Michigan Books

I chose to read Big Annie of Calumet because it features a strong female protagonist, who dedicated a year of her life to working to improve the lives of her family and friends during the Industrial Revolution. She is not only a positive role model for young adults, but also her story is inspiring and interesting for all ages of readers. It is another reminder of those who gave so much so that we can live as comfortably as we do, which is the theme of the book. In 1913 Annie Clemenc, the wife of a Croatian miner, led copper mine strikers in Upper Michigan in daily protest demonstrations against unsafe working conditions, long hours and low pay. Her determination, courage and strength were aimed at the powerful Calumet and Hecla Mining Company. Annie was born in 1888, the oldest of five children, to George and Mary Klobuchar, who were immigrants from Croatia. Her father worked in the C & H Mines for thirty years and Mary worked as a cook and maid for a wealthy family. Annie graduated from a C & H school and became a church worker, who helped crippled miners. She also helped the family by doing laundry for other families. Even though they worked hard, there was no guarantee that there would be enough money for food and clothing. When she was eighteen, she married Joseph Clemenc, a Croatian miner. If Annie was lucky, she could earn fifty cents a day scrubbing floors and washing other people's clothing. She had grown up in poverty, living in a shack and wearing secondhand dresses. She would either continue to live in poverty or she would march against the people who kept her in poverty. "In the summer of 1913, she decided to march." The story is set against the backdrop of the Industrial Revolution and the author devoted the first chapter and much of this book to describing the struggle by the working class during that period in U.S. history. He explained that the number of immigrants to this country was the largest movement of people in history. He also explained that a small group of men gained control of the natural resources. Focusing on profit, these men seemed to forget the workers on whose backs they amassed great fortunes. He shows the reader how men, women and children worked ten to twelve hour days, sometimes seven days and week and earning less that ten dollars a week. Women and children averaged five dollars a week and they worked in unsafe conditions. The author tells how Big Annie marched daily against the giant C & H Mining Co. and provoked them to take several actions against the miners. The striking miners were opposed by the state militia, business owners in the town, which was run by the mining company, and by strikebreakers. They faced shootings and beatings and even the courts and gained international attention in the news media. You'll have to read this wonderful book to find out what happened, but it's a wonderful read and well worth your time! A great book for all aged readers! I give it five stars!

This is another good book on my hero Mr. William C. Durant the creator of GM. Mr. Durant defiantly affected the early automobile history more than any other one man ever. He was the worlds largest cart maker back in Flint Mi. & went on to save Buick from certain bankruptcy. Also creating GM with Buick as the cornerstone car & then adding Olds, Cadillac & Oakland (the forerunner to Pontiac) & many others that didn't pan out. He also started Chevrolet with his famous Buick race car driver Louis Chevrolet. Some other good reads are The Dream Maker 1979 by Bernard Weisberger and The Deal Maker by Axel Madsen 1999. Also some other really interesting info is the Durant website. Sincerely Lance Haynes President Durant Motors Automobile Club

Professor Wilcox's essential point is that Job does curse God. From this central idea he develops a new interpretation of the book. He convincingly argues that, by placing emphasis on the God's natural, beautiful, terrifying, and untameable world the book really is an attempt to undo and reform centuries of Judaic (and by implication Christian) theology.

This is by far the best analysis I have yet read on this important work. It is probably worth reading just for the explanation of why Job's daughters are given such special names and receive an inheiritance with their brothers. Of course there is much much more.

I would differ with the author only in a few respects. By way of criticism, it might be pointed out that he does not pay close enough attention to the mystical nature of the poems in Job ch. 38 et seq. (Clearly Job is experiencing a direct--hence mystical c.f. Blake and Scholem--encounter with God in chapter 38) Wilcox's reading of these verses tends to be a bit limited.

These marginal points aside, I reiterate my praise.

Two great experts on the history of the Sudan coordinated a fine study of the only time a force of regular African troops were deployed to the New World. Taking place during the French intervention in Mexico, this is the story of a battalion of Sudanese infantry who fought against Juarez and his Mexican patriots.

Hill and Hogg start off with a look at the Sudan during the first half of the 19th century. Then part of an Egyptian empire, they explain why these soldiers would be sent to Mexico, and how this impacted on Egypt's foreign relations.

The work covers a wide range of topics, ranging from recruitment, training, deployment, and combat. Also nice is a look at how the surviviors played important roles in the failing Egyptian empire of the 1870s-80s.

American, French, Egyptian, and Sudanese sources are employed. An interesting work that will proabaly never be surpased. Sadly, it was Richard Hill's last book.

This book is an encyclopedia listing some of the earliest African-American graduates from a large public university, namely the University of Michigan. Many readers would be surprised to learn that Black students were on the medical campus
in the 1880's, years before Brown versus the Board of Education.
Dr. Johnson conducted exhaustive research to pull together the details of the physicians included in this volume. Especially moving is the author's own tale of struggle and ultimately success after graduating from South Haven High School, attending Western Michigan University, then attending the University of Michigan Medical School after completing just 3 years of undergraduate study. Dr. Johnson and the other physicians described within the book are role models for current and further medical students of all races and backgrounds.

A MUST-HAVE for anyone interested in Black History or for people studying the history of minorities in the health care field.

This book gives an interesting and excellent account of not only the history of Cass County, MI, but also gives an insightful look at the beginings and funtions of the Underground Railroad, in which Cass County played a major role. It is estimated that 1 out of every 4 fugitive slaves passed through Cass County. Founded by Quakers, scorned in the south for their beliefs in the equality of men and opposition to slavery, Cass County became a rare, thriving, integrated community in the 1800's.

D.L. Moody once said: "Salvation is free, as free as the air we breath...". While it is true that the gospel is simple and that salvation is a free gift. Many proffesing Christians are mere proffesors, that is to say that their concept of salvation relies on the fact that they have "prayed" and "ask Jesus into their hearts", well meaning? hopefully yes, but at best it is not relying on Christ alone. This is an example of faith in faith, i.e. existensialism. What people need is faith in Christ, and in Him alone, void of any efforts, empty of self; through repentance from sin and faith in Christ, any sinner can have salvation. This book provides a good deal of ideas for evangelizing the lost, without the heresy of instant prayerism.

In this true story of a Mississippi sharecroppers' daughter who struggled to survive and overcome a less than adequate education, Blossom deserves the "never say never" award. Clearly, a less determined person would have fallen by the wayside. She shares the sorrow and rejection she experienced when her mother died, and well-meaning relatives identify all of the children they want to take in, except her. She shows pride, when her father flatly rejects all of their offers, letting them know "take all or none." It's amazing that this single parent household existed and thrived, long before the term "single-parent household" was popular. Blossom's father, withstanding harsh criticism, faced danger of losing his children to the state, no one can argue that this African American Man did an excellent job in raising his children. This remarkable young lady, referred to as "not being apt" goes on to finish high school, graduate from college and medical school, but not without overcoming seemingly unsurmountable odds. It's a great success story!

Author Fritz Stansell writes with a warmth, humanity, and humor that makes his memoir of the early years of Michigan's Blue Lake Fine Arts Camp a fascinating read. His tales of fire departments at cross purposes, a naked girl at his front door, his children making a movie of their "Crummy House," a maestro inching through the camp in the back seat of a cab and later being pushed aside by a food service worker whose office he had just used as a dressing room, were a few of the stories that made me laugh out loud. And the characters come alive: Gretchen, his wife, can do anything from washing a year's worth of dishes in a bathtub and raising a family to teaching teenagers to play string, brass, and woodwind instruments and running a world renown international program; Fr. Merek, a real life angel, never lets the camp down, even in its darkest hour when the dream was nearly lost; Ludolph Arens, Stansell's grandfather, an aristocratic, visionary, and somewhat eccentric leader of an early midwestern music colony, serves as the author's inspiration. You can't miss the themes of tenacity, love, courage, education (primarily the Stansells')-- and the book is also a how-to for anyone hoping to successfully run a non-profit.

Now THIS is what poetry can do! It's a bold move, writing a book of poetry about historical events (e.g., the Civil war, the Mexican war) that most of us encounter only through the deadening lens of battered high school textbooks -- and yet Francis offers one of the most human and immediate collections of poetry I've encountered in quite a while. She manages, through her keen eye and her empathy for her characters and her understanding of their voices, to make these long-dead, remote people (mostly the folks who never appear in the textbooks) fully alive, urgent, now. Even the famous people -- Lincoln, Taylor -- become more human in her hands. I was shattered by "A singular dispersion," horrified by "Linsey-Woolsey," wounded by the Detroit riots poems, stirred by "Walt Whitman reads to the limbless," moved by "The White Immensities," and on and on. These are great poems individually, and such a strong, strong collection altogether!