Sam Burnham, Curator @C_SamBurnham To listen to the podcast episode featuring an interview with editor Jan Croon, click here. I am thankful to have had the opportunity to take a look at at such an intriguing work. Only a day after my review copy shipped, a family friend recommended the book pointing out she's a cousin of the author. This is a published diary meaning that, in this case, the author has died and the published work has been completed by an editor who compiled the diary and tried to make it relevant and readable for a modern audience. This puts an effective editor in the position of researcher, dot connector, notation maker, and even translator. The author, LeRoy Wiley Gresham, was 12 years old when he began his diary in 1860. Gresham was a particularly bright young man. He was already an adept writer showed an interest in many subjects, including the gathering clouds of the ominous war to come. The Greshams were an educated family who were among the wealthy of Macon's populace. LeRoy was afflicted with a condition of the spine that left him bedridden. Instead of many of the activities common to other boys his age (which could have included service among the Confederate military ranks) he became an avid reader. He documents the news of each day including reports from the battlefield, from politics, and typically a report of the day's weather. Occasionally an entry might be nothing more than a weather report from the day. in other entries, such as late September, 1863, he relays news of major developments in the war. If you know the names and dates, you know what to expect from the events. But you find yourself interested to read how he reports it. You can see Gettysburg, Chickamauga, Peachtree Creek, and Atlanta, long before they happen. But to see it in the eyes of a young man standing in the path of Sherman's advance gives you a taste of what it must have been like to be standing there yourself. I can imagine that for a person who does not know the specific names and dates, this narrative makes for a great story a first time learner will get caught up in. I was amazed to see how quickly the news traveled then. Reports from battles were often given by the next day, although much of the information was wrong. Casualty numbers and specific people reported dead were wildly inaccurate and he often added corrections as he received new information. He reports Hood killed at Chickamauga, then maybe not dead, then not dead but having lost his leg. The corrections also included the death of Peyton Colquitt, a relative of Gresham's who has been mentioned here before. LeRoy's fortunes seem to track the Confederacy's. At first he has a life of wealth and privilege. Without giving away too much, the family's fortunes, and LeRoy's health, take a dramatic turn in the famine left in Sherman's wake - much like the fledgling nation's. LeRoy's fate and the Confederacy's seem to be metaphorically tied to each other. As for the editing, Janet Elizabeth Croon took a diary from the 1860's with the intent of presenting it to a modern audience. I mentioned "translator" as one of the hats she had to wear. Gresham uses many abbreviations and terms that were familiar to him but that the casual reader might not understand. Carefully added text fills in the gaps between his familiarity and the reader's curiosity. It makes for a seamless read that is easily understandable in 2018. There are extensive footnotes to help the reader understand historic, cultural, familial, and medical terms or allusions. It is evident that Croon put a lot of work into research, documentation, and gathering information that she probably had to learn herself as she went. The notes are so impressive that it pains me to point out there are a very few inaccuracies (ex: 20 May 1864 when Rome, GA is evacuated, our army was at Kingston, GA, not NC). The errors are so rare and minimal and that one so close to home that it caught my attention. Such minimal errors are understandable when the weight of the notes are considered. She did a fantastic job. One of the best things about this book is it puts a first-hand account of the era, and the war specifically, in a form that makes it accessible to an everyday reader. This is a serious historical document that the average person in 2018 can understand. You don't have to be a Civil War scholar or even a historian to appreciate it or enjoy it. The human story involved, the struggle of a youngster who learned to deal with the specter of death at an early age before having to confront his own frail mortality, is touching. In an age where anything Confederate is to be hated and scorned, Gresham reintroduces the humanity of the Southern people into the conversation. He's not a statue or a flag, hes a young boy facing a harsh world and it is easy to become sympathetic to him. Croon does a good job of steering away from bias on either side and presenting only the facts and letting LeRoy tell his first-hand story. And I enjoyed reading it.
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On this episode we have a conversation with Georgia author and writer James Calamine about his writing, his love of music and storytelling, and the people featured in his two volume book "Insured Beyond the Grave." We talk about his interviews with big names in the arts, many of which have ties to The South.
His new book, Insured Beyond the Grave: Volume Two, is now available from Snake Nation Press. Catch the episode here Sam Burnham, Curator @C_SamBurnham (This is a review of one volume of a two volume set. The two volumes were released separately. For the review of Volume One, click here.) As promised, I've returned with a look at Volume Two of James Calemine's Insured Beyond the Grave. This volume, published by Snake Nation Press, hits the streets June 28th. It would be advisable, as James told me when I first asked about Volume Two, to go back and read Volume One, if you haven't already. That advice is not as much for the continuity of a story as it is about having the groundwork lain and seeing what he is trying to do. It is a continuation more than a sequel. Each book could technically stand alone but are intended as two halves of a whole. Volume Two holds even more of the essays about writing, music, entertainment, and some other topics, as well as some of the people who made the stories happen. While not all of the subjects are specifically Southern, Calemine is able to help you connect the dots to see how Southerners and the South played a role in many of the featured stories and people. Calemine opens this volume with the fascinating story of Bob Dylan's unreleased film Renaldo and Clara. His finding a bootleg copy of the film in an Atlanta video store allowed him to view the produce of what might be the most Bob Dylan thing ever - a movie made with no script. That discovery comes across as a taste of forbidden fruit. Dylan didn't release the film but you are left wondering if perhaps he somehow glad to have bootlegs running around where his true fans have a chance to see the work that seemed doomed to economic and critical failure but also destined for adoration among true fans. I was fascinated by the book's first interview, an on record account with Chuck Leavell, a Rolling Stone turned Macon, Georgia tree farmer. They discuss Leavell's music, his own writing, his tree farming, work with UGA's agriculture department, and inducting Widespread Panic into the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. (Calemine wrote Panic's official induction.) The book has many such interviews. His interview with David Barbe, who I became familiar with back when he was the bass player with drummer Malcolm Travis and guitarist-vocalist Bob Mould in the rock band Sugar. Barbe is a Georgia music icon whose predominate work has been behind the scenes, getting other musicians produced and heard. This interview revealed a lot more about a talented musician and producer who happens to be a long time Georgian. It's possible you may have not heard of David Barbe but unless you've ignored music for the last thirty years or so, you've definitely heard from him. This volume also contains many shorter works, including a snippet on Zora Neale Hurston's Tell my Horse and Calemine's own thoughts from the road in Email Dispatches From Appalachia. There is also an introduction to Dexter Weaver's (of Weaver D's fame) book Automatic Y'all, a collection of stories and recipes from the Athens soul food legend. We also hear about Georgia mainstays - REM, The Black Crowes, Kevn Kinney, Amy Ray, so many great artists, musicians, wirters and the people that helped us find them. As in Volume One, there is no shortage of the beautiful photography by the author. Even more locations of Southern yesteryear continue to inspire the nostalgia and set a sense of mood and feeling. Turning the page becomes a searching through antiques and relics to find different treasures - some new and some quite old. To tell much more would be to rob Calemine of his thunder and to rob you of the chance to read it first hand. Get your copy from James Calemine or Snake Nation Press |
Sam B.Historian, self-proclaimed gentleman, agrarian-at-heart, & curator extraordinaire Social MediaCategories
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