reader. A wonderful book that was well worth the wait. Get this one and Lynch's Chicago's Midway Airport: The First 75 Years and you will know it all.

The Chicago Black Renaissance was a revitalization of black expressive arts and community activism rooted in a pan-African identity which blossomed during the 1930's to the 1960's in Chicago's "Black Belt" - or, as residents preferred, "Bronzeville." It was also a tumultuous period in which longtime urban black Chicagoans were faced with assimilating thousands of rural migrants from the South.

The lens through which Knupfer examines the Renaissance is women's activism: as club members and individuals, as reformers of schools and libraries, builders of art and community centers, ministers, writers, politicians and more. They were highly successful in some areas; for example, the nation's oldest WPA arts center, South Side Community Art Center, continues to offer classes and host exhibitions, while the "Special Negro Section" begun in 1932 by the first black librarian in the Chicago Public Library system has evolved in the Vivian G. Harsh Research Collection of Afro-American History & Literature, one of the largest collections of African American historical documents in the nation. But the book also explores the failures and disappointments, which can be instructive to contemporary activists.

One of the most fascinating chapters for me was "Women's Activism in Public Housing" which explores the neglected topic of women's involvement in tenant associations and other public housing groups.

This is a groundbreaking book, but as the author asserts, there is much more research yet to be done. In aid of this she suggests dissertation topics and provides two resources in the appendices: an annotated list of more than 200 women whose names are found in local black newspapers, archives and bibliographic sources, and a list of Chicago Black Southside community organizations and their addresses, 1930-1960.

I'd recommend this engaging and highly readable book to those interested in Chicago history in general, and Women's or African American studies in particular. AfroAmericanHeritagedotcom

This is literally an indespensible book for anybody interested in Chicago history, because for once a book more or less ignores politicians, big business, and downtown and concentrates on neighborhoods, churches, and "the little people" without being pedantic, condescending, or Marxist. Each chapter covers one of the 15 neighborboods, and includes a narrative and a brief tour description. The book is almost 20 years old so is a little out of date, but is really worth getting a copy of if you can.