Steve Goddard's History Wire

Book Alert / Righteous Gentiles

Much has been written -- a lot of it unfavorable -- about the role the Catholic Church played during World War II and the Holocaust as to the fate of millions of Jews. Ronald J. Rychlak, a Mississippi lawyer, comes now with a revisionist tract on the subject, alleging  Pope Pius XII and the Catholic Church responded heroically to the plight of Jews during the Second World War.

In his publisher's words, "(Ronald) Rychlak lays to rest the 'black legend' of the Church during World War II, showing that Pius XII and those he directed deserve the title 'Righteous Gentiles.'" This tract, along with much of what it counters, is ideologically based and is unlikely to be the definitive last word on the subject.

Book Alert / The March

If E.L. Doctorow's The March is any indication, his next book will probably concern the Founding Fathers and their era. While the rest of us move forward in time (like it or not), 74-year-old Doctorow steadily recedes in time, moving from the Cold War-era The Book of Daniel to 1920 Gangsterland in Billy Bathgate to Victorian-era Manhattan in The Waterworks to his current Civil War epic.

So  is The March really as good as they say? (How many books win a star-trifecta, with starred  reviews from Kirkus, Booklist and Publishers' Weekly? And this is even before the big prizes!) Yeah, it really is, possibly the author's finest, although a  half-dozen of them are so good that it's really hard to choose among them.

However, the subject Doctorow has chosen is so challenging -- General William  Tecumseh Sherman's 1864 march to the sea, gathering 25,000 freed slaves with him as he slashes and burns Atlanta, then moves north on through South Carolina and North Carolina to the fateful denouement of the war -- that to carry it off as ably as he does deserves special mention. The reader gets a sense of the giant swirl of humanity around Sherman from the author's description of the march:

"Imagine a great segmented body moving in contractions and dilations at a rate of twelve or fifteen miles a day, a creature of a hundred thousand feet. It is tubular in its being and tentacled to the roads and bridges over which it travels. It sends out as antennae its men on horses. It consumes everything in its path. It is an immense organism, this army, with a small brain."

You won't find descriptive narrative like that on every page, mostly because of the extent of dialogue, as racist Rebels, freed slaves, Union soldiers and Southern landowners rub up against each other and interact in surprising ways. The cadence, rhythm and syntax of their often fevered conversation seems right on the mark or, at least, is almost never discordant.

A Moment of Silence for the Jolly Green Giant

"He's being remembered for three words: "Ho, Ho, Ho."Elmer "Len" Dresslar Junior was the booming voice of the Jolly Green Giant, who encouraged (m) millions of T-V watchers to eat their vegetables. His daughter says Dresslar died October 16th of cancer in Palm Springs, California. Dresslar was an entertainer and singer for nearly six decades, but is best remembered for his simple refrain on the ad jingle for Green Giant foods."

Whither O'Connor?

What's more historic than the first woman appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court? Sandra Day O'Connor worked 'til her Diamond Jubilee, then made what may have been a rash promise to continue as a Justice until her successor was confirmed. But with the withdrawal of the nomination of Harriet Miers, who knows how much longer the Court will ask her to serve?

It's more than an academic matter, of course, because it would hardly do to have only eight justices voting on crucial issues, risking a stalemate. But, as MSNBC reports, "O’Connor has been hearing cases and voting at closed-door meetings. But if she leaves the court before decisions are announced, her votes will not count. Cases with a 4-4 outcome would likely require a new argument session so O’Connor’s successor could participate. “She remains the pivotal figure on the court,” said author David Alistair Yalof."

With people in business and industry routinely retiring at 60, 65, or 70, History Wire wonders what there is about the Supreme Court that its members seem to last to 80, 85 or beyond. We suspect there's something in the cafeteria lemonade.

Book Alert / White Savage

After reviewing the 100th biography of Abe Lincoln or other safe subjects, it's a treat to find a publisher willing to take a chance on a well-written narrative chronicling the life of a far lesser subject -- particularly one born in and best known in a foreign land. Of course, since more Irish live in America than in the Emerald Isle, it may not be such a gamble after all.

The subject is William Johnson, who oversaw Indian affairs for the colony of New York for nearly 20 years in pre-Revolutionary times after leaving Ireland as a boy. And his biographer is Fintan O'Toole (I hate to play with others' names, but doesn't that match anything in Irish literature?), the literary critic of The Irish Times and author of a bunch of other books as well.

So does O'Toole simply lay on us the mid-life of a mid-level colonial administrator? Well, not hardly; any reputable publisher would have deep-sixed the effort in such event. The hook White Savage -- William Johnson and the Invention of America offers is that Johnson's effectiveness with Indians lay in the fact that he lived as a "white savage," marrying both European and Mohawk wives, showing his respect by speaking Mohawk fluently, and inviting Indians themselves into decision-making about their fate. This attractive book is well-illustrated and contains both an index and abundant notes.

Why Wouldn't We Listen to Authority Figures?

WFMYNews's feature, Today in History, recalls a prediction particularly resonant in wartime, when this day in 1972 Secretary of State Henry Kissinger predicted, "Peace is at hand." The Vietnam War actually did not end until 1975.

Tune In, Roger Clemens Fans

Whether or not the Houston Astros rally to keep the 2005 baseball season alive Wednesday night, the Houston Chronicle's contest will remain relevant. See how many Roger Clemens trivia questions you can answer.

How Many Letter Writers Are Left?

Wow! If you're a letter writer, keep it up.

Yahoo!News reports on two now-departed letter-writers whose missives shine abundant light on their careers and character:

"Charles Darwin (born 1809, died 1882) sent 7,591 letters to colleagues and received 6,530 in his time -- a true feat of correspondence for the father of the theory of evolution, according to a study in the British science weekly Nature. But everything is relative, as Albert Einstein (1879-1955) showed. The man dubbed the greatest scientist of the 20th century surpassed Darwin's output, penning more than 14,500 letters to colleagues and reading 16,200, the study by academics from the universities of Notre Dame in the US state of Indiana and Aveiro of Portugal said."

How many contemporary letters will survive, unless the delete key is outlawed?

Book Mention / Now Out in Paperback

For the budget conscious and those seeking to lighten their carry-on load, Penguin has issued paperback editions of four hardcover volumes of note:

1) When Presidents Lie by Eric Alterman. Booklist says: "Although we are occasionally shocked upon learning that a president has lied, Alterman maintains that presidents routinely lie, often with consequences that shape and reverberate through our history. Alterman focuses on four key presidential lies: Franklin Roosevelt and the Yalta accords, John F. Kennedy and the Cuban missile crisis, Lyndon Johnson and the second Gulf of Tonkin incident, and Ronald Reagan and Central America in the 1980s."

2) Making Friends With Hitler by Ian Kershaw, which The Times of London calls "A marvelous portrait... Absorbing, meticulously researched."

3) Death in Hamburg by Richard J. Evans. Roy Porter in the London Review of Books calls it "A tremendous book, the biography of a city which charts the multifarious pathways from bacilli to burgomaster."

4) The United  States of Europe by T.R. Reid. Publishers' Weekly says "While "old Europe" is most often portrayed as more bark than bite in its differences with the current U.S. administration, NPR commentator and former Washington Post European bureau chief Reid finds the E.U. as a whole "determined to change a world that has been dominated by Americans."

Abe and John: Will Their Memories Survive?

Legend has it that Abe Lincoln wrote the Gettysburg Address on the back of an envelope. Could Beatles' legend John Legend have been aping the American president when he used the same vehicle to record his heralded "Give Peace a Chance?" Or was it a case of grabbing whatever surface was at hand? WFTV.com reports:

"All auctioneers are saying, is bid on this piece. It's the envelope John Lennon used to handwrite the lyrics to "Give Peace A Chance." Lennon filled both sides of the envelope with the words. Auctioneers hope someone will pay at least $250,000 for the envelope at an auction in London next month."