Wisconsin Books

As a 3 term legislator I can say that Loftus explains, in a very readable way, the art of politics. His description of a caucus, going door to door, appointing committees, is absolutely accurate. His stories of dealing with abortion, the NRA, etc, are exactly as they happen on a daily basis. This book is a must for anyone who wants to be involved with, and understand, politics.

In this booklet, Stan Gores tells the unusual story of the attempt on Theodore Roosevelt's life in 1912. John Schrank was the strange little man from New York who took it upon himself to kill Roosevelt. It is still the only time I know of when someone tried to kill a former President. After following Teddy through various states, Schrank finally shot his target in Milwaukee on October 14, 1912.

His main reason given for the shooting was his obsession with preventing any President from getting a third term in office. But Schrank also said, in effect, that President McKinley told him in a dream to do it. There is also evidence of a third motive.

Regardless, Roosevelt went on to deliver his scheduled speech that night in spite of his wound. He was subsequently transported out of Wisconsin and taken to a Chicago hospital to be treated for his injury. The bullet was never removed.

Schrank spent the rest of his life in two different Wisconsin mental hospitals. He was regarded as a model prisoner and died in 1943.

Mr. Gores tells this story quite effectively. Relevant photographs are also included in this booklet.

Aztalan: Mysteries Of An Ancient Indian Town is a quest to untangle ancient mysteries surrounding Aztalan, a place 50 miles west of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Who were the early indigenous people who once lived in Aztalan between AD 1050 and AD 1100, and why did they disappear? Written by expert archaeologist Robert Birmingham and anthropology professor Lynne Goldstein, and filled with black-and-white maps, drawings, and photographs of artifacts on almost every other page, Aztalan: Mysteries Of An Ancient Indian Town discusses the cultural landscape, the influence of the Mississippi River, and deductions concerning daily life in this ancient settlement. The text is documented and studious, without being stuffy or confusing. Enthusiastically recommended for students, professionals, lay readers curious about the field of Native American archaeology.

The collaborative effort of Jane and Scott Hall, Backroad Bicycling In Wisconsin: 28 Scenic Tours Through Lakes, Forests, And Glacier-Carved Countryside is a superbly organized and presented resource filled with maps, recommended routes, tips and tricks, and much more for avid cyclers, complete with information about terrain, where to find repairs and rentals, highlights of one's trips, and much more. Backroad Bicycling In Wisconsin is confidently recommended as being a truly first-rate, "user friendly" guide for avid Wisconsin cyclers.

Thanks to a abberation in drinking age laws between Minnesota and Wisconsin in the late 70s, I spent a GREAT deal of time in Wisconsin taverns in my late teens, so I consider myself something of an expert on the subject. This book is a fantastic, politically incorrect primer on the taverns of the land of cheese, beer and Packer fans. Come on - if you think of beer, Wisconsin automatically comes to mind, doesn't it? If you're somewhere else in America, say San Diego or Charlotte, and have never spent a frigid January Saturday night getting tipsy in a little hole-in-the-wall in the woods surrounded by earflapped yokels who have that "yah, shure!" accent just like in the movie "Fargo", this book is as close as you're gonna get. The pages bring you back to another time, before globalization and homogenization and satellite communication where "local flavor" (good or bad) actually meant something. It's obvious that this is a labor of love for the authors - they laugh along with you at the bizarre promotional ideas some of these taverns had, yet, deep down, you know they admired their threadbare earnestness. Each tavern a unique, flawed jem (well, OK, some are just plain rocks) with story after story. This is a natural for anyone interested in breweriana, Wisconsin, or a swig of the barley pop over the third Ole and Lena joke of the night - a classic!

Written by Wisconsin Almanac author and sports buff Jerry Minnich, Badger Sports: Trivia Teasers presents more than six hundred trivia questions about the athletics tradition at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Covering hockey, football, men's and women's basketball, and almost every sport from rowing to wrestling, Badger Sports offers its golden nuggets in straight question-and-answer format. Black-and-white photographs illustrate this great collection of the highs, lows, scores, and star players of UW-Madison sports, ideal for hardcore trivia contests and enthusiasts.

Sometimes a novel gives a better understanding of a culture than any number of sociological books. That is the case with this book. It has a familar story, the wife of a rich man runs away with one of his workers and the resulting story of the aftermath.

The story, however takes place on the impoverished farms, in the coffee shops and cafes and with a country where the world can be described in three words: tobacco, coffee and sugar. The place where this culture takes place is Puerto Rico and the setting is 1936 truly 'another time.'

This is not a long story, but very well regarded, winning a number of literary rewards, and a welcome addition to current literature.

Translated into English for the first time by Dick Ringler (Professor Emeritus of English and Scandinavian Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison), Bard Of Iceland: Jonas Hallgrimsson, Poet And Scientist is an extensive, 474-page compilation of and commentary upon the poetry of Jonas Hallgrimsson (1807-1845), a Renaissance-style scientist who contributed to geography, botany, zoology, and archaeology. His life, his struggle to help Iceland gain independence from Denmark, and his mastery of poetic verse in context are all showcased in this impressive literary collection, skillfully gathered with astute and insightful commentary by an accomplished Scandinavian literary academician and expert.

These poems were amazing, disturbing, evocative. Phrases and images have stayed with me, and a few times I have had to go back and read a certain poem just to touch them again. The recurrent themes of being and not-being, of what it means to be fertile and not-fertile -- BARDO is a gift, and I was fortunate enough to come across an early copy.

When I told a colleague I was reading a book on Oral History, we both cringed. I had to go on to say it "isn't like that." This is a book that uses people's words about their experience as a clue into the complexity of human history. When historians relate "what happened", they are furthering an establishment version of events. As this book shows, some of the events that people who lived through it recount as most important aren't recorded *anywhere*. Likewise, the accounts that are recorded as history are sometimes considered insignificant by the participants.

Another aspect of this book that is interesting is its cross cultural perspective. The author is able to interpret oral texts in both English and Italian, and has done research in Kentucky and in Italy. His background also allows for literary interpretation, demonstrating that when transcribing oral history, care must be taken to accurately recount verb tenses and pronouns as a way of demonstrating whether a person is stating what happened, or how they interpret what happened, or how they have rationalized what happened to fit their current viewpoint.