Kentucky Books

For those who plan on visiting the Red River Gorge for the first time as well as for those familiar with this natural treasure, Stone and Warne's new book is a valuable and enjoyable companion. It offers the reader pragmatic information on where to go and what to do, but it also gives more: a sense of love for the Gorge and its environs and gentle reminders to tread lightly and leave no trace in this much-loved and much-visited area.

I first found this book at my local library, and checked it out for the maximum renewal times just to absorb all the great details of the Cumberland Plateau. Now after buying my own copy I am wearing it out! The depth that Russ goes into and the wonderful insights into not only history, but hiking, camping, canoeing, and other outdoor activites make this book a must for any outdoor adventurer. The information he provided in this revised/updated version was very helpful in planning one of many vacations I will take in the Cumberland Plateau area in the future! Highly recommended!

This is an excellent book telling the story of how Floyd County, in the heart of Eastern Kentucky, was founded. Hundreds of families, along with their genealogies, are documented in the second half of the book. There are hundreds of photographs going as far back as the late 1800's. If you have family from this part of Kentucky and you like history, this book is excellent. From what I have been told by my aunt, Nancy E. Hackworth, people who knew the book was being put together were allowed to submit family history so it is a very accurate accounting. I don't have my own copy, but I treasure the copy my aunt has on her coffee table.

Although this book was published more than 60 years ago -- and has been updated several times since then -- it is THE PLACE to begin if you are curious about Kentucky's fascinating -- and often tragic -- history. Although "A New History of Kentucky" is more current and is quite good, Clark's book is essential for understanding the Bluegrass State and how it has evolved. Clark's book also gives you a deeper appreciation of "A New History" and helps you understand some of the finer points of that book as well. Clark is a first-rate historian, but he also is a wonderful story-teller as well. He weaves a compelling story about Kentucky as a place full of optimism, corruption, idealism and missed opportunity. He captures some of the commonwealth's more colorful figures without deifying anyone or losing focus. Trying to understand Kentucky without reading Clark is not unlike trying to comprehend Rome without reading Gibbon or England without reading Churchill.

I gotta say that I enjoyed reading this and an excerpt I got from another piece of writing done by the author. I'm amused when I read about my ancestors getting kicked out of the church for a fightin' and a cursin', only to be let back in a couple of months later. It's neat to see that my ancestor was a founding member of a frontier church. I even found many ancestors' names that I couldn't find other records, like marriages, deeds, birth records, census, etc. Too bad I can't find out more about those folks. Good thing my church now isn't that strict! I saw an awful lot of entries for ancestors who "refused to hear the church" and were tattled on for drinking and fighting.

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Hitler and Spain is a very good book and is also very well researched. After reading it, I learned about many events and key people in the Spanish Civil War that I was not aware of prior to reading Hitler and Spain. Also, the footnotes at the end of the book are very well documented and are worth taking a look at. Dr. Whealey, if you are reading this in Athens Ohio, my hat is off to you for writing such a wonderful book. I am very excited about your new book on the American intervention in kosovo coming out this year.

This is the definitive account of the fake Hitler diaries: how a small-time con man (and talented amateur artist), Konrad "Connie" Kujau, wrote the diaries; how he flimflammed Gerd Heidemann, a reporter for "Stern" with "a Nazi bug" (as his colleagues called him) into buying them for hundreds of thousands of marks; how "Stern" came to publish the diaries; and how the fraud was exposed.

Hilton's account of the backstabbing world of fakes and fakers cannot be improved. Kujau flimlammed Heidemann out of greed; Heidemann, desiring to become world-famous, lied to "Stern" about the origin of the diaries; "Stern", in turn, lied to Trevor-Roper and other experts it consulted in order to make sure they get a "genuine" verdict, and dishonestly tried to force Murdoch to raise the price he previously agreed to pay for publication rights; Murdoch, for his part, lied to everybody by claiming--after the diaries were exposed as fakes--that the reason he didn't buy the rights was that he suspected forgery. Hilton notes, for example, that Heidemann and Kujau once made a swap: one of Goering's greatcoats for a rare Hitler watercolor... both fake. (One wonders: when a cheater cheats a cheater as the other cheater cheats him back, is there a crime committed?)

This account is worth the price of the book all by itself, but, in addition, Hilton presents us with a crash course on evaluating the authenticity of historical documents in general, and Nazi memorabilia in particular, as well as an amusing account of historical fakers who preceded Kujau. He notes the gullbility of "experts" and proves his case with amusing anecdotes, such as the history professor who bought from Vrain Lucas (a 19th-century forger whose career mirrored that of Kujau in many ways) documents allegedly by Plato and Cleopatra signed "Platon" and "Cleopatra"--that is, the way their name is written in modern French.

If you have any interest in the Hitler diaries at all, this is the book to get.

(See 1998 edition--which is vigorously in print.)

HOLLYWOOD AS HISTORIAN is a widely-used
textbook with essays from the silent era
to Vietnam. In a world fascinated by the
connections between culture and movies, it
is a perfect launch pad for students and
general readers. (Be sure to get the 2nd
edition, published in 1998.)

This collection places the following films
in a cultural context:
The Birth of a Nation (1915)
The Plow That Broke the Plains (1936)
The River (1937)
Three by Chaplin: City Lights(1931),
Modern Times (1936),The Great Dictator (1941)
The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
Wilson (1944)
The Negro Soldier (1944)
The Snake Pit (1948)
On the Waterfront (1954)
Dr. Strangelove (1964)
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?(1966)
Apocalypse Now (1979)

The book closes with a review of sources of
print and video materials.

This book is a classic of its kind and is
used in classrooms across the country. Yet
it is good reading for anyone serious about
the study of motion pictures in relation to
American Studies. A new edition came out in 1998 and is in ready availability.

More information about underlining methodology at this address:

www.filmandhistory.org

Films in one way or another are a mirror for their culture in which they're made. They show who we are, who we want to be, what we're afraid we are. We do the same thing with our citizen kings: the presidents of the United States. This superb book looks at how Hollywood has looked at our presidents and thus how Hollywood has looked at us. Anyone interested in film or history will find this a fascinating look at America.

A fascinating book for everyone! I learned so much!