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Tag Archives: history

Book review: Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong

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Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong by James W. Loewen. Highly recommended.

Sociology professor James Loewen wonders why American history is, for many high school students, their most hated and least memorable subject. After all, given the clash of Native peoples with Europeans, Europeans with each other, a revolution and the founding of a republic, a bloody civil war, two world wars, the conflicts in Korea and Vietnam, and hundreds of years of racial tensions, American history is inherently dramatic. Moreover, studies have shown that minority students who perform well in math, sciences, and other subjects consistently underperform in American history. By examining the contents of a dozen representative textbooks, Loewen discovers what’s wrong with American history as taught — it truly is boring and bland, and, in many cases, consists of lies and half-truths. Almost worse, it is written in a simplistic, declarative style more evocative of grade-school primers than of the college-level works many high school students will soon face.

The simplest example Loewen offers is that of Helen Keller, whose touching story of overcoming disability becomes the entire story of her life, as most of us know it. Like Tom Sawyer, she is stuck in perpetual adolescence in our minds. The real Keller, however, grew up and became an outspoken advocate for the working class and the poor. In fact, she became a radical socialist. As a symbol, Keller is two dimensional, almost like a character in a moving TV movie. As a real person, Keller is also a whole person, sharing why she empathizes with the lower classes, showing courage in supporting the NAACP in the 1920s, and even revealing embarrassing lapses in judgment, like her gushing support of the Russian Revolution.

The example of Keller, paired with what the history textbooks leave out about Woodrow Wilson (his racism and imperialism, and, I would guess, his feud with progressives like Theodore Roosevelt) are minor compared to what follows. There’s the “discovery” and “exploration” of America, with the pertinent question of how a land settled for centuries can be either “discovered” or “explored.”

There’s also the largely ignored question of other possible forays into the “new” world by peoples ranging from Scandinavia to Africa. American history texts treat history as a sacred text and each explorer as an archetype, ignoring Columbus’s avaricious and vicious behaviour toward the Arawaks. One explorer is portrayed overlooking his “discovery” while wearing full armor — when, in reality, he and his party had been left with nothing but rags.

Lies covers a great deal of territory, from Columbus to the whitewashing of even recent history, like the civil rights movement and the Vietnam War. History texts make several egregious errors: They tell blatant untruths. They perpetuate popular myths (e.g., the first Thanksgiving). They lie by omission. They leave false impressions (e.g., the civil rights movement had no causal relationship to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1965). They avoid negative images even from primary sources (e.g., the disgust Columbus’s contemporaries felt about his treatment of the Indians). They fail to portray whole people (e.g., Lincoln and Douglas are carefully edited). They distort events and attitudes (e.g., Reconstruction). They avoid conflict and controversy at all costs. They fail to make critical connections (like that between the civil rights movement and the Civil Rights Act). Fundamentally, they shun anything that would put history, people, and movements into context. 

All fail to do what intellectual inquiry should: engage students and require them to examine information and draw conclusions about its credibility and cause and effect. Instead, students memorise (badly) the archetypes and the myths built around them without thinking about their likelihood — or improbability. And, without being asked to engage themselves with the material or the people who make history, it’s no wonder students can’t remember anything and that they see history as irrelevant today.

How have history textbooks reached this point? The fault lies with everyone from absent and indifferent authors, publishers who need to sell books, interest groups, states that prefer myth to reality, review boards that have their own agendas, and, of course, each of us who learned this myths and believes them as untouchable as A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. Popular culture perpetuates them.

Of course, there are the teachers who are overburdened with administrative and disciplinary tasks rather than teaching. Loewen also notes that, while math and sciences are generally taught by people with degrees in these areas, history is so low priority that it often falls to a coach, who must justify his or her sports role by holding a teaching position, whether they are qualified or not.

Loewen proposes a number of correctives. For example, he suggests teaching fewer topics. Is it necessary to memorise every European explorer who “discovered” something, or would it be more relevant to show the impact that Columbus’s expeditions had, not only on the Americas, but on the cultures, economies, and futures of Europe, Africa, and the Islamic world? Rather than regurgitating facts, students can learn the skills of criticism — how to examine the credibility of primary and secondary sources based on the writer or speaker’s viewpoint and agenda and how to put information into its broader context.

History as it happened is why we are where we are today. Rather than distort it into “feel-good” nationalism, we need to learn what it has to teach us to engage with it. I recommend this to anyone with a serious interest in American history and in the current sad state of American history education.

20 March 2004
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Book review: Mutiny on the Amistad: The Saga of a Slave Revolt and Its Impact on American Abolition, Law, and Diplomacy

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Mutiny on the Amistad: The Saga of a Slave Revolt and Its Impact on American Abolition, Law, and Diplomacy by Howard Jones. Not recommended.

In July 1839, a group of Africans that had been illegally imported into Cuba used violence to take over the Amistad while it was transporting them from Havana to Puerto Príncipe. In August, the Amistad and the Africans were seized off Long Island. These events set off a judicial, legislative, and diplomatic battle that would not be completely resolved until the Civil War ended slavery in the United States. Mutiny on the Amistad looks at the laws, issues, and people involved in this landmark case.

The key questions are: Who has jurisdiction over the case? Are the Africans legally slaves? If so, who has the rights to them? Are they “salvage,” like the Amistad? Will the case worsen the relations with Spain and strengthen Great Britain’s claims in Cuba? Will it become the catalyst the abolitionists need to give them and their cause credibility with the northern public? And how will Martin Van Buren’s administration deal with such a controversial case in a re-election year?

While the case attracted the attention of abolitionists like Arthur and Lewis Tappan and John Quincy Adams; the administration of Martin Van Buren and even those of some of his successors; and several governments, including those of Spain and Great Britain, Jones’s repetitive treatment of the story robs it of much of its drama. For example, he makes the declarative statement that the Van Buren administration’s focus was solely on re-election and ensuring the Amistad case did not interfere with that objective more than a dozen times. Some of the primary source quotes do not seem well selected to expand upon the contemporary view; in too many cases, quotes consist of one or two words, such as “gross injustice,” that are too out of context or are such common expressions that they become meaningless. The best quotes come, not from the case or the participants, but from the various southern, northern, and abolitionist publications; these headlines reveal contemporary perceptions, beliefs, and biases. As for the participants, the only voice that seems to express any passion is that of John Quincy Adams, who is clearly emotional about the abolitionist cause.

In the meantime, the voices of Joseph Cinqué and the rest of the Africans — the subjects of the entire controversy — are heard only rarely, primarily through letters to the abolitionists complaining about the poor conditions they are subjected to in prison. It is not clear if this is because their testimony was generally deemed irrelevant (they seldom speak for themselves) or if their feelings and thoughts are poorly documented because of the language and literacy barriers they initially face. Jones does try to interject them periodically, but during the long passages in which they are missing the reader feels as though the case has become an exercise in legal argument without victims.

Ultimately, it is not clear what the Amistad case accomplished. For many in the north, Cinqué and the other Africans are objects of both curiosity and sympathy, but it is not apparent that the Amistad case significantly advanced the cause of abolition — in itself an irony since Cinqué and company were never legally slaves (one point that the courts and even the district attorney agree upon). Jones asserts that the case raised public awareness of the conflict between natural law (such as man’s right to freedom and to kill to obtain it) and positive law (such as that enabling slavery and preventing slaves from rebelling). The scope of Jones’s research and quotations, save those from newspapers, does not support this; there is little presented to show that the case was discussed every day in ballrooms, parlors, and bars or that the general public’s perception was permanently altered. What is clear, however, is the racism that is prevalent throughout. Even some of the abolitionists, most of whom are spiritual leaders who find slavery an abomination against God, do not consider Africans their equals.

The facts of the case are all here, along with much of the background. Some of the conclusions seem incomplete. Throughout, one gets the impression this could have been a shorter, more succinct, and, more importantly, a more dramatic and tightly argued book had Jones or his editor cut the repetitions, redundancies, and minutiae and focused on a more cohesive discussion of the relevant specifics of the case and its effects on the public, the U.S. government, and policy. As it is, in Jones’s hands this case appears less interesting and less important historically than it probably was, and even the source of all this, Cinqué and his comrades, lose their three-dimensionality — their humanity, as it were. If you are interested in the Amistad case and in the story of the abolitionist movement, this is probably a must-read — but don’t stop here.

16 February 2004
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Book review: Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil

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Explaining Hitler: The Search for the Origins of His Evil by Ron Rosenbaum. Highly recommended.

Explaining Hitler is a misleading title, for the focus is primarily on the Jewish academic community’s attempts to explain Hitler — to put it in grossly oversimplified terms, this is somewhat like the prey explaining the motivations of the predator. The result is that, while Hitler remains a mystery, the academic and personal biases of the explainers are revealed. To each person’s theories and comments Rosenbaum adds his own analysis, finding the flaws with precision.

Hitler explanation ranges from the deeply personal (abusive father, infection by a Jewish prostitute, mother’s painful death under the care of a Jewish physician) to the inevitable influence of historical forces (post-war inflation, depression). Rosenbaum discusses the personal in depth, including Hitler’s rumored Jewish ancestor and bizarre relationship with his half-niece Geli Raubal, the convolutions each theory takes, and the lack of facts or reliable information to support any of them. For example, Rosenbaum astutely points out the only real “proof” of the abusive father is Hitler’s own assertion and sarcastically suggests that there is reason not to trust Hitler’s word. One argument that immediately comes to mind that Rosenbaum only briefly alludes to later is that millions of people have abusive fathers, bad experiences with individual members of ethnic and other groups, and so forth, yet do not turn into war criminals responsible for the deaths of millions. In short, these theories might explain Hitler’s anti-Semitism, but not the results.

What is disturbing about so many of these explanations (some of which are advocated by such noted people as Simon Wiesenthal, who favors the Jewish prostitute theory), and more sophisticated ones that appear later in the book, such as George Steiner’s, is their insistence that a Jew or a group of Jews is responsible. In these theories, a Jewish ancestor, a Jewish prostitute, an Eastern Jew with a different appearance, or the Jewish “blackmail of transcendence” and “addiction to the ideal” is responsible for Hitler — implying Hitler is not responsible at all. Although the egotistical and monomaniacal Claude Lanzmann, maker of the documentary Shoah, is too self-centered and angry to clearly articulate the basis for his belief that Hitler explanation is inherently “obscene,” it could be because so much “explanation” has found a way to point a finger at the Jews, directly or indirectly, while minimizing Hitler. Perhaps for that reason, Lanzmann is interested only in how the Holocaust was accomplished, not with the motivations of Hitler or his followers. The major flaw is that Lanzmann has missed the point by dictating that his rule of “There is no why” must apply to all other individuals — and the irony of that.

As Rosenbaum repeatedly points out, no explanations for Hitler are acceptable that excuse him — that look to a bad experience with a Jew rather than to, for example, the influence of anti-Semitism surrounding him in Austria and Germany. Again, however, it can be said that anti-Semitic influence has surrounded many people (as Rosenbaum notes, pre-war France was more anti-Semitic than either Austria or Germany) who have not killed, let alone killed millions.

Rosenbaum’s approach is excellent, pairing individuals with complementary or opposing viewpoints, e.g., Lanzmann and Dr. Micheels, the theologian Emil Fackenheim and the atheist historian Yehuda Bauer in “The Temptation to Blame God.” Even revisionist David Irving is given a chapter. Rosenbaum saves what seems to be his preference for the last chapter — Lucy Dawidowicz’s belief that Hitler decided on The Final Solution as early as 1918, based on what he said and did not say over time, and on the “laughter” that is transferred from the Jewish victims to the Nazi victors. While this does not explain the origins of Hitler’s evil, it pinpoints the time frame and removes the notion that he was ambivalent or experienced a sense of moral ambiguity. Dawidowicz’s Hitler knows early on what he wants to do and lets insiders in on the “joke” he finds it to be. Presented in this way, Dawidowicz does seem to have come closest to the truth about Hitler. After all, how can one capable of ambivalence ultimately kill millions?

To me, one critical question is not why or how any one man became evil or chose an evil course of action, for the explanation could simply be that the capacity for evil in an individual may be higher than most of us are capable of realising or accepting. That is, everyday evil like John Wayne Gacy’s is accomplished in isolation and is therefore limited in scope. The intent and the desired scope given opportunity remain unknowns. The more frightening question is why and how so many chose to follow Hitler. I do not necessarily mean the German people, per se, but the thousands of bureaucrats, managers, and soldiers who physically carried out The Final Solution, knowing exactly what this entailed and what it signified. Hitler seized the opportunity offered by the political and social situation to institutionalize his personal evil. A single man may envision and desire genocide, but it takes followers and believers to carry it out. Explaining Hitler (or Stalin or Genghis Khan) is not enough to explain the scope of this particular human evil. Without followers, there are no leaders. And without followers, millions of Jews (and Cambodians and Indians and so forth) could not have died. The evil that is so hard to face goes well beyond Hitler to a place that no one could truly wish to discover.

18 January 2004
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Book review: Life in a Medieval Village

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Life in a Medieval Village by Frances and Joseph Gies. Recommended.

Life in a Medieval Village is one of a series, including Life in a Medieval City and Life in a Medieval Castle, written by Frances and Joseph Gies. This series rarely touches upon the great people and events romanticized by Hollywood and numerous fiction writers (and perhaps even a few historians), but focuses on the basics of everyday life for the average person or even the average lord or cleric. The Gies use a number of primary and secondary sources, the latter of which reveal how the historian’s view of the medieval village has changed in the 20th and 21st centuries and how flexible historians must be in interpreting the evidence.

Researched and written for the layperson, Life in a Medieval Village is more accurately about life in an English medieval village, with most of the detail coming from the records of Aethelintone/Aethelington/Adelintune/Aylington (Elton) in Huntingdon, one of Ramsey Abbey’s manors. The Gies provide a history of the village concept and its definition; its role in the manorial system (contrasted to the seigneurial system); a description of its people, physical structure, buildings, administration and administrators, judicial system, family and spiritual life, and work; and the background behind its decline.

The world of Elton and similar villages is not found in movies or novels. Social and economic statuses are not always clear cut, economic upward mobility is possible primarily through acquisition of land, and even the distinction between “free” and “unfree” is not distinct. Life revolves around the manor and the villeins’ and cotters’ obligations to the mostly absent lord and the manor, which come in the form of work, rents, fees, taxes, and fines. The administrative structure of the manor is somewhat like that of a modern corporation, with the lord as CEO of multiple manors (and primary consumer of goods) who “wanted the certainty of rents and dues from his tenants, the efficient operation of his demesne, and good prices for wool and grain.” His steward, or seneschal, serves as senior executive, while the bailiff, reeve, beadle, woodward, and others are the manor’s day-to-day managers and supervisors.

As the villagers acquire surnames (from where they live, what they do, the offices they hold, and personal characteristics), patterns emerge from the records. Some families become dominant economically and politically (e.g., holding many offices such as reeve or juror many times); others decline; while yet others show a propensity for violence and petty crimes. Such infractions are punished primarily with fines rather than corporal punishment; the stocks and hanging are resorted to only in the most egregious cases. The judicial system is often compassionate (or at least practical); many fines for minor trespasses are lowered or forgiven by the court because “she is poor.” When laws are broken, a jury hears the case, but the entire village decides.

The Gies also provide an excellent overview of the passing of the medieval village, which began with a sustained famine and the Black Death. The labor-intensive manorial system simply could not survive the depletion of workers, the increase in expenses, the onerous taxes brought on by wars, and, perhaps more importantly, the sense of change and discontent that began to pervade the villein class.

The challenge for the Gies as authors is to take the minimal material available (ranging from books about estate management written for lords and stewards to court and ecclesiastical records) and to bring the village to life from these records. What emerges are people who live in fragile houses; are rarely well fed from a nutritional perspective and whose food supply is always in doubt; work hard and are not above trying to wheedle out of work; who drink and fight and are sometimes brutal; fornicate (primarily a woman’s crime but not a particularly reviled one); vandalize; commit petty crimes against the lord and their neighbors; and in short live lives of struggle every day without the expectation or vision of change in the future.

The Gies focus on Elton, with supplemental material from other English villages, so the reader who is interested in village life on the continent will need to explore other works to flesh out the picture. Because the mostly illiterate villagers themselves left few personal records, it is up to the thoughtful reader to discern the village’s character and personality and to conceive of what day-to-day life must have been, based on the little that is known — to put oneself into the worn shoes of the working villein and to imagine his or her thoughts, feelings, and aspirations. Life in a Medieval Villageis a good beginning.

30 October 2003
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Book review: Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation

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Trail of Tears: The Rise and Fall of the Cherokee Nation by John Ehle. Highly recommended.

In Trail of Tears, John Ehle (who is, as far as I can tell, non-Native) sketches the people and events that led to the infamous Trail of Tears, the removal of the Cherokee Nation to “Indian Territory” (primarily Arkansas and Oklahoma) where they would “never” be bothered by whites again. The focus is on the “Treaty Party,” consisting of Ridge, his son John Ridge, and his nephews Elias Boudinot and Stand Watie, along with Moravian, Methodist, and other missionaries sent to convert the Cherokees to Christianity and who are caught up in Cherokee/state/federal politics.

Ehle’s bias is evident in the title; the “rise” of the Cherokees is the effort, not wholly embraced by the Nation, of adapting to European-American culture, language, religion, and even livelihood (e.g., Cherokee hunting is uncivilized, whereas the adoption of American farming is preferable). The story begins with some background and the birth of a Cherokee man named Ridge not too long before the American Revolutionary War. The white impact has already begun to be felt, as one of Ridge’s forebears is white, and he and his family are driven into the wilds by the war.

After the war ends, the new Americans have one craving — land and more land. A gold strike in Georgia adds to the fever. The Cherokee, along with the Choctaw, Creek, and other southern tribes, are perceived as “wasting” land that their white counterparts should be entitled to. From this point on, it is clear that the Juggernaut of American expansionism and greed will displace the Native peoples. The question is only how and when.

Meanwhile, Ridge, who will not convert to Christianity but who wholeheartedly adopts many white ways for himself and his children, becomes not only a wealthy plantation owner but a leader of the Cherokee Nation. His son becomes an attorney, while Boudinot becomes the first editor of the Cherokee newspaper, The Phoenix. Both young men marry white New Englanders they meet while at school. Ridge and his family and allies are the first to see the writing on the wall — that the Cherokees will be removed; it is a matter of whether it is “voluntarily” on their own terms in their own time or involuntarily.

The principal chief of the Cherokee, a Cherokee-Scot named John Ross, is portrayed as a man in a state of denial. It is never clear how he thought the Cherokee could overcome the overwhelming tide of white intrusion without bloodshed and without losing. He and his followers blame the Ridge faction for selling the Cherokee out when they sign the Treaty of 1835 that puts the seal on the removal. They feel that they can continue to “negotiate,” not realising that Andrew Jackson has set the tone and the terms — and that the federal government under his leadership has loaded the die. Ehle is no John Ross fan; when the inevitable finally happens and the Cherokee are removed, Ross sends them via the lengthy, dangerous, time-consuming land route, resulting in hundreds if not thousands of deaths (the number remains unknown), while Ross and his family use the quicker, less treacherous water routes.

There are several dichotomies in this history — the Upper Towns vs. the Lower Towns; the full-bloods vs. those with white ancestors/family; the uneducated (mostly full-bloods, according to Ehle) vs. the educated (John Ridge, Boudinot); the federal government vs. state government (a dichotomy that would be resolved violently through the Civil War). A forest/mountain vs. town dichotomy is also evident. In any case, anything that speaks of the way the Cherokee used to be is seen as “primitive,” while Cherokee adoption of white ways is lauded by their neighbors. In fact, this is seen as the heart of the problem; the Cherokee people are pliable, are willing to adapt, are willing to live like the whites — and in the end are treated no better than their Creek, Choctaw, and Seminole counterparts. Ehle includes much contemporary commentary on this particular irony.

This book has been said to be controversial because it shows the wealthier Cherokees, like Ridge, John Ridge, and John Ross, as owning African slaves. The Cherokees tried to marry their own ways with that of the European-Americans; they had always had slaves, usually captives from other tribes. But it is clear that the majority of Cherokees were poor, did not own plantations, and did not exploit slaves.

Trail of Tears is an excellent snapshot of a particular situation and will be eye opening to those who are not familiar with the story of the southern tribes and their interactions with the burgeoning American population. Ehle includes a wealth of primary sources, such as letters, journal excerpts, military orders, and the like, that serve to enrich the story. This history lesson is told in a story/fiction format enhanced by contemporary writings that keep it interesting, lively, and personal. Ehle’s biases are clear but do not detract from this book as a history of a moment in time when the fate of a nation was decided. This is an excellent supplement to any broader history of the Trail of Tears.

29 April 2001
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Book review: The Road to Monticello: The Life and Mind of Thomas Jefferson

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The Road to Monticello: The Life and Mind of Thomas Jefferson by Kevin J. Hayes. New York: Oxford University Press. 2008. 752 pages.

While I was visiting my aunt in Washington, D.C., in the early 1990s, she suggested a road trip: first, to Luray Caverns, then down Skyline Drive to a town where we’d stay overnight, then over to Charlottesville for the triple play of Monticello, Michie Tavern (lunch), and Ash Lawn. Off we went, stopping in Charlottesville first at the Thomas Jefferson Visitor Center. It was at the center that I first started falling in love with founding father and American sphinx Thomas Jefferson. Here and at Monticello, Jefferson’s inventive mind and hands-on applications are revealed in a variety of ways, including the oddities he imagined and the nails he made.

In The Road to Monticello, Kevin J. Hayes explores that Enlightenment mind set through the books Jefferson read, acquired, and cherished and through his writings, from personal letters to his major works, from his “Head and Heart” letter to Maria Cosway to the Declaration of Independence, Notes on the State of Virginia, and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom. The biography is more or less chronological, from his early life under the tutelage of George Wythe, during which he developed his interests in law and languages, to his design for his epitaph and his death on July 4, 1826 — followed five and one-half hours later by that of friend and foe John Adams.

Hayes covers Jefferson’s many advanced interests and everything that can be known or conjectured about his library, his passion for books as objects, his political and religious beliefs, his travels, his family and friends, and the influences and experiences that informed his views and convictions. By the end, Hayes seems to have created that which he set out to: a comprehensive portrayal of Jefferson’s life and mind gleaned from his books and intellectual pursuits.

Hayes falls short in two areas, one of which he concedes at the beginning. Like Adams and Benjamin Franklin, Jefferson was keenly aware that he would become a historical figure and that future Americans would pore over his words and life story. Adams and Franklin wrote their letters and messages accordingly, knowing that they would become part of posterity. Adams in particular seems to have held little back; both wanted to be understood. In contrast, Jefferson worked to efface his personal life and feelings from the record. The “Head and Heart” dialogue, and the form in which it’s written, reveal Jefferson’s discomfort with emotions as well as his apparently inability to express them directly. Perhaps he found this frustrating; “Head” poses a hyperbolic argument against forming attachments, but “Heart,” according to Hayes, gets in the last word and “rejects the pleasures of solitude and upholds the value of friendship.”

The second problem is Hayes’ lack of objectivity and the skewed picture that results. While he lavishes attention on such details as the backgrounds of the booksellers from whom Jefferson acquired his books, he mentions little that is controversial or negative about Jefferson. He glosses over his attitude toward his slaves and his refusal to free them, his relationship with Sally Hemings, his proclivity for overspending, and the financial straits in which he left his family. The uninformed reader won’t learn from Hayes about the unapologetic Jefferson’s secret collaboration with Benjamin Franklin Bache to smear John Adams’ character or how deep was the bitterness that grew between the two men. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have thought they merely disagreed on some key issues, become estranged over them, and reconciled late in life. Jefferson’s duplicity and manipulations are as protected from public view as he would have wished them to be.

The Road to Monticello is a solid if lopsided biography that delivers part of its promise, a glimpse into the life and mind of Thomas Jefferson, but only in idealizing soft focus. His heart and soul are missing, and so are the negative traits that round out his character and make him more than just an Enlightenment thinker; they make him a human being as flawed as the rest of the species. You can’t go wrong reading The Road to Monticello; knowledge of the breadth and depth of Jefferson’s readings and interests alone will expand your mind and thought process. But you would do yourself — and, dare I say it, Jefferson — a real disservice if you stopped here and didn’t dig deeper to explore the darker aspects of his enigmatic nature. For all its length and the research behind it, The Road to Monticello is just a detailed sketch. Supplement it with a full portrait, shade and shadows included.

11 March 2011
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Please Mr. Postman (the blue U.S. mailbox)

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At times separated by an ocean or by hundreds of miles, John and Abigail Adams wrote thousands of letters to each other, covering personal matters such as their farm, family, health, and hopes, as well as their views of freedom, the American Revolution and government, and its participants. Despite the distance, quite possibly their correspondence benefited from postal efficiencies introduced by fellow revolutionary and occasional nemesis Benjamin Franklin, who was appointed Joint Postmaster General of the colonies for the Crown in 1753 and Postmaster for the United Colonies in 1775.

Adams wrote prodigious numbers of letters throughout his adult life, to Abigail, children and grandchildren, and friends on both sides of the Atlantic. Through letters, he and Thomas Jefferson, past their primes and their ambitions, rekindled their friendship and their dialogue about the rights of man and the role of government. Adams finally quit writing in extreme old age, when his eyes were nearly sightless and his hands shook too much to manage a pen. Only physical infirmity deterred him.

As revolutionaries, then as president and president’s wife, John and Abigail had a great deal to say. Like Benjamin Franklin, they were keenly aware that what they wrote would become part of U.S. history.

Blue mailbox

I happened to be reading John Adams by David McCullough when I saw the Washington Post story about vanishing blue U.S. mailboxes that had become a fixture on city street corners and in the downtown area of many a burg. With e-mail, texting, social media like Facebook and Twitter, 24/7 mobile phone access, and other instant, on-the-go ways to communicate, who today takes the time and effort to write letters? Many seem to be able to communicate what we have to say in Twitter’s 140 characters (even John Quincy Adams), except when we’re texting cryptic messages back and forth: “whr ru?” “*bcks.” “b thr sn.” If you feel you need to communicate at greater length, you might start a blog, which, without a theme of general interest to the world or of particular interest to a special niche, will probably quickly fizzle out from lack of participation on both ends, readers’ and writer’s. Of course, you might not want to say to the world what you would to family, or to family what you would say to friends.

Although she did not have much to say, my mother wrote letters to sisters and brothers spread out across the country — Pennsylvania, Arizona, California. She didn’t like writing letters. I don’t think any of them did, because letters she wrote and received invariably began with an apology that the writer had not written sooner, followed by numerous apologies for having nothing to say, descriptions of the local weather, a bit of news if there were any, e.g., “Diane starts school in two weeks, Where did summer go?” Why write when there was so little to say and it was such a disliked chore? The answer — long distance was relatively expensive and reserved for truly important and immediate news, like deaths. Usually only one aunt, more affluent and urbanized than the others, called once in a while just to chat — and possibly to avoid writing a letter.

My mother also kept a diary, one of those old-fashioned small books with psychedelic covers popular in the 1960s. Five years of entries for, say, April 8, fit on a page, with perhaps three to five lines on which you could summarize the day for posterity. “A.M. Sunny but snowed in P.M. Insurance man called.” Writing didn’t come naturally to my mother, and she seemed painfully aware of it. She told us that, when she died. she wanted her diaries burned — clearly not for their lurid content or insights into her thoughts, but, I suspect, because she didn’t want anyone to see how mundane they were. I complied, although of course now I wish I hadn’t. I did keep my own two equally dull diaries from my childhood, although I rarely look into them — there is that little of interest in my colorful childish scrawls.

As someone who is paid to write, I’ve found that most people, even those with advanced degrees, are not comfortable expressing themselves in writing. Ostensibly, they worry about such things as grammar, flow, and polish. Could I make them sound better, more intelligent, more interesting, please?

I don’t think people are afraid of their technical shortcomings as writers, whether of professional communications, day-to-day diaries, or letters to family and friends. I suspect there’s a deep-seated fear of revealing our thoughts and how we think to those who know us personally. Unlike John and Abigail, my mother didn’t have congressional congresses, wars, courts, diplomacy, or politics to write about from a firsthand viewpoint. That left her feeling like most people, who think they have nothing worthwhile to say or are afraid to say anything worthwhile from fear of offending or causing an argument or a break (something that troubled Adams less than Jefferson). So they talk about TV shows and tweet about the weather, what they’re listening to or watching, where they’re eating, perhaps what they’re reading. We’re afraid to write, or are unable to write, paralyzed by our lack of material or the unwillingness to be ourselves. We’re afraid to be judged by what we say and how we say it.

I write letters — lots of letters. For all I know, they bore the recipients. But I love the sensory experience of writing, the glide of pen across paper and the appearance of writing, which is almost magical. I may start out on one mundane topic, which leads to another, and another, and, on occasion, sometimes a broader topic of more general interest. A comment about a Victorian novel may lead to a different perspective about some aspect of contemporary life. Writing — not typing — helps me to think questions through and to remember details. Knowing that I am going to write letters keeps me on the lookout for things to write about — the lack of fireflies this summer, neighborhood news, overheard conversations, interesting perspectives on the news and the world, quirks of human behavior, including my own. Sometimes a seemingly ingenuous observation launches me into what I hope is a worthwhile digression, making me perceive a topic or problem differently. Letters allow me to think out loud in a way that a journal, with its audience of one, can’t. Even without a dialogue, I can imagine my audience’s reaction, just as perhaps John, Abigail, and the other assorted family members thought of each other centuries ago as they sat at their desks, dipped their quills, and looked out over the bleak fields of winter and the ripening fields of summer.

Communication doesn’t have to be instantaneous or uninterrupted for the emotional connection to remain strong. To remember this, read some of the most poignant letters from any war — or the letters of John and Abigail Adams. When Abigail reminded John that he was sixty years old, he replied, “If I were near I would soon convince you that I am not above forty.” Could John Adams have conveyed his feelings and the implicit compliment to Abigail so eloquently in a text message? One can only imagine how Abigail’s heart rose as she held the paper and read of his love and lust for her in John’s own handwriting.

My heart still rises in the same way when I receive a handwritten letter, no matter who it is from or what it proves to be about. It’s an old habit that dies hard — and I’m not the one to fight it. Long live the blue U.S. mailboxes.

Book review: Benjamin Franklin: An American Life

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Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Walter Isaacson. New York: Simon & Schuster. 2003. 608 pages.

As the Founding Father who spent most of the American Revolution in France, Benjamin Franklin often seems more caricature than patriot in today’s American imagination. In children’s cartoons, he’s portrayed as an eccentric old man flying a kite in a thunderstorm. Adults think of him as a lusty old man charming the ladies of Paris. In Benjamin Franklin: An American Life, Walter Isaacson attempts to flesh out a man who defies description — a printer turned writer turned postmaster turned inventor turned Enlightenment scientist turned patriot turned diplomat. Franklin, a man of the “middling class,” did as much to establish the American dream as to define American democracy.

If Thomas Jefferson bequeathed us with lofty philosophical prose, Franklin left us with his streamlined homilies and plans for personal improvement. Dale Carnegie and Stephen Covey would have felt at home with the practical and prudent Franklin, who, naturally did not always live up to his own standards. At times Franklin’s business practices seemed questionable, his friendship with men many but shallow, and his marriage breezily detached. Strangest of all was his relationship with his son, William, who was firmly ensconced on the British side of the conflict. Each time William reached out to his father, the normally conciliatory Franklin rebuffed him, his loyalty to colonies and cause stronger than bonds of blood. Conscious of his place in history and eager to shape the future’s opinion of him, Franklin intentionally distanced himself from William — yet positioned his autobiography as a letter to his son.

For the most part, the discoveries and inventions that established Franklin among his Enlightenment peers came in the prime of middle age, after his retirement from business. His accomplishments raised him in society, especially in France, above his middle-class roots. Compared to his fellow Founders, Franklin was well traveled and well connected. With his extroverted personality, pragmatic approach, and cachet as a scientist, Franklin was the natural choice to represent the rebellious colonies and to woo allies to their cause.

Franklin spent most of the war in France and did not have much face-to-face interaction with his fellow rebel leaders except those sent to Paris to assist him or to keep an eye on him. Isaacson cites numerous passages from his correspondence, describes his rocky relationship with the somewhat dubious John Paul Jones, and recounts highlights from his friendships with luminaries such as David Hume, Joseph Banks, Beaumarchais, Voltaire, and the duc de la Rouchefoucauld, yet Franklin and Franklin, both man and biography, seem distant from the action. As Isaacson notes, however, he was “instrumental in shaping the three great documents of the war: the Declaration of Independence, the alliance with France, and the treaty with England.” Indeed, one of Franklin’s small edits to the Declaration altered its tone; Jefferson’s “We hold these truths to be sacred” became Franklin’s “We hold these truths to be self-evident.”

Benjamin Franklin illuminates much of what is fascinating about the birth of American-style democracy; a unique combination of personalities, backgrounds, beliefs, and temperaments came together to define and strive for freedom, with no consensus on what that meant. Washington brought natural leadership; Jefferson, an understanding of and appreciation for Enlightenment philosophy; Sam and John Adams, passion and fire; and Franklin the practical sensibilities of the middle class blended with worldly knowledge. They did not always get along (John Adams: “That I have no friendship for Franklin I avow. That I am incapable of having any with a man of his moral sentiments I avow.”) Contrary to current popular belief, they did not agree on democracy. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts declared, “The evils we experience flow from the excess of democracy,” while Roger Sherman of Connecticut said the people “should have as little to do as may be possible about government.” Franklin, according to Isaacson, “favored direct elections, trusted the average citizen, and resisted anything resembling elitism.” His constitution for Pennsylvania “was the most democratic of the new states’.” Years after Franklin’s death, John Adams “even cast Franklin’s lack of religious commitment, which he had once derided as verging on atheism, in a more favorable light: ‘All sects considered him, and I believe justly, a friend to unlimited toleration.'”

Franklin, the middle-class espouser of middle-class virtues like prudence, frugality, and temperance, used his gifts to rise above his station, but didn’t lose sight of it. When today’s pundits talk about the intentions of the Founding Fathers (as though they were agreed on anything) and try to force an uncomfortable marriage between capitalist greed and religion, they might consider the real Benjamin Franklin, not the caricature: A self-made man who moved with ease among the ranks of the noble and the wealthy but never joined them and who believed in every man’s right to practice his own religion in his own way.

15 March 2009
Copyright © Diane L. Schirf

Family business

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I’m halfway through Walter Isaacson’s Benjamin Franklin: An American Life. Franklin, I learn, was at the vanguard of “compassionate conservatism” and “trickle-down economics.” While he believed that consumption by the rich boosted the productivity (and prosperity) of the poor, somewhat ironically Franklin was also a founding member of the emerging American middle class and a devotee of the myth that hard work and frugality are the cornerstones of American success.

Had Franklin looked looked more objectively at his own career, and those of the hard-working poor, he might have arrived at a more balanced, accurate belief. Certainly hard work (including staying up all night to set type after a plate was broken) and his wife’s frugality (if not always his) contributed to the success of his business and helped him and his family to live comfortably as stolid middle-class citizens. For many that is success of a kind.

Franklin, however, was a success because in entrepreneurial fashion he saw, seized, and created opportunities, and, more than once, rolled over and sometimes drove out less astute or less ruthless competitors. He also built networks of like-minded men who could help each other and lend support to their respective businesses and interests. Like a modern-day self-made man, and with his appointment as postmaster, he could retire at a relatively young age — not wealthy, but not in debt, either.

When he saw his son, William, pursuing position instead of business or work, he advised him on the virtues of effort and frugality. Perhaps lacking the entrepreneurial spirit, William accepted appointment as the royal governor of New Jersey — a post that elevated him above his father and his middle class. Ultimately, Benjamin would side with the rebellious colonies while William remained a Loyalist.

The divergent paths of father and son and their mutual interest in politics reminded me of something I’d been thinking about since George W. Bush became president and later when Hillary Clinton announced her candidacy for the Democratic nomination for president.

Although there’s nothing to prevent it, and my feeling disregards that the candidate may be as or more qualified than anyone else, it bothers me that American politics is dominated by a handful of families — perhaps most famously the Kennedys, and more recently the Bushes and Clintons. We’ve had father-and-son presidents, and almost a husband-and-wife set. We’ve had Theodore and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Beginning in 1989, George H. W. Bush was president, then one son became governor of Texas in 1995, another the governor of Florida in 1999. Joe Biden’s son, Beau, serves as attorney general of Delaware. And Caroline Kennedy is itching for Hillary Clinton’s Senate seat, representing New York.

Here in Illinois, we have the Madigans, among others: Speaker of the House Michael and his daughter, Attorney General Amy (not to mention Governor-for-Now Rod Blagojevich and his father-in-law, Chicago Alderman-for-Life Richard Mell). Cook County Board President John Stroger managed to pass on the baton to his son, Todd, whose performance to date has underwhelmed even those with the lowest expectations. More locally, Chicago Mayor-for-Life Richard J. Daley fathered Chicago Mayor-for-Life Richard M. Daley. In a nation of 305 million souls and in a city of nearly 3 million, the same names keep popping up. Where are the fresh faces of new leadership?

A friend tells me that I’m looking at this the wrong way. She points out that politics is a family business like any other and that members of each younger generation may choose to follow in the older’s footsteps, just as, for example, some children grow up to become doctors, lawyers, or coal miners like their parents. Certainly, many of the Kennedys seem to see themselves as devoted to public service, and for all I know so do the Madigans, Strogers, and Daleys.

Unconsciously, Benjamin and William Franklin (and perhaps Samuel and John Adams) were among those who helped start the American tradition of politics as family business. It may have made sense in the small world of the 13 colonies, in which Philadelphia (population 23,000) was their largest city and when American-style democracy was still years off. I am not so certain that it’s still a good model, or the best, for a complacent, celebrity-obsessed society more interested in names than accomplishments and looks than abilities. To succeed in politics requires money, influence, backing, name recognition, and personality — something both Franklins would have understood.

I think, or wish, we could do better than that.

As Spock of Star Trek says, “There are always possibilities.”

And opportunities.

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