Louisiana Books

We travel to and through Louisiana quite a bit. Because of this, I tend to pick up books about Louisiana, particularly Louisiana history. I bought this book because I liked the pictures. However, once I began reading this book, I realized that there was much more to the cemeteries than interesting statues. I can honestly say that I enjoyed reading this book and found it as informative as it was interesting.

This book begins with an introduction about cemeteries in Louisiana and then covers different cemeteries in Louisiana. Generally there is a history of the cemetery, an accounting of some of the more famous people buried in each cemetery and a lot of information.

For someone visiting Louisiana, particularly someone who is considering a tour of the cemeteries, this book is a must.

Filled with lovely photographs, this book is both entertaining and educational. It gives a brief history of the whys and wherefores of the burial practices in southern Louisiana, as well as describing how the tombs are cared for in the present. It also makes a great guide, if one is planning to visit the cemeteries in and around New Orleans. Easy to read, but never insulting to one's intelligence, this book gives a fascinating view of the cities of the dead.

I would never have went to New Orleans without visiting at least one of the famous above ground cemeteries - I was not disappointed! The history behind them is fascinating. They're built above ground, so that when there is any kind of flooding, the bodies don't float away since New Orleans is 700?ft below sea level. What was really neat to me though, is that one tomb, could and would be used for many generations of the same family. I thought it was a comforting thought to know that you wouldn't be burried alone, but in the exact same place as your ancestors. I think New Orleans people celebrate death, not that they're glad someone is gone, but that they're glad they had the chance to live and love them! There is just a kind of magic about the cemeteries, especially St. Louis #1, the oldest cemetery in the area. The photo's in this book capture that magic! Unfortunately, the section on #1 is small. This book includes many of the cemeteries including St. Louis 2 and 3, and Metairie, which is one of the nicest and most [costly] ones. I highly recommend this book for it's information and photography! If you go to see #1, it is in a not-so-good crime area that is improving, but make sure you go with a tour! The tour guides always have some interesting extra info!

I was very pleased with this book and read it from cover to cover.Besides having a fascinating text it's loaded with beautiful pictures, including a set of pictures of Anne Rice doing a publicity shoot in one of New Orleans's cemeteries.I really wasn't that familiar with the history of the burial grounds in New Orleans and I learned a LOT from this book. I would strongly recommend it to anyone who's into cemeteries, funeral history, and Anne Rice!

Rob Florence's book is hands-down the best book on New Orleans cemeteries I have found--and, believe me, I've looked. I'm researching cemeteries. Not only is there tons of information, but he has also included personal stories of people who have loved ones entombed as well as of some who are entombed. I had the pleasure of meeting Rob Florence recently, and he is a walking and talking encyclopedia of knowledge. If you're taking a trip to New Orleans, sign up now to take one of his tours through Historic New Orleans Tours. You won't be disappointed. Before you do that, though, BUY THIS BOOK to take along with you!

this book should prove useful for readers looking for a well-written, intelligent, and accessible introduction to this often very difficult and enigmatic thinker. hollingdale tackles head on many common misconceptions of nietzsche (i.e. that he was a nihilist, an anti-semite, a fascist) through the use of extensive quotes and poignant commentary. we see the development of his thought, from his youthful admiration of wagner and schopenhauer, through to his mature explications of the idea of life as will to power, and the theme of eternal recurrence. for the disciplined student this book proves to be of great value as well, offering insights into the personality of the man himself, through numerous letters and recollections from those who knew him most intimately. this is a great biography, respectful and humane, but also willing to acknowledge nietzsche's shortcomings and possible confusions as to his own state of mind and health.

Anyone interested in a lucid,fair,nonsense and distortion-free overview of Nietzsche's writings and life could do no better than to start here.Hollingdale avoids what the usual crowd of Nietzsche biographers and explainers and interpreters stumble over.Here you will not find the deconstructionist nonsense of Gilles Deleuze or the turning of Nietzsche into a contradictor of his own writings a la Heidegger.Perhaps no philosopher in history has had so many bad advocates and screeching and intentionally misleading and misinterpreting critics as Nietzsche.So much fetid,vapid and idiotic writing has enveloped Nietzsche that it threatens to destroy the philosopher altogheter.The future of Nietzsche scholarship needs many more individuals like R.J. Hollingdale if one of the most profound,original and critically important figures of the modern world is to be given proper justice.More importantly the public sorely needs to have the means to better understand why this philosopher is the axis on which all philosophy of the last century turns.Most of what Nietzsche wrote is still terribly misunderstood and reviled for no good reason.Hollingdale is one of the few,but hopefully the beginning of a flood of well thought out,accurate and sober scholars who will help integrate this most fascinating and courageous philosopher into our public discourse and common knowledge.

Hollingdale worked side by side with the dean of all Nietzsche scholars, Walter Kaufmann, for many years. His biography of Nietzsche parallels Kaufmann's groundbreaking study "Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist", a watershed in American Nietzsche scholarship. While Kaufmann's work has been eclipsed (see R. Schacht's "Nietzsche") in terms of philosophical sophistication, Holligdale's biography of Nietzsche remains the very best in detail, breadth, cogency, and intimacy. Its style is unobtrusive and flowing, making it easily accessible to both the everyday reader and the student of the history of ideas. It is indispensible to anyone with even the slightest interest in Nietzsche.

Hollingdale's biography/analysis of Nietzsche and his philosophy was an unexpected delight. I had already read Walter Kaufmann's translations of Nietzsche's major works when I came upon Hollingdale's volume; expecting little, I was amazed at the additional insights the author offered into Nietzsche's thought and world outlook. I would recommend this book to anyone who is new to Nietzsche - who would like to learn something of his philosophy, but who has held back because they feel Nietzsche, and perhaps, philosophy in general, is too remote or difficult.
Believe me, Hollingdale's volume will usher you, gently, into Nietzsche's world, and make you hungry for more. Nietzsche, himself, in "Thus Spake Zarathustra" had his protaganist announce, "I am the railing by the rushing torrent - grasp me if you can; your crutch I am not!" Like Nietzsche, Hollingdale does not seek disciples -- he explains the basic concepts of Nietzsche's philosophy with cool detachment, and offers them to the reader as a launchpad from which the reader can, if he/she wishes, soar, exploring Nietzsche's world for themselves, drawing their own conclusions. Nietzsche, the enemy of blind adherence, would have heartily approved such an approach. This is the man who said, "if you wish to strive after peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you wish to be a disciple of truth, then inquire!" Enjoy the Journey!

Anyone interested in a lucid,fair,nonsense and distortion-free overview of Nietzsche's writings and life could do no better than to start here.Hollingdale avoids what the usual crowd of Nietzsche biographers and explainers and interpreters stumble over.Here you will not find the deconstructionist nonsense of Gilles Deleuze or the turning of Nietzsche into a contradictor of his own writings a la Heidegger.Perhaps no philosopher in history has had so many bad advocates and screeching and intentionally misleading and misinterpreting critics as Nietzsche.So much fetid,vapid and idiotic writing has enveloped Nietzsche that it threatens to destroy the philosopher altogheter.The future of Nietzsche scholarship needs many more individuals like R.J. Hollingdale if one of the most profound,original and critically important figures of the modern world is to be given proper justice.More importantly the public sorely needs to have the means to better understand why this philosopher is the axis on which all philosophy of the last century turns.Most of what Nietzsche wrote is still terribly misunderstood and reviled for no good reason.Hollingdale is one of the few,but hopefully the beginning of a flood of well thought out,accurate and sober scholars who will help integrate this most fascinating and courageous philosopher into our public discourse and common knowledge.

Most people assume the war and Grant's strategy to end it, concluded on April 9, 1865 with Lee's surrender of the Army of Northern Virginia at Appomattox Court House. Not so. Appomattox closed Eastern Theater operations only. On the first day of April, Richmond claimed sovereignty over an area that stretched from Texas to Virginia. After Appomattox there remained then, significant, intact, active forces in North Carolina, Alabama and Trans-Mississippi, all of which still needed to be subdued.

Out of the Storm is the story of the final months of the Civil War when Grant's grand strategy to end the conflict is executed with impunity and in detail. The author details Appomattox, the completion of Sherman's amazing march culminating with the surrender of Joe Johnston in North Carolina, and Wilson's relentless sweep through central Alabama and Georgia including his ultimate capture of Confederate President Jefferson Davis. After Appomattox and despite Lincoln's assassination, the Southern Confederacy came apart like a house of cards. As a result of Grant's overall strategy, Union troops, it seemed, were on the move everywhere. Mopping up operations were conducted with efficiency and dispatch. Mobile and south Alabama fall, Charleston surrenders, Union prisoners are freed, Galveston is occupied, Texas is subdued, Lincoln is buried and the South is subsequently partitioned into 5 conquered Military Districts.

With the end of active combat operations the unremitting blood lust finally abates. During the war over 600,000 soldiers, 5% of the US prewar population, die. The nation emerges with whole generations of men missing, with the majority of the South's industrial sector, agriculture, railroads and ports decimated. But through it all one uniquely American trait shows through. At the end, there were over a million Union soldiers under arms and by the end of summer only something like 50,000 remained. Union forces were by far the largest, best trained, equipped and most practiced professional Armed Forces in the world. Demobilization was so rapid and so swift, men were returned to peace so quickly, Europe was thunderstruck.

The war was over and the end came more rapidly than anyone could have imagined. It also cost more, in terms of personal sacrifice, than we today will likely ever realize.

The end of any war or battle usually concludes with a whimper and is always messy and never pretty. So does the great American Civil War. As the sound of the guns died away the cleanup began. Mr. Trudeau's concise history of the conclusion of the American Civil War is an excellent synoptical overview of those chaotic times. It is by far the best history of how the Civil War actually ended and what happened after the fighting stopped.
Mr. Trudeau examines what happened after the Generals went home and answers many nagging questions like: What did the Confederate Government do? Where did Jefferson Davis go? What happened to all the soldiers once the guns fell silent? Who was the last soldier killed and what happened to all the major participants? So many questions, and Mr. Trudeau does a good job of answering them all. The history also examines many of the controversies that seemed to plague the War's ending. The Warren-Sheridan flap was noteworthy.
All in all an excellent history of a topic not generally covered. Many think the Civil War concluded with General Robert E. Lee's surrender at Appomattox, not so. Battles continued and the sound of the guns did not conclude until the battle of Palmito Ranch, May 13, 1865. When the last volley was fired, LTC David Branson of the 62nd U.S.C.T. simply said, "That winds up the war." And so the fighting stopped, but then the hardest part began: reuniting the Union and healing the wounds of a battle scared nation. It would not be easy but nothing difficult ever is. The soldiers had done their glorious duty now the politicians had to do their difficult work. The fighting was over now America must move on: And move on the unified nation did.
Highly recommended for anyone interested in America's Civil War. A good solid windup to the end of that most difficult time. The best overview book on this subject - 5+ stars.

The Civil War did not end at Appomattox or Bentonville but dragged on for several months. This is the only book that covers those months, the men, battles and the surrender. The author writes well and keeps us interested even though we know that this is all in vain. The battle of Palmito Ranch could be the saddest battle history you will ever read. "When Johnny comes marching home" is an excellent chapter on what happened to the men that fought the war, something we all to often do not have. Including this keep s the war from being an isolated instance but shows it to be part of their lives.

I have all of the author's books but chose this and "Like Men of War" to be signed.

In School, books, and TV it's ingrained that the Civil War began with the First shot at Fort Sumter, and ended in April of 65 with the surrender of Lee, and the Death of Lincoln. However, at the ending of April and beginning of May the Confederates may have been on the run, but the government was still in function with Davis on the move but still the President - Johnston was still somewhat of a threat, and Kirby Smith still had a hold in Texas. This book wonderfully explains those last months to June, not April of 1865. I recommend this book highly, and another writer states that "The Long Surrender" surpassed this book. Well, in some sense both of these books cover the same time period, but I think both book are excellent. In "Out Of The Storm," the focus is on the remaining holdouts beginning April 1st 1865. In "The Long Surrender" is a fascinating tale of the collapse of the confederate government, and the escape of Davis and his cabinet, even when it seemed all was lost, Davis still had hope of making it to Texas - Both books are different enough and interesting enough that I would recommend both books.

"Out of the Storm" is a good account of the last months of the Civil War, that is unfortunately eclisped by Burke Davis's superior "The Long Surrender," which covers much of the same ground, but provides a better historical perspective. Andre Trudeau focusses on the three month period April-June 1865, carrying the narrative of the War from the fall of Richmond to the last skirmish in Texas (a Confederate victory). Along the way, he retells many important stories that seem lost to history, like the Sultana explosion, the deadliest naval disaster in U.S. history than claimed the lives of nearly 1700 people, most of them returning Union POWs. Overall, this is an interesting historical account that should appeal to those with an interest in the Civil War.

I can only echo the previous reviews! This cookbook was given to me as a gift 30 years ago when I was living in New Orleans. It is tattered and torn and my most cherished cookbook. Everything is wonderful. I have just ordered two copies for friends.

This, my most treasured cook book, was a gift from my beloved New Orleans mother-in-law in 1972, the year I began law school at Tulane. I know for a fact the Garden District and Uptown Junior Leaguers submitted these recipes from their fantastic family cooks and from the "back room" at Antoines. With these can't- fail recipes, you can prepare incomparably authentic and delicious New Orleans cuisine. I live in California now, and last night I did the Plantation Cookbook's extraordinary crayfish etouffe' with whole, frozen crayfish I found at Ikea of all places!

This cookbook has lived in my kitchen for over 12 years and has survived several moves and a flood. It provides excellent recipes for classic New Orleans and South Louisiana cuisine. The directions are easy to follow and the variety of recipes will never leave you without choices of what to have for dinner - be it a family affair or a formal occassion. Also, you can find the ingrediants for most of the recipes regardless of where you live. I've made my favorite dishes while living in four different states. (don't miss the recipe for banana-nut bread)

This cookbook provides the foundation for more recent cookbooks that feature New Orleans style cuisine. And as previously noted, it also gives you a wonderful description of many famous Louisiana plantations and New Orleans homes.

I gave this book to my future sister-in-law for a shower present. I love it. I have made many of the receipes.

Every single recipe in here is perfect. I have made about 95% of the dishes and if you follow the recipe exactly your dinner party will be a smash!

The collaborative effort of Linda and Steve Bauer, "Recipes From Historic Louisiana" is a compilation of recipes drawn from the head chefs of forty-eight popular restaurants and dining establishments from Louisiana and ranging from Alexandria, through Evangeline Country, to venerable New Orleans. Embellished with fascinating stories combined with savory 'kitchen cook friendly' recipes that can transform ordinary meals into culinary delights, "Recipes From Historic Louisiana" showcases dishes that range from Bronzed Stake with a Gingersnap Gravy (K-Paul's Louisiana Kitchen); to Barbecue Rib-Eye (Dickie Brennan's Stakehouse); to Trout Meuniere Amandine (Galatoire's); to Gumbo Ya-Ya (Commander's Palace); to Spiced Butternut Squash Soup (Mabry House). For a 'kitchen cook friendly' collection of authentic Louisiana cuisine, add Linda and Steve Bauer's "Recipes From Historic Louisiana" to your cookbook shelf! Also very highly recommended is the Bauer's companion collection, "Recipes From Historic America: Cooking & Traveling With America's Finest Hotels".

Linda and Steve Bauer cooked up a big 'ole gumbo pot of the best of Louisiana cuisine. Their timing was a divine appointment as they may have unknowingly preserved precious cultural treasures in the wake of Katrina. Bravo!

This is one of the best cookbooks that I have ever bought It is full a great recipes and beautiful pictures. Linda and Steve Bauer had done an excellent job on this book.

Fara Raines

I recently received a couple of books, and Ms. Bauer's was in the stack. After I skimmed it, I called a friend and started talking about the recipes as well as New Orleans in general. An hour later I realized we were STILL talking about her cookbook!

Bottom Line: I consider Top Ramen a food group and I was enthralled. Anyone with even a slight interest in cooking or New Orleans will be extremely pleased with this offering.

New Orleans has always, until Hurricane Katrina, been first and foremost famous for its food and restaurants. Recipes from Historic Louisiana is a collection of 120 favorite dishes from chefs at 48 of Louisiana's most famous restaurants. The history, stories and 130 full-color beautiful photographs combine with the recipes to enable you to recreate this incredible cuisine at home. The book is interesting in of itself for its historical content and the recipes are great.

I served the Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Bananas and Vanilla from G. W. Fins restaurant at a recent dinner party and received several requests for the recipe.

The authors present easy-to-follow instructions for all the famous Creole and Cajun dishes that will bring back fond memories of New Orleans for those familiar with the Crescent City. And even if you've never been there, you'll have a hard time trying to decide which recipe to try first.

Some of my favorite recipes from the book are Bananas Foster French Toast, Pesto Cheesecake, Slow Roasted Brisket, and Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Bananas and Vanilla. If you've ever been to Louisiana, or are familiar with its cuisine, you'll love this book. I haven't been there in over 20 years and Recipes from Historic Louisiana was a real stroll down memory lane, in addition to being a cookbook that you'll want to have. The book is beautiful, the recipes are sublime, and a portion of the proceeds from the sale of this book will benefit the National Trust for Historic Preservation Hurricane Relief Fund.

I have all of the River Road books and this one is the best of the series. It is not only beautiful, with colorful picture, but it has a durable hard cover to sustain a long life. I can't wait to try the wonderful recipes inside.

This is my new favorite cookbook. Everything I have made from it has been wonderful. I especially love the recipes for crawfish pie, pecan praline bacon and spinach salad sandwiches. Plus it is a beautiful book. This is a must for all Southern cooks!

I came into this marriage with a husband who had his own river road cookbooks. And a mother-in-law on the committee.... (who hates to cook- guess???) and I LOVE the first, despite the plastic comb, like the second, really appreciated the 3rd, (but healthy and cookbook don't go that well together), and this is a beauty.

I LOVE the hardback, killer format. The photos, and ESPECIALLY the stories. But come on you guys, it is starting to really LOSE the regional flavor that made the first so great. And ASIAN??? I mean, yes, you can get great Asian food almost anywhere now, but I buy regional cookbooks for the regional flair- thus knocked off one of the stars...

what I REALLY WANT to see is a 'BEST OF RIVER ROAD' with all the glitz of the last cookbook, and all the HEFT (number of regional recipes, I have enough Lasagna thanks very much) of the first.... PLEASE

This new River Road Recipes is absolutely beautiful! The pictures are gorgeous and the text reads like a Louisiana traveloge. The recipes are new and current but still reflect the types of food people like to eat in Louisiana. Not the same old gumbo recipes but no weird ingredients you have to look up either. We are loving it.

This is a truly wonderful cookbook. It looks beautiful, is laid out well, and most importantly, has lots of terrific recipes. The recipes are not difficult, the ingredients are generally easy to find, and yet they all have that special flare that great southern cooks are known for. I'm buying a second copy to give to my sister-in-law. It is a great addition to your cookbooks and makes a great gift.

Does "Scottsboro: A Tragedy of the American South" need any more 5-star reviews to convince readers that it may just be the best historical account of an American tragedy ever written? More than seventy years have passed since nine blacks were wrongfully accused of raping two white women on board an Alabama freight train and the event still rings in the ears as if it happened yesterday. Professor Dan T. Carter has remained the preeminent expert on the Scottsboro case for more than thirty years and his extensive research is evident in this book. Never dry or dull, Professor Carter guides the reader through a harrowing story that must be read to be believed. If you're not familiar with the Scottsboro case and its important role in American and more essentially pre-Civil Rights history, this should be the first book on your list. I also recommend James Goodman's superbly written "Stories of Scottsboro" and Quentin Reynolds' "Courtroom," the biography of Scottsboro defense attorney Samuel S. Leibowitz.

Too often books come and go, getting barely a mention, then fading into obscurity. Others, such as University of South Carolina Professor Dan Carter's 'Scottsboro', make reading both a blessing and a curse. To elaborate, this is not the sort of book one can read and not bite your tongue at the profound tragedy that marked the Scottboro trials and their legacies. You will shake your head in disbelief, want to argue, and, ultimately feel your blood pressure rise on more than a few occasions.

Carter's prose is excellent, well reasoned, masterful. His sources are tremendous, though one needs to consult his dissertation (UNC-Chapel Hill) for the complete listing. In the revised edition an interesting conclusion to the final proceedings is included, lacking none of the dramatics and eccentricities of the original trials decades before.

'Scottsboro' cannot be recommended highly enough. This is history written the way it was should be.

It is hard to imagine that such an terrible injustice could have occured in a country that prides itself on "justice for all." Dan Carter does a meticulous job in presenting us with one of the most engaging and informative books on the Scottsboro case I have ever read. As a pre-law and African-American history student I was thoroughly impressed and I recommend it to anyone regardless of their interests.

I love reading history books, especially when they read like a novel. Carter has produced a detailed account of this nearly forgotten episode in American History and he has done it with so much energy that one can not help but be swept up in his telling of the story. He traces the episode from its hobo origins. A freight train that carried two women and several black young men was stopped. The women, when taken from the train accused all the black men of rape and from here the stories of these rail riders takes off. Working with facinating material, the segregation of the deep South, the idea of a woman's honor, the Communist and NAACP rivalry over the case, the Jewish NYer who comes to represent the boys, the racist judges and the status quo governor and the one judge who martyrs his carreer to stand up for what he believes is right,Carter shows that the tale of Scottsboro is stranger than fiction. Not only is the story itself excellent, but Carter also brings the story up to date. For anyone interested in this time period, this is a must read!

Dan Carter has done a superb job in this study of the miscarriage of justice that took place in the Alabama of the 1930's. His picture is so complete and enlightening and he has attacked all the issues from all sides. If you want to get a very different picture of the atrocities capable in the U.S. of the 20th Century, read this book. I could say so much more.....

Lawrence Powell set out to write a book about the David Duke phenomenon, about how a KKK leader and Nazi could sit in the Louisiana legislature and run for the U.S. Senate as a Republican. But work on the book took him in another direction after he interviewed Anne Levy, a Holocaust survivor who confronted Duke in the state capital. Captivated by Levy's story, Powell has produced a terrifying, poignant and finally a triumphant book about the Holoaust as witnessed through the life of one of its survisors, Anne Levy.

Troubled Memory is a beautifully written and tender account of a personal story that stands as an intimate history of Hitler's final solution. Powell's prose will carry you into the Warsaw and Lodz ghettos and into the vegetable bin where 6-year-old Anne and her sister hid from the SS. This is a book that makes the Holocaust relevant to every reader. It will fill you with horror and wonder, and it will move you to tears.

I am a student at Tulane University and have taken a seminar with Dr. Powell on the Holocaust. This book is the last book that he included on the syllabus for the course, and I understand fully how and why he wrote this book. At first I was a bit leery of his inclusion of his own work in the course, but the work is a great synthesis of traditional Holocaust study and how it pertains to American (particularly Southern) culture today.

The first half of the book largely provides a survey through a personal account of the sociopolitical landscape of World War II-era Eastern Europe: the reasons that the Holocaust occurred, bystanders, perpetrators and victims psychological profiles, as well as giving a very readable human interest story of the narrative of this one particular family. The second half picks up where most Holocaust narratives leave off: the post-war years, the family's emigration to America and the challenges that they faced in New Orleans as Holocaust Survivors, and finally, Anne Levy's battle against David Duke and the formation of the Louisiana Coalition against Nazism and Racism. The first half of the book is essential for understanding her drive in the second half of the book, and Dr. Powell does an excellent job in connecting traditional and new scholarship on just how frighteningly close Louisiana came to David Duke's authority and how important it is to be aware of the ideals that the Louisiana Coalition and Anne Levy espouse.

This book is written in a highly readable manner: the diction is not overly dense nor confusing and the personal story allows non-scholars to enjoy the material as much as a student of history or politics would. It is very obvious that Dr. Powell put an immense amount of personal effort and dedication into this account, and his contribution to the historical documentation of the Holocaust and its impact on contemporary society is a testimony to his skill as a historian.

Troubled Memory is the story of the Skorecki family, which survived the Hoocaust by escaping from the Warsaw Ghetto and going into hiding, intertwined with an accessible history of the Warsaw Ghetto. But is is also the story of Anne Skorecki Levy, 45 years later and transplanted to Louisiana, deciding that she doesn't want Klansman and Holocaust denier David Duke to become the governor of her state. On all three counts - as a tale of survival during the Holocaust, a history of that time and place and the story of little Anne Levy's dogged pursuit of the bigshot politician during his election campaign - the book reads like a taut thriller, a real page-turner from beginning to end.
In its linking of the Holocaust in Poland with the troubled racial history of the American South, Troubled Memory is reminiscent of Styron's Sophie's Choice - except that this is fact, not fiction. It's a compelling, genre-busting book that is not quite like anything you've read, and it leaves you both feeling good and with much to think about.

This story chronicles the survival of small Jewish girls who were hidden in an armoire by their desperate parents in the closing days of the Warsaw ghetto. It easily matches the personal resonance and innocent terror of the far more famous Anne Frank Story.

Even after their final liberation as perhaps the only intact nuclear family to survive that infamous ghetto, the Skorecki family was due one more date with history. Survival, it turns out, was the story within the story. Little Anne Skorecki Levi, the little girl who survived by staying silent inside that armoire struck a blow five decades later for Jewish survival by speaking out against Louisiana's Neo-Nazi gubernatorial candidate David Duke, and helping to engineer his electoral defeat.

This account of Anne's travel along the arc from victim to victor is an inspiration and a reminder that each of us can and must preserve our collective memory, however troubling.

I read books on the Holocaust to try to understand the times, the mileu, the horror, and the suffering. After more than 20 books, I realize that I can only scratch the surface. I will, however, never stop reading because of my fear that someday the deniers and the downgraders might get the upper hand.

Thank you to the the author and Anne Skorecki Levy for relating a story that is very, very moving as well as insightful and timely.

I was surprised that this item was once owned by a library, I hope it wasn't a book that someone forgot to return. Other than that it is a very interesting book.

We as Freemen describes details and history of Plessy vs. Ferguson that my history books had overlooked,,,and I was an American history student in college. We as Freemen is an effective lesson in race relations, legal history, Supreme Court history, Reconstruction history. The reader knows the outcome of Plessy vs. Ferguson case, but the book reads with a compelling story up to the fateful decision. The characters don't know what will happen, and Mr. Medley describes the Supreme Court changes that they must consider,,,you almost forget the historical outcome and keep reading to find out what happened. A scholarly read that I recommend to anyone who enjoys history or period books. With the pending changes at Supreme Court right now,,,this is surprisingly relevant right now.

"We As Freemen" is a book that reminds us that the names impressed on our court cases were people with professions, families and all of the messy problems of ordinary life. The author draws on original documentation to illustrate the pains of the free and newly free Black populace as they watched their liberties curtailed or removed entirely. It was interesting to read the precise legal choices of the Comite des Citoyens as they moved to ensure that the charges against Plessy be properly drawn (This was reminiscent of Taylor Branch's "Parting the Waters"). The text is clear and dramatic. It could easily serve both as a warning of how freedom is lost and as encouragement for anyone seeking a roadmap for change.

I enjoyed this book so much that I read it in about 6 hours. Medley provided tremendous insight that helped to explain the context in which the case unfolded. Oddly, the descendents of some of the players are still alive and well in Louisiana. Fortunately, so is the fight for equality and justice!

This book was the perfect read on the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education.

Long before Rosa Parks refused the disrespectful order
to go to the back of the bus in Montgomery, Alabama,
came Homer Plessy, the young shoemaker who knew he'd be
arrested for refusing to leave the "whites only" car on
the New Orleans railroad. He refused to go to the
segregated car in order to make the point that the law
was cruel and unjust. A federal case was made of it,
and in the end, the US Supreme Court made segregation
the law of the land for the next 53 years. The high
court ruled that "separate but equal" was fair and
equitable but history has proven there was nothing fair
nor equal about that decision. History also proves
there was no justice in that high court opinion and no
wisdom or sense of human rights residing with the
Justices who issued it.

In "We as Freemen," Keith Medley uncovers the rich and
intriguing history of the personalities who fought for
equality 30 years after the Civil war ended, but
generations before U.S. rulers ended legal
discrimination based on skin color. In carefully
crafted prose, the author is apparently the first
researcher to explore the character, mores and lives of
the long forgotten men of the Comité des Citoyen
(Committee of Citizens) who planned and carried out the
peaceful challenge to Louisiana's Separate Car Act of
1890. Homer Plessy did not suddenly challenge
segregation. In a story well-told, Medley turned up
primary research found in dusty nooks and crannies, and
church, library and cemetery logs around New Orleans,
which is his hometown. He describes the efforts of
businessmen, lawyers, educators, and artisans to stop
segregation from taking hold in the South. They
conducted their campaign while the forces of reaction
were regaining political control after the Civil War.
The Comité aimed "to obtain a United States Supreme
Court ruling preventing states from abolishing the
suffrage and equal access gains of the Reconstruction
period that followed the Civil War."

Medley manages to summon Homer Plessy from the
obscurity Jeremy Irons identifies in his "A People's
History of the Supreme Court" (Penguin: 1999) with new
research that portrays Plessy as a quiet, hardworking
man anxious not to be treated disrespectfully because
of his heritage and skin color.

Like the U.S. Supreme Court's 1857 Dred Scott decision,
which barred slaves and their descendants from
citizenship, the high court's decision in Plessy vs.
Ferguson was demeaning and hurtful to millions of
people. The high court decision in Plessy divided the
population, causing widespread suffering. For this
reason, it is useful to recall the dark side of Supreme
Court history and to appreciate that the Justices are,
for better or worse, political appointees who often
press their own viewpoints, which tend also to
represent the narrow views of the class of politicians
who appoint them. Or as Irons put the Plessy decision
in context, amid growing strife "the Court remained a
bastion of conservatism, earning this banquet toast
from a New York banker in 1895: 'I give you, gentlemen,
the Supreme Court of the United States- -guardian of
the dollar, defender of private property, enemy of
spoliation, sheet anchor of the Republic.' "

In 1857 and again in 1896, the Supreme Court inflicted
upon the public the views of Southern plantation owners
and thuggish ideologues, a tiny but disproportionately
powerful part of the population.

In short order, the Comité "formulated legal strategy
while raising money from the neighborhoods of New
Orleans, small towns throughout the South, and in
cities as far away as Washington D.C. and San
Francisco" and published their views in the African-
American daily, The Crusader. Medley documents the
heroic role of The Crusader in the battle for human
rights in the humid South. The Comité held popular

rallies, and did all anyone can do within democratic
structures to organize resistance to the dark era of
ignorance spreading through the legislatures, town
halls and courtrooms controlled by rich white American
men across the South. (Women would wait another
generation to win the right to vote.) And, it would be
more than five long decades before the wrongs of the
high court's Plessy decision would be reversed, in part
due to arguments put forward by then lawyer Thurgood

Marshall to the high court sitting in 1954. Marshall
argued the case in conjunction with the re-awakening
across the land of the persistent struggle for Civil
Rights.

I highly recommend Keith Medley's "We as Freemen" and I
particularly like that he was able to locate
photographs portraying those who fought bravely but
lost a key round in the struggle for human rights.

Fritchey does a masterful job allowing the general public to view the deception that has gone on with so-called conservation organizations in the Gulf, and Atlantic, in order to achieve their selfish re-allocation objectives. From making commercial fishermen red herrings for the "alleged" slide in fishery stocks, to the ouright grab of resources for themselves, these allocation organizations have lied, perjured, and extorted the public's resources right out of the public's reach. In so doing, they have driven a wedge between the user groups, and deprived the non-fishing public access to the most regulated fishery resource in the world. Meanwhile, the marsh habitat that these resources depend on are being lost at an ever increasing rate daily. A truly spectacular job connecting the dots that have led to the ruin of many hard working, tax paying, American fishermen, and have left the marsh habitat they depend on in sad shape. Britton Shackelford

Wow, what a great book. It is sad that this is an account of true events. Unfortunately, these events are still taking place all over America's coastal states. Wherever Exxon's faux conservation group the Coastal Conservation Association shows up, they make it there mission to destroy the commercial fishing industry, and reallocate fish stocks to their wealthy membership. With Exxon's record profits and friends all the way to the white house it hasn't been hard for them to do. The argument the Coastal Conservation Association uses, is that more money is generated by wealthy sportfishers then by lowly commercial fishers and seafood consumers. Therefore all fish should be protected for their membership's exclusive enjoyment. Sounds simple, but this puts thousands of people out of work and denies the consumers their right to the fisheries resource.
This is truely a David and Goliath story. David being the inshore finfishermen whom represents the Free American Spirit that refuses to die and Goliath being Exxon who represents corprate greed.
Read this!
I Understand the sequel is being written as I type this. Can't wait for it to come out!!

I'm doing a research paper for english and I chose the net ban as a topic. My father used to be a commercial fisherman on the Florida coast. He was put out of business after the net ban was put into effect in 1995. He's always had theories about why the ban was passed. He read and loved the book Wetland Riders and with his information, and the facts I got from the book I was able to write a strong paper against the net ban. The book was great and was a lot of help. Anyone who's been affected by Net limitations in any state should read this book.

I'm Robert Fritchey, the author of "Wetland Riders." I fell in with South Louisiana's traditional coastal finfishermen in 1980, deciding after graduate school that I would earn my living only from renewable resources. A lifelong sport fisherman, my addiction to fishing and the outdoor life led me to the Bayou State's rapidly vanishing coastal marshes, where I earned my livelihood netting redfish and other wetland-dependent species of fish through the 1980s.

"As the 1980s opened, fishermen worked freely, under few restrictions other than those imposed by nature," I wrote in the book's preface. "But earning a living as an inshore finfisherman became progressively more difficult--and finally next to impossible. What happened?"

"Wetland Riders" details my own search for the answer to this question. But my interests were more than academic--in 1988, Louisiana's anglers--prodded by a Texas-based sportfishing organization which has since gone national--claimed the redfish for their own exclusive use. By taking the fish from us fishermen--and the seafood markets and restaurants--the sportsmen began to devalue Louisiana's threatened coastal wetlands. I wrote "Wetland Riders" as an educational tool, to circumvent a biased media and inform the public directly, as a prelude to getting back our fish.

Equipped with my experience as both a sport and commercial fisherman, I investigated the escalating fish fights between the recreational and food-producing industries which, I learned, were occurring around the coasts of America.

I also learned that the underlying cause of the sportsmen's aggression against our traditional seafood harvesters lies deeply embedded within our emotional human nature. In the book's introduction, I quoted a true sportsman, a Texan who-- in the 1930s--also sought to quell the destructive friction between these two environmentally important industries: "When the average sportsman sees a net fisherman make a good catch he is overcome in many cases with a feeling that must be experienced but cannot well be described." That feeling, unfortunately, is envy, an emotion that can easily overpower rational thought.

The number of recreational fishermen began to steadily increase following World War II, and exploded during the 1980s and 1990s, as financially successful Baby Boomers and their children took up fishing. A critical mass of these anglers have proven more than willing to be organized into a political movement which imperils our domestic seafood industry.

As old Claude McCall--one of the 7 net fishermen that I profiled in "Wetland Riders"--explained, "There needs to be regulation, but not the kind we have now. The management that's being used now just tries to knock the commercial fisherman down. We'll wind up with almost no domestic production of seafood; it'll all be imported.

"How about if we get in a war and can't get imports? We'll have to eat steak, I guess."

In the chapter, "It's Not Me, It's Him!," I revealed that, "The collective impact of great numbers of recreational fishermen, each landing just a few fish, quickly adds up." Indeed, virtually every species of fish that is currently defined as "overfished" is being harvested by both recreational and commercial fishermen. And data presented in this chapter reveal that, in many fisheries, the recreational sector is responsible for harvesting a far larger slice of the pie than the food-producing sector!

As I investigated why this fact is not publicized, I described in "The `Con' in Conservation" the first attempt by a media conglomerate to expand their "educational program" beyond the sportsmen, to 30 million members of the general public. The campaign typified the recreational media's tactic of focusing blame on our family fishermen while avoiding any responsibility by sport fishermen.

In "The Recreational Fishing Industry: Something of Value?" I deconstructed the incredibly diverse recreational industry that is displacing our traditional commercial fisheries. Many of our commercial fisheries are centuries old, and predate recreational fisheries. They have achieved sustainability by merely harvesting fish which they send out to consumers in urban areas, thereby bringing only money into their rural communities. The tourism-based recreational industry, on the other hand, brings people into coastal communities which spurs coastal real-estate development.

The co-existence of both industries leads to a natural tension, a sort of two-party system where each "party" limits the impact of the other, though in different ways. As we go to a one-party system, the astute reader may envision the future of these old fisheries.

In "Conservation Through Use: Resource Management for the Twenty-First Century," I advocated sharing hotly-contested finfish species on an equitable basis, and cite the precedent for such an action. Upon the increased allocation of fish that commercial fishermen and consumers would receive, I proposed a per-pound severance tax. Inspired by the self-reliance, resourcefulness and optimism of our inshore fishermen, I suggested that taxes on our product be used to establish a local, sustainable source of revenue for a stewardship action fund dedicated to slowing the loss of fishery habitat.

As noted in the update to the book's second edition, "1998: New Players, Same Game," sportsmen in the mid-1990s benefited from a multimillion dollar national "fish crisis" campaign, which eerily failed to mention any negative impacts by the vast sportfishing industry. Amid that backdrop, well-heeled sportsmen demonized and outlawed nets, destroying some of the largest traditional food fisheries in the country, including Louisiana's.

Mr. Fritchey drew on his background as a commercial fisherman and his impressive skills as a researcher to put together this compelling story behind the story of the so-called "fish conservation" movement that's become so popular with the mass media today. In Wetland Riders he's exposed this blatant resource grab for what it really is; a well-coordinated and well-financed assault on the U.S. consumer's right to fisheries resources that belong to us all. From consumer to commercial fisherman to someone who enjoys the ambiance of coastal communities without boardwalks and amusement parks and tee shirt shops, if you have any connection to the seafood industry at all you owe it to yourself to read this book.