PA BOOKS on PCN

Latest Episodes:

"The Knox Mine Disaster" with Robert and Kenneth Wolensky Jun 17, 2019

Show notes

The Knox Mine Disaster is much more than a history of an accident—or an industry, for that matter. Because the book draws on the recollections of miners and their families, industry officials, and individuals involved in the legal aftermath of the disaster, it is an epic drama that is as spellbinding as it is sensational. Candid photographs of members of this cast of characters lend a human element that overshadows the gaping hole in the riverbed, the billions of gallons of water that crashed through it, and the tons of twisted equipment and machinery.

Description courtesy of Amazon

"The Foreman's Boys: The Story of Civilian Conservation Corps, Company 1333, Camp S-63, Poe Valley" with William Marcum Jun 10, 2019

Show notes

Employment prospects for many were bleak at the height of the Great Depression. For unmarried recent high school graduates, the prospect of getting a job was mostly non-existent. President Roosevelt's New Deal plan included the Civilian Conservation Corps, a program specifically targeted to provide employment for those whose job prospects were non-existent. This seventeen to twenty-five-year-old age group would seize upon this opportunity for full-time employment, enroll for a six-month hitch and venture into the unknown. The work projects included tree planting, eradication of destructive vegetation, construction of roads and bridges, fire management, soil management, and the development of parks and recreational areas. This book tells the story about CCC Company 1333, Camp S-63, Poe Valley situated in the rugged mountains of central Pennsylvania. From the first day the camp was activated through the last day of operation, the book is filled with accounts of camp development, work projects, construction of the dam creating Poe Valley lake, and numerous stories told by veterans, camp administrators, and military commanders. Included are hundreds of names of rostered enrollees. Anyone interested in learning what life was like in a CCC camp during and after work hours, this book will provide insight into camp operations and activities.

William Marcum is a Civilian Conservation Corps enthusiast who for many years hosted reunions for veterans of Civilian Conservation Corps Company 1333.

Description courtesy of Sunbury Press.

"Blue-Blooded Cavalryman: Captain William Brooke Rawle in the Army of the Potomac, May 1863–August 1865" with J. Gregory Acken Jun 03, 2019

Show notes

In May 1863, eighteen-year-old William Brooke Rawle graduated from the University of Pennsylvania and traded a genteel, cultured life of privilege for service as a cavalry officer. Traveling from his home in Philadelphia to Virginia, he joined the Third Pennsylvania Cavalry and soon found himself in command of a company of veterans of two years' service, some of whom were more than twice his age. Within eight weeks, he had participated in two of the largest cavalry battles of the war at Brandy Station and Gettysburg. Brooke Rawle and the Third Pennsylvania Cavalry would serve with the Cavalry Corps of the Army of the Potomac through April 1864, fighting partisans and guerrillas in Northern Virginia and also seeing action during the Bristoe Station and Mine Run battles of late 1863. A meticulous diarist and letter writer, Brooke Rawle documented nearly everything that came under his observant eye in 150 well-written letters home to his family. These letters, supplemented by his diary entries, provide a fascinating, richly detailed look into the life of a regimental cavalry officer during the last two years of the Civil War in the East.

J. Gregory Acken served for twelve years on the board of governors of the Civil War Library and Museum of Philadelphia.

Description courtesy of Kent State University Press.

"Pittsburgh's Lost Outpost: Captain Trent's Fort" with Jason Cherry May 28, 2019

Show notes

As 1753 came to a close, European empires were set on a collision course for a triangular piece of land known as the Forks of the Ohio at the confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers. The navigable waterways were valuable to the French to complete their control of the Ohio Valley as the British looked to create a center for their booming fur trade and westward expansion. Former soldier turned trader William Trent set out for the untamed wilderness to stake Britain's claim. He would build the first fort to form the humble beginnings of Pittsburgh and set the staging ground for the French and Indian War. Author Jason A. Cherry details the history of William Trent and Pittsburgh's forgotten first outpost.

Jason A. Cherry has lived in Western Pennsylvania his entire life and has interpreted the French and Indian War for almost thirty years. He resides in Butler, Pennsylvania, in the heart of the Ohio country.

Description courtesy of The History Press.

"Longstreet at Gettysburg, A Critical Reassessment" with Cory Pfarr May 13, 2019

Show notes

This is the first book-length, critical analysis of Lieutenant General James Longstreet's actions at the Battle of Gettysburg. The author argues that Longstreet's record has been discredited unfairly, beginning with character assassination by his contemporaries after the war and, persistently, by historians in the decades since. By closely studying the three-day battle, and conducting an incisive historiographical inquiry into Longstreet's treatment by scholars, this book presents an alternative view of Longstreet as an effective military leader, and refutes over a century of negative evaluations of his performance.

Cory M. Pfarr works for the Department of Defense. He lives in Pikesville, Maryland.

Description courtesy of McFarland.

"Battle of Paoli" with Thomas McGuire May 06, 2019

Show notes

In the years since the Revolutionary War, legend has obscured the story of the Battle of Paoli, better known in history as the Paoli Massacre. For this first-ever full-length treatment of the battle, the author has uncovered never-before-published primary documents to tell of British General Charles Grey's brutal attack on Anthony Wayne's division of 1,500 men in September 1777. The detailed account follows the action from the arrival of Wayne's division south of the Schuylkill River, near Paoli Tavern, to defend Philadelphia against Howe's encroaching troops to Grey's discovery of Wayne's position, the bloody battle that ensued, and the subsequent court-martial of Wayne, who had been accused of negligence.

Description courtesy of Google

"Good War, Great Men: The detailed accounts of a machine gun battalion during World War I" with Andrew Capets Apr 29, 2019

Show notes

"Good War, Great Men" provides first-hand accounts of more than a dozen soldiers who served together during the Great War. Their stories have been rediscovered by compiling unpublished letters and journals with historical insights to provide a compelling history of the men of the 313th Machine Gun Battalion. Endorsed by the United States World War One Centennial Commission, this project honors the service and sacrifice of American servicemen and women in World War I. Surviving the incessant shelling and gas attacks were often a matter of luck. Enduring the long marches, muddy trenches, and soaking wet uniforms were routine. Being able to laugh through the misery, finding a swimming hole on a march through the French countryside, or sleeping in late under the warmth of the sun occasionally made it a good war. You'll read about a young Private who colorfully describes the antics of his fellow draftees while they trained at Camp Lee preparing for war. Meet an idealistic officer who provides vivid details of the simple pleasures and the aggravating moments as he marches his company to the front lines. Discover the naïve desires of a Company Commander hoping to get into a ‘real show' which are later extinguished when his unit takes on multiple casualties from a gas attack. Read the honest prose of one officer who reveals a catastrophic mistake made during the harrowing events of the Battle of the Meuse-Argonne.

Andrew Capets is a State Farm insurance agent in Monroeville, PA. He created a local history website traffordhistory.org and was involved in establishing the Trafford Historical Society.

"American Aurora: A Democratic-Republican Returns; The Suppressed History of Our Nation's Beginnings and the Heroic Newspaper That Tried to Report It" with Richard Rosenfeld Apr 15, 2019

Show notes

200 Years ago a Philadelphia newspaper claimed George Washington wasn't the "father of his country." It claimed John Adams really wanted to be king. Its editors were arrested by the federal government. One editor died awaiting trial.

The story of this newspaper is the story of America.

In this monumental story of two newspaper editors whom Presidents Washington and Adams sought to jail for sedition, American Aurora offers a new and heretical vision of this nation's beginnings, from the vantage point of those who fought in the American Revolution to create a democracy--and lost.

Description courtesy of Amazon

"Lawmaking and Legislators in Pennsylvania, Volume 2, 1710-1756: A Biographical Dictionary" with Craig Horle and Joseph Foster Apr 08, 2019

Show notes

This superb biographical dictionary of Pennsylvania legislators provides elaborate accounts of each Pennsylvania lawmaker who served during the period covered by the volume, with detailed scholarly introductions analyzing the makeup of the legislature and the entire lawmaking process. The introductions alone should be required reading for all students of colonial Pennsylvania. . . . The publication of the first two volumes of this series has set a standard by which similar projects must be measured.

Description courtesy of The American Genealogist

"Rush: Revolution, Madness, and Benjamin Rush, the Visionary Doctor Who Became a Founding Father" with Stephen Fried Mar 25, 2019

Show notes

In the summer of 1776, fifty-six men put their quills to a dangerous document they called the Declaration of Independence. Among them was a thirty-year-old doctor named Benjamin Rush. One of the youngest signatories, he was also, among stiff competition, one of the most visionary. From improbable beginnings as the son of a Philadelphia blacksmith, Rush grew into an internationally renowned writer, reformer, and medical pioneer who touched virtually every page in the story of the nation's founding. He was Franklin's protégé, the editor of Common Sense, and Washington's surgeon general. He was a fierce progressive agitator—a vocal opponent of slavery and prejudice by race, religion or gender, a champion of public education—even as his convictions threatened his name and career, time and again. He was a confidante, and often the physician, of America's first leaders; he brokered the twilight peace between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson. As a doctor, he became "the American Hippocrates," whose brilliant, humane insights and institutional reforms revolutionized the understanding and treatment of mental illness in ways that still reverberate.

Stephen Fried is an award-winning journalist and New York Times bestselling author who teaches at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and the University of Pennsylvania.

Description courtesy of Crown Publishing Group.

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected